Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Schwarzer Leopard, roter Wolf by Marlon James

109 reviews

aileend's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark slow-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

3.0

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goddessssssssss's review against another edition

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

5.0

One of the weirdest books I've ever read, but one of the best. Based in a pre-colonial Africa, the story draws on native myths and legends to create a colourful and terrifying world.
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bbpettry's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

When folks ask if I like this book I tell them like isn't the word. This story and world possessed me for an entire season and I will happily dive in twice more. 
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nikki_readsss's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark 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? It's complicated

5.0

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ambergrewal's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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

4.0

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justinlife's review against another edition

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

4.0

A love a pretty cover and this one is gorge. That’s the main reason I bought it. The book is really good. It’s also a black queer writer writing a black queer fantasy, which I didn’t know going in and LOVED!

It’s an epic, it’s mythology (and all the fuckery that entails), it’s fantasy, it’s a mystery novel, and it combines these genres nicely. 

I see comparisons to Game of Thrones, but I didn’t read those nor watch many of the episodes. Maybe the cruelness and the casualness of abuse and violence is similar. It was a bit rough to get through but overall it’s a really good book with a complicated story and complex characters. And also YAY BLACK QUEER STORIES!
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henneyce's review against another edition

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I got lost. And there was a lot of disturbing content I could not get past.
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sshabein's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • 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

2.75

I respect the world-building and inventive takes on African folklore here, the writing has some good moments, and I liked seeing queer characters in this fantasy setting, but this book wasn't really for me. The violence is toe-curling, the prevalence of rape or talk of it is a LOT, and the point of view is so... Male? I guess I am not really enjoying the dick-swinging, both literal (and sometimes Spider-y?) and in attitude. Definitely not a bad book, but I won't be reading the sequel.
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its_kievan's review against another edition

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

1.0

My copy of this book has rave reviews from, among others, the New York Times, the Guardian, Lousie Erdrich, and Salman Rushdie, describing it as "gripping", "extraordinary", and "a miracle". I think if they had asked me instead I would have described Black Leopard, Red Wolf as "boring", "shit", and "weirdly obsessed with incest". I might have explained that reading this book was a frustrating slog, that the supposedly artistic prose just made everything impossible to understand, or that between this and Tade Thompson's Rosewater I'm starting to wonder where all this "award-winning African SFF" is getting its awards from. But hey, nobody asked me.
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catsforlenny's review against another edition

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

3.0

I have such mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, the pacing is very slow so it's quite hard to get through, especially the first 200 pages. Also it has very graphic depictions of violence and rape and it's very dark overall. On the other hand, the writing style is very beautiful and I grew to love the characters.
Overall I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone, and I won't be reading the next ones in the series but I did enjoy some parts of it.
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