Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff

11 reviews

booksalacarte's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense 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

4.75

Empire of the vampire- 4.75⭐️ 3🌶️

Epic Fantasy

Vampires

Catholic inspired religion

Storytelling style narration

Confinement

Secret society 

War

🏳️‍🌈 side characters

Tw: addiction, homofobia

To break it down to the bare minimal… this was an interview with the vampire styled story with dual timelines and a flawed MC. The story was slow, as journeying can be, but entertaining the whole time.

So often male authors, choose to sanitize the softer emotions in their books, to push the physical. Moving the plot forward for the glory and the heroism of their main character. As a woman, the more sterilized approach to emotion in men’s writing, tends to turn me away… 

This book is anything but emotionally sterile. I found myself enjoying the emotional and spiritual journey of the main character and the friendships and bonds created and broken.

There were so many plot twists. Character flaws were aplenty. 

I must have the humor of a 14 year old boy, because some of the insults and jokes had me chuckling.

The things that I didn’t enjoy include misogyny  standard to European medieval feudalism centered around religious orthodoxy. If you thought a book that was inspired by medieval Catholic Europe was going to be without it being present, I don’t know what to tell you. But it’s there, it’s never fun to have to read in excess. But it’s an adult fantasy, with cursing and I get it.

Bad guys as pedophiles. Yup. Tracks. But the other underage sexualization was not great. A lot of times this is used as a chance to show how disgusting the enemy is. And it’s just gross all around… even when the MC is underage. 

I am so looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Addiction, Blood, Toxic relationship, Violence, Homophobia, Outing, Religious bigotry, Bullying, Cursing, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Drug use, Grief, War, Confinement, Alcoholism, Animal death, Hate crime, Misogyny, Emotional abuse, Death, Death of parent, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Vomit, Gaslighting, Sexual content, Drug abuse, Alcohol, Stalking, Body horror, Torture, Excrement, and Adult/minor relationship

susanatherly's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Blood, Drug abuse, Violence, Torture, Sexual content, Child death, Sexism, and Cursing

Moderate: Gaslighting, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, Homophobia, Gun violence, Drug use, Torture, Suicide, Child death, Biphobia, Animal death, Fire/Fire injury, Murder, Emotional abuse, Body horror, Death of parent, Death, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Outing, Kidnapping, Drug abuse, and Classism

Minor: Genocide, Vomit, and Slavery

freckleface3's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Murder, Addiction, Blood, Cursing, Gore, Physical abuse, Violence, Grief, Alcohol, Animal death, and Torture

kbc_dino's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

An enjoyable ride from start to finish. I can't wait until the next one!!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Cursing, Murder, Death of parent, Violence, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Blood

Moderate: Sexual content, Child death, Drug use, Bullying, Alcohol, and Child abuse

Minor: Outing, Grief, Homophobia, Classism, Religious bigotry, and Torture

novel_obscurity's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

Main character is challenging, and the book ends on a cliff hanger that was a bit predictable. Overall, not bad - writer does a good job with creating tension and fear!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Violence, Sexual content, Alcoholism, Homophobia, Drug use, Death, Blood, Addiction, Outing, Emotional abuse, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Cursing, Confinement, Torture, Physical abuse, Murder, and Animal death

shannonvonpesach's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-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

3.5

It was too slow paced for me, it could've been shorter imo. I did love the worldbuilding but not the way it was narrated. Sometimes I was so confused with where I was. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Alcohol, Physical abuse, War, and Violence

Moderate: Emotional abuse

simmich429's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-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

starts off very slow but SOOOO worth it. can’t wait for the book 2 to come out

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Grief, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Body horror, Violence, War, Drug use, Torture, Animal death, Death, Death of parent, Murder, Child abuse, Alcohol, Blood, Emotional abuse, Gore, Alcoholism, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, and Sexual content

wrensreadingroom's review against another edition

I made it to book 2 chapter 4 and the main character is is incredibly unlikeable and honestly kinda whiny that i had to just give up. Also there is hardly any action as well. Like 3 cool parts up till this point. The rest is like lore and politics 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence, Alcoholism, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual content, War, Emotional abuse, Gore, Addiction, Blood, Body shaming, Grief, Infidelity, Animal cruelty, Classism, Animal death, Confinement, Cursing, Gun violence, Bullying, Cannibalism, Child death, Child abuse, Pregnancy, Vomit, Misogyny, Alcohol, Body horror, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Domestic abuse, and Physical abuse

andromeda_1998's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcohol, Blood, Sexism, Sexual violence, Injury/Injury detail, Religious bigotry, Torture, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Grief, Sexual content, Violence, Body horror, Child death, Drug use, Homophobia, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Vomit, Physical abuse, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, War, Animal death, Classism, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, and Genocide

clairew97's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Child death, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Vomit, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Ableism, Animal death, Addiction, Body horror, Confinement, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Genocide, Grief, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, Abandonment, Bullying, Cannibalism, Misogyny, Pregnancy, Torture, Alcoholism, Sexism, Toxic friendship, Violence, and War