Reviews tagging 'Cursing'

The Lost Girls by Sonia Hartl

6 reviews

aformeracceleratedreader's review against another edition

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fast-paced

4.0

Thoroughly enjoyed this and liked the ending as well. 
Loved seeing immortal teen girls kicking a little bit of ass and doing a found family. 
Would def read more from this author.
There could be some trigger/content warnings so maybe check those out.

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slimywyrm's review against another edition

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

4.0


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longlost's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious 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? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

mmm. i really wanted to like this book. like many other reviewers i was sold on the Sapphic Vampire Revenge Story premise and while there were parts of the book that really spoke to me and made me feel like it was worth reading, the parts that bothered me were.... a bit too Much to gloss over in favour of what i did like about it. 

the good: hartl's brand of dark humour used to tell this story made it feel very engaging to me, but that's very much personal taste. i liked the characters - the core vampire trio (later quartet) were easy to love for their quirks and i found what we did learn about their backstories and histories to be genuinely interesting and at times heartbreaking. holly's issues w/ her mother also really spoke to me when they did become front and centre, and i liked
the resolution with her mother in their final scene together.
ive never really been that invested in vampire stories so im going into this world with the basics of vampire knowledge, but i really enjoyed the work hartl put into worldbuilding regarding the vampire lore. when i picked up the book to continue reading i was as much interested in seeing where the characters would go next as in how the world and the rules behind vampirism would be unraveled. which sucks because the stuff im going to talk about next really ruined whatever good aspects those parts had.

the bad (and the Ugly): so. the entire premise of the book is the three girls who were coerced by the main villain - a vampire creep who preys on vulnerable, isolated teenagers - teaming up to kill him so he can't ensnare anymore victims. and then we spend the entire book developing a romance between holly and parker of which the inherent weirdness of it is never really acknowledged ? like yea, we know that holly genuinely cares because we're reading things from her point of view and there's a lot of emphasis on how being Turned pauses you at that point in time meaning that holly is Technically still 16 but. it is just, not that simple ? she's been existing for like 30 years and parker is. a teenager. maybe there could have been ways to approach it well but here it just felt.... extremely brushed over despite a major plot point of the story being how the villain did similar things to the main character & her friends. the romance felt kinda bland too but tbf i was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt until the out of nowhere underage sex scene which very nearly made the book a DNF for me but there wasnt much of the story left at that point and i wanted to keep to my rule about having read a book in full before writing an in-depth review like this and i felt like these issues were glaring enough that they needed to be discussed in context of the story which is. as explained, never really addressed by the author other than holly being like "oh no if we date parker will eventually grow old and die" which. doesn't even begin to address the juxtaposition between the entire revenge plot and holly and parker's relationship. the overall ending seems to be contentious from reading other reviews here but tbh at that point id disengaged emotionally so i dont have any real thoughts on that. 

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ednam0dewannabe's review

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adventurous emotional funny sad tense fast-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

4.5


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mollyanne624's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious fast-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

4.5


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toofondofbooks_'s review

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dark funny lighthearted sad tense medium-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? Yes
I liked the first half of this book enough that I was going to give it 5 stars, but the second half kind of chipped points away for me. As always, I wanna start with the good aspects. The first of these being that this was campy and fun most of the time. I highlighted a ton of parts that made me laugh, there was so much of it that was darkly funny. Another thing I really liked were the two vampire "sidekicks" (but let's face it, they were kind of running shit) Ida and Rose. I thought they were far more interesting than our main character, whose name I kept forgetting 💀

The things that bugged me are as follows: the romance was weak. I felt like it was a little forced and I have an idea for a different route it could've taken that would make it better. I also think the book would've been better from Rose or Ida's point of view, or switching points of view, but I understand why it wasn't. There was also sexual content that made me uncomfortable. It didn't feel like it belonged in what I'm pretty sure is a YA novel, but maybe that's just me. Also, I found the way they disposed of their kills to be a little too convenient and unbelievable, even for a vampire story.

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