272 reviews for:

Trials of Death

Darren Shan

4.01 AVERAGE


Darren the wholesome vampire competes in the TriVampire tournament
metazoan's profile picture

metazoan's review

5.0
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

Trials of Death marks a return to the issue of Darren's blooding. Vampires are forbidden from turning a human child. To prove himself, Darren has to pass five Trials, but how can a half-vampire expect to accomplish tasks that even Vampire Generals fail?

Cirque du Freak is just a wonderful series. Easy-to-read with fast-paced action, the books tell an engaging story with fascinating characters.
adventurous challenging dark mysterious fast-paced
dark emotional sad 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: No

Really enjoyed the ending of the book and didn't expect anything like it! 
The beginning does feeling really repetitive with telling us about each character again but the plot thickens  

gaugesymmetry's review

4.25
adventurous dark fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
adventurous dark sad 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: Yes
adventurous fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

It's never been PC, and I've tried hard to overlook this as it's nice to study a vampire series where the vampires aren't sexual predators and a vampire's bite isn't a metaphor for orgasm. 

But... this is the book in the series that, were I still the age of the target reader, I would have stopped reading. 

First, there are some action scenes where it's hard to suspend my disbelief--mostly scenes with animals. 

More importantly, the take on women (especial female vampires) is dismal. The most damning thing, the reason I gave this book such a low rating, was the premise that there are few vampire women because vampires can't have children. The subtext, that females are for breeding, and all (or at least most) females want offspring... is.... misogynistic at best. 

Ugh.

This book would have frustrated and annoyed me as a kid.   

As an adult, I'm reading this for research and literary analysis purposes, not for pleasure, but if the misogyny keeps up, or gets worse, I'll walk away from this series and find a different vampire series to study. 
adventurous dark funny 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: Complicated

stormyharper's review

3.0

I only gave this book 3 stars as sometimes I found it hard to get into I loved all the challenges that Darren needed to face and was really shocked with the big cliffhanger