Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Ship of Destiny by Robin Hobb

12 reviews

melt27's review

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious medium-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

4.25

So many loose ends were tied together so well. And such stunning character development throughout the series. Extremely well done 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Pregnancy, Rape, Murder, Slavery, Blood, and Death

kenthekenku's review

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Rape, Blood, and Child abuse

10stormlight's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gaslighting, Rape, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Child abuse, Alcohol, Blood, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Death, Misogyny, Drug use, Sexism, Gore, and Violence

Minor: Pedophilia and Slavery

nadia's review against another edition

adventurous emotional slow-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

4.0

Overall, a decent end to the trilogy, but I was a teeny bit let down, given just how much I loved Ship of Magic. 

I finished The Mad Ship almost a year ago, so maybe I was a little out of touch with it all, so I struggled to piece together the politics and the motivations of all of the characters. 

I also felt like some character decisions did not make sense to me or were frustrating, and some character arcs were ended unsatisfactorily, especially those that I feel didn't get their just deserts...

Still, Hobb is an incredible storyteller, creating rich, complex, morally grey leading characters, and the way she weaves everything together is so masterful! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Blood, Sexual assault, Violence, Death, and War

Moderate: Kidnapping, Animal death, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Mental illness, Gaslighting, Death of parent, and Child abuse

Minor: Slavery

atalea's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Rape, and Violence

Moderate: Death, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Grief, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Confinement, Pregnancy, War, Pedophilia, and Slavery

Minor: Infidelity, Mental illness, Abandonment, Animal death, and Alcohol

queerdalloway's review

adventurous challenging dark 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

What a captivating conclusion to this series. I finished the entire thing in a number of days because I just couldn't put it down and was desperate to find out what happened to these characters I have grown so attached to. It was everything I could've hoped for and more. Robin Hobb is a master of uncanny metaphors, rich world building, and the most complex of characters. Each one of the characters' decisions and motives have clearly been well thought out and as dark and surprising as they may be at times they all just make sense. I can't remember the last time a book had me literally clutching at my pearls and yelling out at the pages as though they could hear me but this certainly did. These characters will stay with me for the longest time, I love Althea and Malta and Wintrow and Amber and I am so intrigued by Kennit and how twisted he is. They were the perfect players to enact Hobb's themes of generational trauma and abuse, religion, family dynamics, slavery, and many other difficult themes. I'll probably recommend this series forever and ever. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery, Rape, Incest, Pregnancy, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, and Grief

kaziaroo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Suicide attempt, War, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Grief, Medical content, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Death, Emotional abuse, Murder, Rape, Sexism, Sexual content, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Drug use, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Pregnancy, Vomit, and Confinement

Minor: Ableism and Child abuse

divine529's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional reflective tense slow-paced

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

For those of you who don't know me, the Realm of the Elderlings (RotE) is a series that means everything to me. It's impossible to review something I love and adore as much as I do. Anything I say about this book won't encapsulate the overall feeling and story, so I'm not going to do my normal routine (fully).

This is the third and final book in the Liveship Traders trilogy and the sixth book in the overall RotE series and we continue to follow several characters, mostly from the same family (the Vestrits) with a few exceptions. This takes place in another part of the world - primarily Bingtown and we also get an added Rain Wild portion. As with the other books, it's full of feminism, pirates, dysfunctional families, political intrigue of a different kind than we had with Fitz and complex relationships of all kinds.

Every element I normally do in my breakdowns (writing, plot, characters and world building) is just phenomenal. Hobb's characters and world building in particular are some of the best I've read. It's not a simple act of reading these books, you live them.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Drug use, Grief, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Sexual harassment, Animal death, Gore, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Death, Sexism, Sexual content, Kidnapping, Sexual assault, Violence, Misogyny, Murder, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, and Suicidal thoughts

alexhaydon's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny inspiring mysterious tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Murder, Gore, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Rape, Sexual assault, Slavery, Death, War, Violence, and Body horror

Minor: Pedophilia

genny's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional medium-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

4.25

This book wrenched my heart out! One thing I can say is that the characters went through a huge transformation throughout the series, and Hobb manages to make their development believable. Malta, who I used to hate, became my favorite character by the end. Wintrow, who I used to root for and cherished like a baby, angered me so much that I wished for his death. An emotional excerpt from my reading journal:

"Fuck Vivacia. Fuck Wintrow, especially. Cowardly piece of shit. The only reason he believes Althea is because Etta does. He believes his own aunt not out of his own volition, but because the woman he has a stupid crush on told him to. And still he prances around like Kennit's lapdog."

Yeah, I was going through it. 😆 The priest is gone, and in his place is

a man who has bent his morals so much that he can even excuse rape. I'm disturbed by Hobb's repeated use of sexual assault as a plot device.

I appreciate that characters can develop negatively instead of all of them becoming better people. But it still hurt.

Plenty of readers feel conflicted about Kennit. I do not. The twist in his story was expertly done (honestly, I can't believe I didn't guess it sooner!), but as for Kennit himself...

he deserved far worse than what he got. I didn't want him to die a martyr or a legend. I wanted his allies to turn on him, all of his deceit unveiled, his reputaton ruined. I wanted him annihilated. Instead, we got the complete opposite.

I understand what Hobb was trying to do here, because it mirrors what happens all the time in real life. But man...I have never felt more betrayed.

I loved most of the other characters. Special shoutout to Ophelia and the Teniras, the most optimistic, unproblematic residents of Bingtown! 😅 I thoroughly enjoyed the chapters focusing on rebuilding the city with the Tattooed and Three Ships immigrants. Overall: incredible attention to detail, and solid groundwork for all of the later reveals to make sense. I'm bitter about some characters' fates in the end, but it's still an incredible trilogy. I won't be reading the rest of Realm of the Elderlings yet because I'm emotionally exhausted, but maybe when I've recovered...

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Child abuse, Death, Drug use, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Violence

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Grief, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, and Slavery

Minor: Pregnancy