Reviews tagging 'Animal death'

Malice by John Gwynne

38 reviews

missgarceau's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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? It's complicated

3.5

I just really didn’t have a particularly fun time reading this tbh.

Had I checked content, I would have skipped it entirely.

Definitely do not recommend going in blind.

I did well with the prose, and overall plot and character development.

It’s only book 1- so there’s plenty left to be developed. That’s a given.
Like all big epics- I was mentally prepared for the information overwhelm. The amount of characters could give Wheel of Time a run for its money. 

I was disappointed in the strategies and political plots. Felt very “made for TV” and typically why I avoid political plots, in general.

A part of me felt like this was the typical “dude fantasy” that I avoid at all costs. I’m not entirely sure that’s inaccurate.

But, I still binged the shit out of it- and immediately dove into the second book. Guess that means I didn’t complete hate it. It’s complicated.

Commentary re CW:

The animal brutality was just sooooo unnecessary and I’m pretty sure NO ONE WANTS THAT!!! It was… a LOT! And the sound effects were just insult to injury. I wanted to DNF and chuck the entire thing sooooo many times. But people I trust have convinced me to carry on.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Death, Genocide, Gore, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Cancer, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, and Abandonment

helliecreed's review against another edition

adventurous 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? It's complicated

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Violence, and War

Minor: Ableism

scarletwillow's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense slow-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

4.5

What a great start to a series I think I'll end up adoring. The first 150ish pages were ROUGH, but I pushed through and found myself really invested in these characters. I'm surprised to say there isn't really a POV that I dreaded reading from - which is surprising from such multi POV story. My only real complaints are the rough start and lack of distinction between some of the characters... I also don't really know what any of them look like lol there's definitely a lack of physical descriptions in here so I've filled in a lot of gaps in my imagination. With that ending, I'm excited for book 2 and hoping for more female perspectives 🙏🏻

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death and Violence

charissap's review against another edition

adventurous tense slow-paced

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

3.75

Slow start with lots of characters to meet. It took around 1/3 of the book to understand where the overall plot might be going. It was engaging though with well done foreshadowing.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, and Murder

kliberty21's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-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

Malice is a slow burn with a BIG pay-off. There is a large cast of characters, but once they are introduced and the web begins to spin, and the wheels start turning, strap yourself in for one incredible ride!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, and Violence

Moderate: Bullying, Death of parent, and War

Minor: Alcoholism, Physical abuse, and Torture

skycam's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

4.5

First off the .5 star deduction is not because of what most people would think. It wasn’t because it was slow in the beginning or had too many characters. These were both things I actually loved about it. I didn’t find the beginning slow, I was actually invested right from the beginning! And I loved the multiple different perspectives, it’s one of my favorite things for adult fantasies to have. My problem was that I felt a little detached from a lot of the characters, specifically the ones outside of Corban’s perspectives. I think their individuality suffered a bit because Corban was obviously the main focus, but everything else about this book I adored! 

After finishing this, I. Am. A. Mess. 
I can’t believe I put this off for so long just cause I don’t tend to like military/grim dark fantasy! This was everything my epic-fantasy loving self yearns for!! 

The family in this??? Perfection, no notes. The animal companion? The loml. The epicness? Off the charts. SO GOOD. I am so happy that I loved this and cannot wait to continue with the series since I’ve heard that it gets so much better from here! 

💀🩸🐺⛰️⚔️👑🐴🧙🗡️🐍🏹🌊 🐜

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death

rase's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Violence, and Death of parent

Minor: Alcoholism, Bullying, Death, Misogyny, Blood, and Grief

arian_dragonelf's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

This took a long while for me to get into. That’s really the only thing that kept me from giving it 5 stars. This was intense. I could handle all the fighting scenes, but it was hard for me to get through the animal deaths.

Poor Buddai! I teared up imagining the faithful hound lying on his master’s chest as he died.

That was rough. I did see some things coming, but that wasn’t a bad thing. I was kind of irritated that we didn’t get any information about Corban. John Gwynne had been teasing it for I don’t know how many chapters, and then the book just ends. Thankfully I do have Valor, but I don’t know if I want to go straight in. I think I need to sit in this for a little bit. I need to go read a cozy mystery or reread a favorite romance. There is only so much head chopping a person can take!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, and War

Moderate: Gore, Kidnapping, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

rachel_faerie's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

The beginning was a nice slow world and character building experience but once I connected to the characters man I fell in love with it and had a great time. 

Also wow John Gwynne is RUTHLESS lol I can’t believe this was his debut!? I can’t wait to get to book 2 🥲

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Violence, and War

thoughtsontomes's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

There is a lot of setup in this book for the greater conflict of the overall series, and as such it is pretty heavy. There’s a tension building throughout and a lot of characters involved. It can be confusing at first, especially since some storylines are similar, but they start to differentiate as the book goes on. This is a series with a lot of character death though, so be warned. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Bullying, Child death, Gore, Blood, and Death of parent

Moderate: Ableism and War

multiple dog deaths