Reviews tagging 'Self harm'

Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

28 reviews

heatherjchin's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective tense fast-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? It's complicated

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Murder, War, Blood, Suicide, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, and Death

Moderate: Gore, Emotional abuse, and Gaslighting

Minor: Kidnapping, Death of parent, Colonisation, Self harm, and Grief

kappafrog's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Classism, Death, and Blood

Moderate: Suicide, Sexism, Violence, Racism, Self harm, Bullying, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Domestic abuse, Colonisation, Fire/Fire injury, and Gore

Minor: Body horror, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Cultural appropriation, Cursing, Misogyny, and Murder

ashconklin's review against another edition

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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm

emily_mh's review against another edition

adventurous emotional reflective slow-paced

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

3.5

Unfortunately I didn't super enjoy my time with this one. This is a quest narrative but it didn't do the job as one for me. I think the beauty of a quest narrative is that you don't really know where it's going - as a reader you have knowledge of an end point and an initial plan, but something will throw the hero off course to keep you on your toes. However, the narrative followed the initial plan in a really linear and repetitive way, with only minor obstacles for Casiopea and Hun-Kamé (until the end). 

I did like the narrative voice as I found it unique and it had a fairytale-like quality to it. However, it came at the cost of feeling distanced from Casiopea and her inner-world. A final thing I didn't like about the book was how quickly Casiopea and Hun-Kamé fell in love. Even though we are told this happened slowly, they had only known each other for a few weeks so I just didn't find this believable.

So I was especially frustrated that they were both so close to throwing in the towel because of this love.

Also, I really don't like the immortal/mortal trope especially as Casiopea is only 18. 

Despite these negatives, there were a lot of positives too! I really enjoyed the opposing development of Casiopea and Hun Kamé, how they were switching from mortal to immortal or vice versa, and how they learned more about their initial state through the other's journey. I really liked where Casiopea ended up overall, too. Speaking of the ending, the last 50 pages were really fantastic - gripping and satisfying. And I really loved reading and learning about Mayan mythology too, like the duality of Xibalba that was cleverly reflected in so many other parts of the narrative. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide and Death

Moderate: Cursing, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Murder, and Violence

Minor: Terminal illness, Pregnancy, Confinement, Racism, Alcohol, Forced institutionalization, Drug use, Gun violence, Colonisation, Slavery, Deportation, Animal cruelty, Domestic abuse, Religious bigotry, Classism, Gore, Emotional abuse, Body horror, Physical abuse, Death of parent, War, Child abuse, Racial slurs, Hate crime, Self harm, Body shaming, Ableism, Sexism, Misogyny, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: illness, colourism, ethnic racism, volcano, self-injury, insects, hurricane, earthquake

carolynnagain's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Domestic abuse, Suicide, and Self harm

divine529's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark informative reflective slow-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

I had a hard time with this book. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it either. The best word I can use to describe my feelings for this book is apathy. 

I read another Garcia book awhile ago and I loved that one a lot, but this one gave me a hard time, which surprised me. 

This is a dual perspective book and follows our protagonists Casiopea (our main protagonist) and her cousin Martin. Casiopea accidentally awakes the Mayan god of death, Hun-Kame and gets a bone shard embedded in her hand, and if she wants to live, they have to embark on a quest to get him back on his throne and defeat his brother who did this to him. Along the way they encounter many different demons and ghosts and gods and things go from there. 

Generally, I wasn't connected to any part of this book. The writing was good, the plot was ok and the characters were just not relatable to me and I didn't emotionally connect to them. I liked the historical and mythological aspects of the book the most I think. 

The last 5-6 chapters were absolutely fantastic and I was fully engaged and invested in them, I just wish more of the book was that way for me. 

All in all, a bit disappointing, but would recommend people try it anyway. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Self harm, Sexism, Bullying, Animal death, Murder, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Death, Misogyny, Sexual assault, and Suicide attempt

savanapavlak's review

adventurous inspiring reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• 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: Animal death, Blood, Self harm, and Suicide

jaedia's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious relaxing sad slow-paced

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

4.0

 Gods of Jade and Shadow is a very sleepy fantasy. I expected a little more action from a story about a god of death on a quest to reclaim his throne after brotherly betrayal, and there was a little, but mostly the story meanders through moments, quietly weaving its myth. I found it a very calm read. I had no anticipated that but it was really nice and while I felt some of its events could have had a little more 'oomph', maybe drawn out just a little bit longer, perhaps packed a little more emotion, by the end I was still in tears and kinda wanting to hear more from these characters.

This book is a slow burn for sure. And it is lovely. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Animal death, Blood, Emotional abuse, and Self harm

Moderate: Racism and Gaslighting

eevee314's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful 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? No

3.5

The world in the story was the strongest point, 2nd would be the few honest laughs I got from the dialogue. The plot was simply go to the place, do the thing, go to the place, do the thing which got repetitive. The writing style itself was also repetitive, and somehow clipped. It never got into a flow and enjoyable flow.

Narration performance was good. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death

Moderate: Domestic abuse and Self harm

Multiple animals are killed by the antagonist as part of their magic. While appropriate within the story and the wold, is still a bummer

therese_nook68's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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

5.0

5/5 stars 

A favorite of the year! 

I didn't really know what I was expecting from this book — I knew very little about the plot and the characters and very limited people that I knew had read this book. But I think you should go into it without knowing a lot other than the bare bones of the plot and that there's a lot of build up. 

This was such a heartbreaking book and I loved reading about the characters and their personal journeys. I am so emotional over the ending and in some ways, it was a happy ending? 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Animal death, Self harm, and Domestic abuse