Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

Muse of Nightmares by Laini Taylor

8 reviews

aksmith92's review

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective 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

Muse of Nightmares is a typical Young Adult fantasy novel where love saves the day, and I ate it all up!

She's beauty, she's grace, she's Laini Taylor. Her writing is poetic, atmospheric, gorgeous, readable, and accessible. Yes, it's young adult, leading to some dramatics, but nothing over the top, and indeed a piece of art. I loved this so much, and even more than the first one, dare I say.

The setup: We left off on a BIG plot twist in Laini Taylor's first installment of this duology, Strange the Dreamer. With Sarai's fate in question, we are left with confusion and madness in Weep, where most citizens must run out of town because the Citadel is shifting and changing. Lazlo has a pretty big plot twist (although I could see that coming in the first novel). Either way, we are left with many questions about godlings, citizens of Weep, and the infamous dead gods that must've left more of a story than many thought.

Now, the story pivots to those godlings up in the sky in the Citadel, Minya's intense vengeance, and Sarai's adaptability into a new self in more ways than one. Eril-Fane and Azareen are still big components of the story and work to shift mindsets on the ground in Weep. In addition, we still hear from the wonderfully facetious Calixte and the learning and growing Thyon Nero. Lastly, we get an entirely new story about two sisters living in what seems to be a wholly different world made of ice. You know immediately that the stories will connect somehow, but the road to get there is beautiful and intriguing, yet devastating.

Laini Taylor creates an intricate world(s!) and develops the lovely characters from book one.

What I loved: My favorite part was the unique villain arcs - here we are, 15ish years after the fall of some of the more horrible villains I've read about, and we are reading about those impacts, leading to one of the most fantastic character development novels I've read. Because this story takes place years after the deaths of the villains (not a spoiler; it was also the same in the first book!), and we don't get the why for those villains other than the typical power-thirsty monsters, we now see excellent nuances in characters like Minya being stuck in the past constantly feeling like she has to save her family. Or, Nova, whose character was phenomenal, and I won't get into it because of spoiler reasons. It was pure art to have a story embedded in the after-effects of an awful fantastical regime. I loved the characters, even the ones who took a bit of a back burner in this novel, and the world-building was quite interesting. The world aspect may not necessarily be "original," but I found it unique nonetheless. PS: I must admit, the writing around eliliths - the tattoos girls get once their bleeding begins - was actually really cool. I've grown up learning to hate that, and in this fictional world, it seems powerful and beautiful. This part of the book is obviously not big, but I wanted to mention it anyway.

What would've made this a perfect read? I rated this five stars because of how it made me feel, the writing, and the story arcs. However, I will say that if I were being ultra critical, I would mention that I did feel there was a miss in relationship development between Thyon and Lazlo, the friendship that could've been, and just a better and more exciting wrap-up relationship between the godlings and those in Weep. A LOT was going on outside of that, which was critical for the story, so I let it slide. Lastly, Lazlo and Sarai are a little bit instant-love (as a reminder, the majority of this book truly takes place in one to two days!), but I don't think it overtook the story. Oh, as much as this is wonderful writing, Lazlo learned about his mesarthium control a littleeeee bit too quickly to be believable. It's implied their powers are meant to be ingrained, but I still thought it was a bit fast. Again, I let this slide because the other parts were just so good!

I am excited to read other books by Laini Taylor when I'm in a young adult and fantasy world mood. I really enjoyed my experience with Strange the Dreamer, and I'll be sad to see it go (or, as Laini Taylor puts it at the end of this book, Muse of Nightmares, is it really the end?). Bravo to this beautiful story!

"Many a choice is made this way: by pretending it makes itself. And many a fate is decided by those who cannot decide."

"But how do you stop someone from crying? How do you lead them out of fear? Can hate be reversed? Can revenge be defused?"

There comes a certain point with a hope or a dream, when you either give it up or give up everything else. And if you choose the dream, if you keep going, then you can never quit, because it's all you are."

"The ones who know can't tell us, and the ones who tell us don't know."

