Reviews with content warning for Confinement - Gods & Monsters

I’m kind of bummed about this one because so many people say it is better than book 2 but I don’t think that’s true unfortunately.

Lou starts this book possessed by Nicholina and it takes the crew a while to realize it and devise a plan to exorcise her from Lou’s body. They’re still on the hunt to eliminate Morgane too so they’ve got a lot on their plate. Célie joins up with the crew with some much-needed money and civility that eases their journey more than once. Just when Lou is freed from her possession, Reid protects her from her mother by making Morgane forget her at the cost of his own memories of her and they have to find a way to stop Morgane while Lou and Reid find their way back together.

Ultimately, way too much of the book ends up with Lou possessed or Reid with memory loss and I don’t think it helped the story. There’s enough going on without those back to back hurdles. We also could have cut the mermaid plot line completely. I really like Célie’s addition to the crew and her desire to be more than what she was born into. Jean Luc is generally less likable but his inclusion showed that it isn’t impossible to change for the better. The final battle was pure chaos and so many characters that I barely remembered kept popping up which made it hard to focus on what was actually happening.

I did have a teary moment during the epilogue because

they saved a seat at the wedding for sweet baby Ansel and he got to see his friends be happy and healing and then he got to go be with his parents in the afterlife and it hurt my heart in the best way.

Content warnings:
Blood, death, injury, violence (on page):

Lots of violence, injuries, etc because of the nature of the plot. Blood witches are involved so there is plenty of blood flowing.

Fire/fire injury (on page):

Coco’s grief causes an unceasing hellfire that can’t be put out until she works through her grief. Lou and Reid are sentenced to burn to death and almost do but are rescued by their crew just in time.

Confinement (on page):

Lou and Reid are kept in a cage following their failed attempt to infiltrate the city.

Death of parent (on page):

Coco’s mother must die for her aunt to die; Morgane gets her comeuppance after a big speech about how she couldn’t really love Lou.

Sexual content (on page):

Mostly fade to black scenes between Lou & Reid. Very mild.

Grief (on page):

Everyone is still reeling from Ansel’s death but mostly Coco because her grief causes an unending hellfire that destroys parts of Cesarine.

Alcohol (on page):

Scene of Lou, Reid, Jean Luc & Beau getting drunk together and playing truth or dare. They have hangovers after.

Cannibalism (off page):

Discussion of La Voison and Nicholina eating human hearts.

Torture (off page):

King Auguste definitely green-lights torture via rat even if it isn’t explicitly said.

Content Warnings

kat1105's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny 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

Content Warnings

rinku's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

2.0

I recently have no luck with last books of book series (see Locklands or A Sky Beyond the Storm), and Gods & Monsters fits perfectly in this trend, sadly. This book was just too long and slow and didn’t make sense at many moments. It had some amazing scenes though which is the reason why I gave it still two stars.

The story takes place right after Blood & Honey: Our characters still have to deal with what happened at the end of this novel, while also figuring out how they can defeat Morgane and her allies. Lou additionally behaves weirdly, and we learn that she’s

possessed by Nicholina for some reason. I believe this was hinted at at the ending of the last book, but I can’t remember

. I first found this idea intriguing and kinda creepy, but it later only annoyed me since it almost takes one third of the story until

she’s normal again

Sadly, this is basically everything relevant happening in Gods & Monsters. We have so much random side-questing that barely makes any sense and just consists of our characters searching for other characters or some random objects. Scenes that were interesting and important, like

when Lou goes in these holy waters to cast out Nicholina’s spirit

, took too much time as well. I was hoping that we would now get more Reid x Lou after all those things, but then

Reid randomly loses his memories which was one of the stupidest things I’ve read in a book in a long time and annoyed the hell out of me. This was just a lazy way to create the same dynamic between Reid and Lou from the first book where they hated each other and wanted to kill each other, but this time it’s just Reid hating Lou. I hated everything about since it stretched the plot unnecessarily and led to Reid just being annoying; it didn’t add anything worthwhile to the story

Besides this, many things simply didn’t make sense and I didn’t understand what was happening. Characters randomly appear without many explanations, like

Morgane when Lou is at the holy waters, or Coco’s mother which is a mermaid for some reasons

? On a similar note, many mythical creatures are randomly introduced, like dragons or mermaids, which was just a bit too much and felt too much like 2010s YA fantasy where many creatures are often lumped together as well. Other things that I didn’t understand were

how Lou became the new Dame or why she wouldn’t tell Reid from the beginning how he could get his memories back

But the last 15% aka the finale got randomly so amazing, and I wish the whole book would’ve been like this:

Reid finally gets his memories back, right before Lou and him are captured and almost killed – their plan was bound to fail in the first place, but okay. It was such an epic moment how they were saved last minute and how the final fight then starts. This final fight was amazing as well and the scene where Lou and Célie together kill Morgane was so powerful

Looking on the characters, I still like our main squad quite a lot, even though they all annoyed me at some points in the story. It was nice that Célie joined them (and that she gets her own story told in The Scarlet Veil), and that

everyone’s alive in the end

but the pairings especially annoyed me here. Coco x Beau came a bit out of the blue and they don’t really match in my opinion. Furthermore, I wasn’t the biggest fan of Reid x Lou here, since there was barely any romance between them. This is mainly caused by this stupid

memory loss of Reid

which causes all the chemistry between them to just disappear. Only in the last chapters,

Lou and Reid are both back to their normal self, but this was just way too late

All things considered, I honestly don’t know if the Serpent & Dove series is worth it or not. Like many other reviewers note, three books were not necessary and just dragged the story; a duology would’ve been fine but not a trilogy. Seprent & Dove perfectly works as a standalone and I probably would recommend reading it and then deciding if one is enough invested in the world and characters to continue with it – because otherwise, the second and third book are not interesting at all. This is all so sad since I think that the general setting and story had so much more potential.

Content Warnings

alyssasaurus's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

leedolee's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark 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? It's complicated

4.0

This series has easily stolen a place in my heart and these characters will truly remain favorites of my mine.

The world, the magic, the action, the drama, the twists, the relationships, and the plot were outstanding! Yes, my least favorite trope was found in this book but I enjoyed the novel regardless.

Lou and Reid will be one of my favorite ships. Always.

Content Warnings

baexlee's review against another edition

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mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

The previous installment to this series had me almost putting it down permanently. Blood & Honey had felt like such a divergence from the characterization of Lou and Reid as we had come to know them, coupled with an absolutely tragic and realistically avoidable character death in the end of the sequel of this trilogy I really thought nothing would bring me back. Ultimately I am glad that I returned for the final installment Gods & Monsters.

While the second installment had many issues that I struggled to overlook, the finale to the series does it's best to correct the mistakes that were made within that second attempt while still maintaining some truth to the story left behind. In all honesty, I had completely blocked out the events of the previous book from my mind because I truly didn't enjoy it, but as I dove back in to the world and was reintroduced to Lou and Reid I was pleased to find that they felt more themselves then they had as they bickered their way through Blood & Honey. The climax of the story arc still fell a bit flat overall, and ultimately there were some aspects of Lou's magic that felt... strangely pointless? It was interesting to see her utilize her magic so... poorly in the grand finale of the series. The ending just didn't pack the fantasy punch I like to see in these kinds of trilogies.

Content Warnings

powellki's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful fast-paced

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

4.5

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