Reviews with content warning for Vomit - The Last Graduate

This book was... such a disappointment. I absolutely loved the first book, an easy five-star read, and I was so hopeful when I started this one.
But somehow, something changed between the books. Suddenly, both main characters turned into what felt like the worst versions of themselves.
While I had liked El's snarky comments in the first book, this time, many of them seemed mean-spirited, sometimes borderline abusive to Orion.
Orion too. He was a great character in the first book, and I liked the 'naively heroic' act he put out, including his flaws. But this time around, he barely even appeared, and when he did, he was mostly whining or being saved by El. Like... what?

In general, I hated the way El's power was developed because... honestly,

the moment she got the power sharer, she was literally OP.
And all that talk about 'because ONLY I can save them,' 'I am the only one who can do this', and her general skill to simply kill anything with any spell.
Until it mattered, at which point she started to be kind of... useless? I don't know. How her power or anyone's skills worked against that many mals really didn't seem to have been explained well enough for me to understand why she suddenly had issues. And why couldn't they have just run around that mawmouth? Huh?

And I don't even want to look at that ending. I had to read the last pages twice because I couldn't believe just how stupid the characters were acting. Or maybe I still missed something, but...

why the hell didn't they both leave?! Why did Orion decide to stay?

This was so stupid...

Added to this that I had to start and skim most pages in the middle of the book as basically nothing happened (besides endless worldbuilding and El going off of five mental tangents in the middle of action scenes, somehow?), and... yeah. I wanted to give two stars after that endless middle part but went down 0.25 stars for that ending.
As a comparison: I needed less than two days to finish the first book, with me being endlessly amused by all kinds of little things and situations. It took two weeks for me to slog through the second. I don't even know if I laughed once. It mainly was eye-rolling and groaning instead.

It really is frustrating because I loved the idea of the setting and where it could have gone with it... but after checking out what's going to happen in the next book, I certainly will not continue to read this series.
What a frustrating experience.

Content Warnings

blacksphinx's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional hopeful 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

Just when I was complaining that a certain main character hadn't done anything all book or exhibited any sort of personality, we got some nice time for them to open up and bloom a bit before the brutal cliffhanger of an ending.

It's lovely watching our protagonist grow as a person, opening up, learning to ask for help, and forming close friendships with other girls. (The unexpected LGBT+ representation was a nice bonus!) There was at least one plot point in here that didn't really make any sense to me, but the emotional through line and building themes stop me from giving it less than five stars.

Content Warnings

litliz's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny 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

Content Warnings

kat1105's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-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

Content Warnings

thequiltyreader's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I enjoyed it in the main but I felt some sections were a bit too protracted, whereas other areas were rushed through. Also I felt some of the characters lacked some depth. Though it ended with a lot of loose ends, and I enjoyed it enough to reach out and read the final book in thr trilogy.

Content Warnings

blackheart's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional 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? It's complicated

4.0

Great sequal. Major tension and an illegal cliffhanger. I'm looking forward to finding out what happens next.

Content Warnings

athryn's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious tense fast-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

Picks up right where the previous one left off, but managed to surprise me with subverting my expectations of where I thought it was going. Still darkly humorous, and hard to put down.

Content Warnings

toopunkrockforshul's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense fast-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

What a book! Just as good as the first but omg the ending. Unbelieveable, glad I don't have to wait for the next one!

Content Warnings

More...