Reviews tagging 'Murder'

A Day of Fallen Night by Samantha Shannon

29 reviews

sophiesmallhands's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Gore, Death of parent, Animal death, Violence, Pregnancy, War, and Death

Moderate: Child death and Religious bigotry

Minor: Colonisation, Classism, Sexism, Xenophobia, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Misogyny, Miscarriage, and Sexual content

lmfry's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Pandemic/Epidemic, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, War, Grief, and Murder

Moderate: Infidelity, Death of parent, Classism, Animal death, and Mental illness

Minor: Alcohol

readandfindout's review against another edition

adventurous slow-paced

4.0

Style/writing: 4 stars
Themes: 4.5 stars
Characters: 4 stars
Plot: 3.5 stars stars
Worldbuilding: 4 stars

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Child death, Infidelity, Violence, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Grief, Pandemic/Epidemic, War, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, and Murder

Moderate: Religious bigotry and Animal death

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Suicide, and Cannibalism

shottel's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional inspiring mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

A Day of Fallen Night is an improvement over The Priory of the Orange Tree in nearly every way. It would take a long time to enumerate all the positive changes, but a few in short: The pacing is better, the diversity is better, the appeal to modern audiences is better, the feminist themes are clearer, and even the cover art is better! Priory's Eastern branch lagged, but the branches are deftly balanced in Fallen Night. The book remediates Priory's odd penchant for mostly only mentioning the skin type of white characters, and features a significant number of LGBT+ (every letter of the acronym! and then some!) main and secondary characters. It draws on contemporary writing trends from other adult-genre books and, seemingly, fanfiction ("It's too cold, we have to cuddle for warmth") to excellent effect. And women's issues, most notably issues of pregnancy and birth, feature far more prominently, with the noble requirement to sustain a bloodline playing a role throughout the book.

This mandate to procreate establishes this book as far more clearly feminist (the idea that women have issues, interests, and stories worth hearing as much as men do) than its sequel. The need for nobility to sustain itself through childbirth is a recurring, central issue of the book, among other issues which concern women more than they do men, which also make frequent appearances.

In some ways, this book feels like it was written to an audience that might be into medieval court drama or epic adventures, but aren't too fond of the biases that pervade those genres. It is a grand epic, fantastically wrote, including women, LGBT+ characters, and people of color as equals to men, cishet, and white characters.

There are only a few places where it falters. The biggest problem I had is that the action scenes are confusing. I found myself frequently struggling to imagine the scene, re-reading portions over and over again. At first I thought it was a me issue, but after a half-dozen or so times, I figured it's probably not a me problem.

Additionally, I flagged two more minor concerns. First, with the presence of so many LGBT+ characters, the lack of transfeminine characters stands out oddly. Perhaps one or both of the nonbinary characters in the book are intended to be transfeminine, but there is no way to know this from the text. I don't make any guesses as to why; it just sits weirdly. Secondly, while *Priory* is a truly self-contained work, *Fallen Night* hints at an intention to write another book set between the two. This is the only change which I find to be a step backwards from *Priory*.

When layered inside an over 800 page grand adventure, these issues are minor, thus my score of 4.75/5. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in grand adventures, feminist fiction, fantasy, or fiction with LGBT+ main characters.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Religious bigotry, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Sexism, Blood, Death, Violence, Grief, War, Terminal illness, Misogyny, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Kidnapping, Child death, Infertility, Body horror, Gore, Emotional abuse, Torture, Miscarriage, and Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Cannibalism, Abortion, and Animal cruelty

justgothenough's review against another edition

adventurous emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy, Pandemic/Epidemic, Sexual content, Death, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Grief, Murder, and War

tinybluepixel's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Child death, Pregnancy, Body horror, Grief, Gore, Murder, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, and Death

Moderate: Infertility and Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Suicide

vanessa_books26's review against another edition

adventurous emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

So much better than it's predecessor, all of the characters were better fleshed out and each was a distinct separate entity from the others. None of the characters served as an extension to another's storyline, they had their own journeys and paths. This was beautifully written and I hope we get to see more of these characters again in another book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Murder, Religious bigotry, Blood, Animal death, Death, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Kidnapping, Sexism, and War

Moderate: Gaslighting, Alcohol, and Medical trauma

Minor: Adult/minor relationship

sehenry20's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, Kidnapping, Death of parent, War, Pandemic/Epidemic, Grief, Death, and Child death

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship

quechaya's review against another edition

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book is way better than Priory, and it's not even close.
I remember reaching a part in this book where I thought "oh no, this is where the bad things start happening to them" and realizing in that moment how expertly the author made me care for these characters. I haven't connected so strongly with book characters in a very long time. Every time the POV changed, I was left wanting more, but the next POV would instantly pull me in. I will remember these characters for a very long time.
I have two critiques. The first is that

humans vs wyverns is just not that interesting to read over and over and over, with every POV character, so some of the battle scenes toward the end felt repetitive. Conflicts between humans are much more interesting.

The second is:

the author knows what we want, but gave us an ambiguous ending for one of the lesbian pairs anyway?? GIVE US WHAT WE WANT. WE ARE STARVING.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Violence, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, War, and Death

melodyseestrees's review against another edition

adventurous emotional tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

It is very easy to lose the plot while listening since there is so much going on. But each narrator did a good job. I wasn't fond of how the last hour or so was just an interview. It was nice but it was also something I would've rather searched for.
I did adore how one of the characters was in their 30's. We need more 30-80 year old characters in fiction.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Blood, Violence, War, and Death

Moderate: Animal death, Sexual content, Murder, and Pregnancy

Minor: Suicide and Adult/minor relationship

The adult/minor relationship is an unconsummated marriage.