Reviews tagging 'Confinement'

Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey

7 reviews

willow1113's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Animal death, Rape, Sexual assault, Alcohol, Blood, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, and War

Moderate: Confinement, Gore, Vomit, Animal cruelty, Grief, Adult/minor relationship, Antisemitism, Emotional abuse, and Medical trauma

alexalily's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Slavery, War, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Death, Blood, Kidnapping, Death of parent, and Gore

Minor: Injury/Injury detail, Pandemic/Epidemic, Alcohol, Confinement, Grief, Animal death, and Pregnancy

bkmckown's review

2.0

This book was recommended to me by MANY people. It’s was such a slog to finish. Over 1,000 pages and I would’ve quit if I hadn’t needed it for many of my reading challenges. I’ll start with the positive:

The overall story was fairly interesting. The sexy parts were indeed spicy. That’s about it. 

Now for the stuff I did NOT like:

 Let me preface this to say that I don’t like fantasy that much. Especially the ones who refer to characters in full name, the ones that have names that are difficult to pronounce, the ones that have exotic names for every group of people, location, position, etc

The main character is basically a child who is taught in the erotic arts. HUGE WTF! She’s a sex slave. Her first “master” just enjoys inflicting pain- which part of her “curse” makes it pleasurable to her. I felt like it wasn’t BDSM, but just abuse. Maybe there was a time in my life where I’d find this read enjoyable, but this isn’t it. 

I did give it 2 stars because the author did create and intricate cast of characters and story, but honestly, I would’ve DNF at any other time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Classism, Slavery, Torture, Toxic relationship, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Violence, War, Death, Domestic abuse, Forced institutionalization, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, and Misogyny

ambientdusk's review

adventurous dark emotional inspiring mysterious tense medium-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content and Slavery

Moderate: Torture, Bullying, Animal death, Confinement, Sexual assault, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Kidnapping, Blood, Misogyny, Murder, Slavery, and Death

lanid's review

adventurous dark mysterious

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Rape, Death, Body horror, War, and Sexual content

Minor: Slavery, Confinement, Xenophobia, Adult/minor relationship, Torture, Religious bigotry, Animal death, Blood, and Classism

btrz7's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Diverse cast of characters? No

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Rape, Sexual violence, Confinement, Death, Slavery, Torture, Violence, War, and Sexual content

Moderate: Animal death

massivepizzacrust's review against another edition

emotional tense slow-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

I have a lot of thoughts about this book and while I think it has some issues (or maybe a lot of them), I've definitely never read anything like it. Did I enjoy reading it? I don't know. Would I recommend it to other people? I... don't know...? But it sure will continue to live in my head forever. 

I think for what the content of this book is, I didn't love the "narrating from the future" writing choice. It felt detached and I've never been a fan of explicit foreshadowing. All the emotionally important raunchy scenes happened off screen or were only summarized in a couple of sentences, while the "just what work looks like" scenes were the ones highlighted. That's just not what I personally enjoy. But I liked the world building, where the wider plot went and how the main character interacted with the diplomatic challenges around her given her skills... 

Phedre's boys were my favorite part, I love them. Also, if Joscelin could unbutton about two more buttons on his shirt, he would be so much better than Melisande could ever be. That's just my two cents. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gore, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Rape, Sexual assault, Blood, Cursing, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, and War