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kathrynleereads's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad 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

4.75

Picking up only minutes after Strange the Dreamer ended, Muse of Nightmares, by Laini Taylor, was everything that its predecessor wasn’t… in the most surprising ways.

With the Citadel now in Lazlo’s control but still looming over the city of Weep, Muse of Nightmares opens with a whole new level of chaos. Citizens are fleeing, Eril-Fane is trying to corral the Tizerkane warriors, and Lazlo is meeting the other Godspawn for the first time.

Before we find out how the night's events play out, however, we’re introduced to Kora and Nova, sisters living in a desolate village, who have an incredibly different view of the blue-skinned “gods” that the people of Weep have come to dread. 

As the story plays out for the sisters, Lazlo, the Godspawn, and the people of Weep, the book really lives up to its name. 

Where Strange the Dreamer was all dreams and imaginary worlds, Muse of Nightmares is all horror and unimaginable crimes. The books were like two sides of a coin. Readers fell in love with the picturesque and awe-filled version of Weep, then had that whole idea spun on its axis until it was an ugly truth. 

There are very few times when reading a book that I can honestly say I experienced gut-wrenching horror, and Muse of Nightmares was the reason for many of them. 

All of the questions presented in Strange the Dreamer were finally granted answers, but they were the answers of nightmares.

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lanid's review

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

4.5


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anneroza's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad 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

3.75


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msradiosilence's review

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dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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

3.0

Tldr; Minya gets a story, but so do other characters that were entirely unneeded. For an almost 600 page book, it was pretty boring.

Read my full review here: https://www.rainyreader.com/single-post/muse-of-nightmares.

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oddduck's review

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mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.0

I have mixed feelings about this book. Like, I liked it, but there was a lot that was not at all where I expected this to go, and I'm still not sure how I feel about it.

Let's start with the things I unequivocally liked. I really appreciated that the pace in this book was faster than the previous one. It was still slower than I would have preferred, but more happened in the present and there were fewer interruptions (flashbacks, exposition). I also really appreciated that Minya got more page time and development. I was very interested in her in the first book, so learning more about her was appreciated. I really liked both of her dreams that Sarai went into, and it was delightful to see Minya choose Sarai over her army. In general, the character development in this book was very good and exactly what I was hoping for, especially for Minya and Thyon Nero (I was so happy with his development).

I also loved the new bit, about Nova and Kora. At one point I had to skip ahead because I had to know what happened in their test on the ship. It was so interesting and tense. It also demonstrated that Laini Taylor can write short, succinct backstory that's interesting and conveys all the information we need to not be confused later on. 

Now then. What I’ve got mixed feelings about. 

For starters, Sarai and Lazlo's relationship was cute, but I do wish the timeline on it had been longer. It was very instalove in the first book, and the way it's written in this one felt as if they'd known each other and been together for a lot longer than they really were. And I get why Laini Taylor did that, since almost the entirety of Lazlo's motivation for what he does after Sarai's death is to protect her ghost, but it still was a little hard for me. I would have preferred Lazlo have multiple motivations and not essentially just Sarai. Still, they're a cute couple, at least until I remember how long they've known each other.

I’m not sure how I feel about the multiverse being introduced. In hindsight the whole “not of this world”/alien metal and mesarthim in general do kind of hint at this, but because magic exists in this world, I was not expecting the multiverse to be the answer to “where did the mesarthim come from”. I do like the end, when they go off to explore and find the other godspawn. But otherwise, it was not at all what I was expecting. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it can be difficult to adjust expectations without enough warning.

I'm also not sure how I feel about the way the plot was executed. The Minya-villain arc was mostly resolved because a bigger threat was introduced, and then the last of it was cleared up when Minya had to make a choice. I really liked that Sarai was trying to help Minya through dreams, so it would have been cool to finish the plot that way. And that's kind of what happened, but it was with Nova instead, so it didn't feel quite as meaningful to me.

This duology was a little outside of my usual reading, which was nice, but it did remind me why I don't usually read this genre. They were certainly enjoyable and a good change of pace though.

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hotpinkmess's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0


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angelareads's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5


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