Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

Cinderella Is Dead by Kalynn Bayron

329 reviews

aleesha_mcnair14's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious 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

3.75

I genuinely really enjoyed this book more so than I originally thought I would. I found this book through a recommendation from a friend based on the premise it was a Disney Twisted Tales book and it greatly lived up to the expectations. The added LGBTQ+ elements of the book added an alternate perspective that made me love the characters even more. Sophia was a great character and I cared for her character throughout the book. Constance was a great addition and I loved Luke as well. I really wanted to like Erin but she always appeared to be horrible to Sophia. The story also had twists and turns though like reading about Liv and how quickly they killed her off.
Even when Sophia tried to kill Manford after discovering he was the king all this time but instead he just laughed
. Overall though, the book had some really good shocks though that kept me engaged throughout. 
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robin_nescu's review

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challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective 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

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melsage1823's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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hello_ned's review against another edition

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adventurous funny fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

Perhaps if I was younger, I'd have enjoyed this book more. Quite a shallow book about serious topics that just didn't hit hard for me.

The dislikes
  • The pacing was quite strange, although I admit that near the end, I just wanted to get this book over with
  • Shallow, one-dimensional characters. All you know about Sophia is she's lesbian and wants to overthrow the patriarchy. She's very outspoken, stubborn, and constantly speaks out- which is strange considering how many times you were told how dangerous it is to speak against the king and the system. She doesn't grow as a character at all. What she starts out with is what we finish with.
  • The confrontation scenes with her parents and Erin are disappointing, yet again reflections of their shallow characters.
  • I found the ending quite ironic,
    as their whole idea is to otherthrow the dictatorship, but then they placed themselves as the rulers, chose their own advisors "for the good of the people" and didn't change their laws despite the outcry from some people stuck in their ways. You can say it's good they made all those changes to strive for equality, but it was described to quickly and shallowly that it made me disappointed. No matyer how good their intentions were, in the end, they became dictators. Whicb really spoils the meaning of the story.
  • As a lesbian, i really did not enjoy this portrayal of romance. It was shallow, and immediately focused on physical attraction. There was a scene where they stripped naked, and although it was "necessary for the plot," it was tinged with weird vibes. 
  • The main plot twist was.. meh. Not particularly engaging. There was a "callback" from the middle ish of the story that I didnt remember. I looked back and it was mentioned in like one line.. felt a bit shoehorned it.
  • Very sad to see the only gay male character be absolutely infinitesimally unimportant to the story. He was present for like 10 pages total and might as well have not been in there, which is a shame.

The loves
  • Despite clearly aimed for pre-teen girls, there was a lot of violence. The mentions of domestic violence was handled well in a serious tone. The other violence in fighting/battle scenes where very well-written and downright shocking. There was a scene where
    they bring out this minor character,  that I for some reason really liked, and straight up chopped her head off.
    it was important to the story, and my jaw had dropped. I had to take a second to recuperate 
  • It had some humour I really enjoyed, some quite crude. There was a scene where they threatened this man with a dagger and he "pisses his pants." It genuinely made me laugh out loud.

Not much to this story, not spectacular. If this was a Wattpad book or a Netflix show it would have rated higher. This was really popular on booktok, which usually indicates general disappointment- especially with new-age writing.

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bimenace's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring 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? It's complicated

4.0

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fire_wolf's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

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fierygecko's review against another edition

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dark hopeful sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

Cinderella is Dead surprised me with it’s world building; I was taken by the concept that Bayron presents of a world continuing on after a fairy tale takes place in it and the impact that has on society. While I really enjoyed this, I also struggled with how absolutely miserable the world is purely because I wasn’t expecting it. The story speaks very loudly about sexism and homophobia, which I think is a good thing. However, I also felt tired at the idea of another novel where being queer was against the norm and looked down upon. Additionally, some of the plot twists in the novel didn’t feel believable to me, which made the ending of the book feel kind of unsatisfying. I think if I had’ve read this when I was of age to be the target audience for this novel, I would have loved it. It asks the hard questions about what princess stories teach us about self-worth, and has an ethnically diverse cast to top it off.
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bubblebot's review

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adventurous inspiring reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

already own two books by this author. what is one more hehe.
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alys055's review against another edition

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It's leaning really heavily into misoginy and homophobia and It's not the vibes I need right now
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gabi_715's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • 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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