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I am glad there was only one s*x scene and one kiss scene, much more preferred. I liked the world and the fantasy of it. I enjoyed our characters and I just love magic card stuff, always here for tarot related stuff.
Graphic: Violence, Murder, Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Bullying, Sexual content
Minor: Confinement, Cursing, Gore, Sexism, Torture, Police brutality, Medical content, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Sexual harassment
Graphic: Cursing
Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Gore, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Pandemic/Epidemic
Minor: Child death, Genocide, Infidelity, Terminal illness, Vomit, Death of parent, Alcohol
Graphic: Gore, Violence, Blood, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Death of parent, Murder
Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Death, Gore, Terminal illness, Violence, Blood, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Child abuse, Chronic illness, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Torture, Death of parent, Abandonment, Alcohol
Minor: Bullying, Police brutality
(I liked the second book better and gave it 4 ⭐️, so I'm editing this rating to reflect that) ~~
I thought this was gonna be like all the other YAs flooding Booktube/Booktok, but thankfully it was not! I enjoyed it a lot <3
Bonus points because we were not dealing with a cast of 17 years olds, the characters are young adults yay!
So, the less good (because I wouldn't say it was BAD, just some stuff I didn't enjoy as a reader) and the good!
- It started really slow and confusing (like a lot of fantasy books) because we are introduced to a world where magic is quite different from what we're used to, so getting the lore and everything else established was a bit tedious. (I'm not a patient person :'))
- After the first 15%, the action kicks in and it's really fun!
- At a certain point it was going too fast (certain characters were too trusting, agreeing to everything that was proposed to them, which made me go o.o), but the pace settled nicely after Equinox (a celebration in the book)
- I liked the characters and their flaws, but tbh Elspeth bothered me sometimes. I didn't like her thought process on a number of things, which made me want to tear my hair out. We got the very classic "I don't want to tell the guy I love about the
- I also think the romance could have developped later on; I don't think the characters had enough time together to really fall in love? I guess the stuff they go through together made their feelings progress faster? I don't really know, but to me it could have been a slower burn ;)
- The spice is pretty much non-existent, for those that this interests. No descriptions, barely 3 pages T-T I wish it was more, but thankfully it didn't prevent me from continuing the book, the story had its hooks in me, which is great :)
- Can't wait to start the next one and see where all of this goes!
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Murder
Graphic: Death, Blood, Murder, Alcohol
Moderate: Child death, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Infidelity, Sexual content, Grief, Death of parent
this was so good, kept me hooked, the only reason I put it down was to study 🫣
I think I would've enjoyed more if Ravyn and Elspeth were slow-burn.
can't wait to start the second book!
Graphic: Sexual content, Violence, Blood
Moderate: Child death, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Injury/Injury detail
PROS:
🩸The Infection
🖤Raven
🩸The Highwaymen
🖤Court Intrigue
🩸The Magic System
🖤All magic has a cost
🩸The Nightmare
🖤The poems
CONS:
🩸Royals only concerned with their own power
🖤Genocidal tendencies
🩸The cost of some magic is too much to bear and it isn’t always a choice
🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸 out of five infected young girls with cat like yellow eyes
Graphic: Misogyny, Sexism, Violence
Moderate: Genocide, Blood
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Murder
Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Injury/Injury detail