Reviews tagging 'Torture'

From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

100 reviews

bree_h_reads's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

0.25

What was that ending?

This book started out pretty shaky BUT I was won over by the amazing work of the narrator. She had a way of narrating things so that the banter and characters flowed in a way that the prose didn’t. I will also credit the book with the fact that Poppy felt like an 18-year-old girl scrabbling for control in her own life. The themes and exploration of them was interesting. Poppy’s character lent to these themes and it was fairly well done. Aside from that, the foreshadowing as fairly well done.

What really tanked this book for me was the last quarter of the book roughly. While it was declining slightly before the twist was revealed, that’s what destroyed the book for me. Everything about the characters and who they were felt like it vanished. Their actions stopped making sense and while I thought some changes after the reveal of the twist were well some, most didn’t. I stopped understanding Poppy and her actions. I found myself so frustrated with her and what she was doing that it tanked the book for me.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Sexism, Cursing, Death of parent, Religious bigotry, Confinement, Sexual assault, Kidnapping, Misogyny, Grief, Sexual content, Rape, Sexual violence, Death, Sexual harassment, and Violence

Moderate: Body horror, Emotional abuse, Murder, Confinement, Physical abuse, Gore, and Torture

Minor: Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, Child death, and Child abuse

cdoubet's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad 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? Yes

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Child death, Body shaming, Child abuse, Confinement, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Genocide, Bullying, Gaslighting, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Murder, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Panic attacks/disorders, Alcohol, Blood, Classism, Cursing, Physical abuse, Addiction, Death, Mental illness, and Misogyny

Moderate: Kidnapping, Domestic abuse, and Medical content

Minor: Toxic relationship, Animal cruelty, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

ephemeral_remi's review

adventurous dark emotional funny reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.0

"we go home to marry»

🥹🥹🥹🥹 I’m sorry? 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Grief, Kidnapping, Gore, Emotional abuse, Death, Blood, Infidelity, Abandonment, Violence, War, Torture, Religious bigotry, and Physical abuse

Minor: Sexual content

louiepotterbook's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

1.25

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Grief, Kidnapping, Sexual content, Death, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Gaslighting, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Torture, and Toxic relationship

toknowthyshelf's review

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

3.0

 Very mixed feelings - book itself is derivative but enjoyable, then 80% of the way through has some antisemitic tropes that I don't think the author realized she was replicating. But it turned me off- not sure now if I will read the next books in the series. :/ 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Kidnapping, Torture, and Antisemitism

I suspect it is unintentional, but the book very directly recreates antisemitic tropes related to blood libel. This comes up about 80% of the way through the book and, as a Jewish reader, made me incredibly uncomfortable and sad.

jo_d's review

adventurous dark funny tense fast-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

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Vomit, Torture, Death of parent, Sexual assault, Murder, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Violence, and Blood

toastyghosty13's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-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? Yes

3.5

I was suggested this book as a recommendation after reading the A Court of Thorns and Roses series.

The first 25%-30% of this book I found quite boring, it took me longer to read this section than the rest of the book. It started to pick up a lot more with

the attempted abduction of the main character Poppy and the murder of one of her personal royal guards, Rylan.

I could not put the book down after this, and read pretty large chunks afterwards, finishing a bulk of the book in 2 days. This is that majority of where the 2.5/5 rather than 4/5 stars comes from. 

My other main criticism of this book, but not as much as the first point is

the romantic relationship between Poppy and Hawke. I found it pretty cringey for some parts, but also love him as a chaotic character of weird morality.

He reminds me of (ACOTAR spoiler)

Rhysand a lot, but if Rhysand was a bit more murdery and psycho I guess?

. 

I definitely recommend this book for people who liked ACOTAR. I think the overarching conspiracy theories are very engaging once you start to get into it. I will say that a lot of the twists were very easily predictable for me, but YMMV. I think this book was really used to set up a lot for the rest of the series, so just try to get through it if you find parts boring because I have a feeling more exciting things are in the future. I finished the book today, and the ending had a twist I actually was not expecting at all that was left as a cliffhanger. If anything, it made me happy that I can start the next book asap because I am feeling the same type of excitement that I felt when (ACOTAR/ACOMAF spoilers)

Feyre was taken to Velaris

. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Murder, Physical abuse, Violence, Sexual content, Bullying, Death of parent, and Torture

Moderate: Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Child death

abicaro17's review

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious slow-paced

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

4.75

Holy shit this was a rollercoaster from start to finish!! I adore Poppy and cant wait to read more of her and her badassness. My old complaint is the age gap between the two of them other than that it was awesome!! 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Torture, Body horror, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, War, Blood, Child death, Classism, Violence, Confinement, Cursing, Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, Death of parent, Gaslighting, Murder, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Child abuse, Grief, Medical content, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Alcohol, Death, Genocide, Gore, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

saskiahill's review

3.75

Interesting story but poorly edited. From bad grammar, to missing words, to incorrect uses of phrases - I was surprised given it's such a popular book.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Sexual content, Blood, Death, and Grief

Moderate: Child death, Kidnapping, Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Cannibalism, and Death of parent

Minor: Animal death, War, Infertility, and Self harm

nat20charisma's review against another edition

2.75

It was just.. ok. Not so bad that I had to DNF it, but not great either. 

I really don’t enjoy the trope of “sexually experienced man shows a virgin the ropes”. I also felt like there were times that Poppy didn’t want it and clearly said so, but he pushed forward anyway because he “knew she would like it” and would “thank him later”. 

It was also a HUGE red flag that he

took her virginity before he revealed who he was. Pretty sure that’s rape, and that is traumatic. But I know she will still fall in love with him because he is in the other books as a hero.

All that aside, I found the major plot twist a little too predictable (I knew a quarter of the way thru), and I found some of the plot needed to be trimmed because it didn’t make sense or it didn’t add to the story. 

Not my cup of tea, but the writing could have been worse. At least it was still readable, even if it wasn’t gripping. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Blood, Sexual content, and Death of parent

Moderate: Torture