Reviews with content warning for Self harm - The Gifts That Bind Us

Reviews tagging 'Self harm'

The Gifts That Bind Us by Caroline O'Donoghue

57 reviews

geminireader's review

adventurous 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? Yes

4.0

This is easily one of the most creative and truly fun series I’ve read. It is not a light-hearted series - in fact, this particular book covered many grim and triggering topics. But the book still remains so whimsical and interesting, even if it does trudge into dark territory. I have endless praise for the author. I never know exactly where this series will go and the threads of the magical elements and problems alongside common teenage problems is woven so beautifully together to create a truly excellent young adult novel. I did take off a star only because some parts felt a bit rushed and some problems get solved a little too conveniently. I think this is aligned with the nature of the world and the series but still, can be a bit of a downfall when book-long problems are solved within a page. Regardless, if I convince you to give this series a go: I am a paper book only reader, and I have purchased the third book in hardcover just so I can read it. That’s how much I love this series and how much I want to know what happens!

Content Warnings

jaecae's review

Go to review page

adventurous 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? Yes

4.25

Content Warnings

libraryraven's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark hopeful 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

Content Warnings

rinku's review

Go to review page

dark emotional mysterious 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? It's complicated

4.0

The beginning of The Gifts That Bind Us was so great that I was ready to give it five stars but sadly, the focus of the main plot shifts later to the aspects that didn’t interest me so much and it becomes a bit too irritating for my taste.

Lily is now back, and all our characters got some kind of magical power: Maeve can now read minds and emotions of other people, Fiona has healing powers, Roe can open doors, and Lily is able to control electricity. Weird things start to happen, and the friends have to find out what causes them before it’s too late. If I’m being honest, I was more invested in the coming-of-age-elements of the story since it’s the last year of school and Maeve is not totally sure what she wants to do after school and struggles with dealing with all the changes happening around her.

What I still love about this novel is how fantasy elements get combined with social justice issues, like queer rights or classism, though I wish the Children and their influence on the town would’ve been thematized more. I’ve said it before, but this plot point still really reminds me of the Engelsfors series. This is probably coincidental but when comparing the two series, Engelsfors is just better in showing how a cult can slowly take over a whole town and manipulate it. Another similarity of both novels is that

the school is some kind of magically important place

Towards the ending though, the story just got a bit weird, and I didn’t fully understand what was happening at the end. It was so obvious from the beginning that

Heather was evil. The story gets quite creepy towards the end which I liked but it’s so weird how Maeve suddenly owns the school

What I appreciate about the characters is that they are a realistic portrayal of teenagers and that there’s a big focus on the friendship between them. At first, there’s jealously between them since Lily is back and mixes everything up between Maeve and Fiona. This creates a kind of tense dynamic between them. In the course of the story,

we see how Lily and Maeve get closer to each other again which was great

. What I appreciate about Maeve is that her feelings are quite relatable and that she messes up because she isn’t hundred percent a good person. Aaron is still an interesting character but I’m not sure what I should think about

his redemption arc. He was a great villain before, and I don’t know about the new villains

. I furthermore have to admit that I totally forgot that Lily and Roe are siblings since we barely see them interact as such.

Besides some of the critique I had about The Gifts That Bind Us, I’m still curious how the story will end and if I will be happy about the ending.

Content Warnings

megangrayce's review against another edition

Go to review page

4.5

i love maeve

Content Warnings

christineolivia's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious fast-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

cjmast's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

4.25

Content Warnings

jeanbean1617's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional mysterious 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? Yes

4.5

Content Warnings

osladek's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark 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? Yes

4.0

Content Warnings

josb's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Decided to read this one because I wanted something to pull me in and the first book had no problem doing that. Despite this one mostly focusing on the Children of Brigid slowly taking over the town, I found it was not as tough a read as I was expecting. Yes there are scenes of homophobia, gender policing, and slut shaming, but there is also a big problem the characters are trying to solve while they try to avoid the "scary" cultists. There are scenes where they have to interact with the cultists, but the reader is not subjected to unnecessary awful descriptions just for the sake of it.

This book in the series is very "dark forest" where our characters are not okay after the events from the first book and are trying to piece themselves together. Note that there is mention and descriptions of self harm.

I appreciated that the author went with a 3 book series, I can't imagine squishing all of this content into a duology. The end of this book got me really excited for book 3 so the setup was certainly there. There are certainly enough reveals in this second book that I don't feel it was too stretched out.

If you like darker YA's I highly recommend. The worldbuilding is interesting enough and the chapters are written in a way that hooks you and makes you curious to continue. Unfortunately, the "big bads" are complete pricks and manifest themselves as hard core old testament Christians which means there can be triggering content for some readers.

Content Warnings

More...