Reviews with content warning for Vomit - The Fifth Season

~Short Synopsis~

The world is ending...again. Welcome to The Stillness, a broken world familiar with struggles and natural disasters. Orogenes, those who wield the power of the earth as a weapon, are feared but they are also the only ones who can quell the shakes. When Essun, an Orogene masquerading as a school teacher, comes home to find her son has been brutally murdered and her daughter has been kidnapped, she decides to hunt down the culprit...her husband.

~Review~

I didn't really know what to expect with this book as neither the blurb nor the cover give much away. But I was absolutely blown away by this book. Dystopian fantasy is my all time favourite genre and THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT!

The writing style is so unique with some of it being written in 2nd person; which is incredibly hard to pull off but Jemisin does it effortlessly. The world building is slow, only revealing information when it's absolutely necessary. And the plot twists are something else!

I also loved how un-hetronormative it is (I won't go into details as potential spoilers).

This is the kind of book where you should go into it knowing as little as possible and you also need to give it to at least page 50 before it will start to make sense (but that is the case for most high fantasy). Also this is definitely 18+ as there is mature content and some disturbing scenes.

If you're a fan of The Bone Season series by Samantha Shannon then I think you would enjoy this book.

Content Warnings

hermyknee19's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

redthistle's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark 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

This is an amazing and unique book unlike any I have read before.
The book is split up into different povs, two of which are told through third person narrative and one which is told through second person narrative. I'd never read a book before that used second person and it was really cool. At first it felt strange, but it didn't take long for the second person chapters to feel very natural and for me to stop noticing that it even was. NK Jemisin is an amazing and talented writer and in this book weaves an interesting, complex, and captivating world together with rich characters.

One thing I will mention is that I felt that this book was rather heavy. Throughout reading and after I finished I felt very contemplative and at times sad or disturbed by events which occurred and ways in which the society functioned. This was intentional as the book it set in an apocalyptic world.

Content Warnings