Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Violet Made of Thorns by Gina Chen

10 reviews

chocolatethief's review against another edition

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

0.5


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aquilleanmenace's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious 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

4.5


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tak_everlasting's review against another edition

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

1.0

An insult to fairytales, anyone who has ever liked anyone romantically, and, most egregriously, me.

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kbairbooks's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Holy WOW. Oh my gosh I couldn’t put this down!! This is the BEST fairytale retelling I have EVER read. Wow I am… speechless. Is there a book two in the works? Has Gina Chen written anything else? I’m like… itching for more 😂 I need more. Period.

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erica_reads_everything's review

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adventurous lighthearted tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.25

This book was cute, but not great. An easy read, it would be best for older teenagers. I think my main complaint is that the author put forth a lot of ideas that were wonderful, but didn’t see them all the way through. It felt like it was too fast, and that she could have explored some of the intricacies of the story in more detail.

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angiegeorge_reeds's review

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

There are several references to classic fairy tales that’s pretty fun. I enjoyed the mysterious side of things and the big reveals were very interesting. Some were predictable, but it was still a fun read. The reason this is 4 instead of 5 stars for me, even though I seriously couldn’t put it down, is because I feel like the love story side of it just didn’t fully add up. A love a good enemies-to-lovers, but it just felt more one sided for truly being lovers until the very end… idk felt toxic tbh

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hannianne17's review

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adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious 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

5.0

Started this for the book club.
Stayed for the angst and the brooding angry prince.
Fell in love with the sarcastic, self-serving, and iconically hilarious antiheroine.

Representation: Asian main character, lesbian princess, brown bisexual scholar, and the male love interest is red-headed.

Trigger Warnings: self-harm for magic rituals (cuts hand), themes of racism (towards the main character and her friend from the royals), cursing, and gore/violence.

This book literally pulled me out of a reading slump. I appreciated it so much. I love books that have antiheroines. I think I might relate to them a little too much.

I think most of all, I fell in love with the way Violet had to fight for herself and her ability to be vulnerable. Fear of vulnerability and shame are really hard emotions to write well and this author nailed it. Violet was constantly at war with herself about what she wanted and what she equated with survival so she could feel safe.

You watch as she struggles to be enough to emotionally support herself, but she's still whole all on her own. And I think that is a very important and hard distinction to write. I've seen far too many authors write characters that try to balance their hyper-independence by making them completely mold themselves to the male love interest. At the end of the book, Violet was still herself. She was still secure in who she is.

Violet also challenges the idea that we must do what's "right" instead of what's right for ourselves. We've been taught to never bat an eye about a king that makes selfish decisions based on his greed. I think it's time the seers, witches, scholars, and fairies of the world have the ability to do the same without judgement in order to protect themselves from the destruction created by the greedy kings of the world.

There's also the exploration of privilege. Violet acknowledges how Cyrus doesn't have to worry about his reputation or his place in the court. Cyrus pushes her to stand up to his father, but he's completely tone deaf about how that will impact Violet's career. She's doing what she feels she must to protect herself physically and to protect her reputation.

But the quote that got me?
"If the fates control our future, I don't understand to what end...The fates judge us. If we are generous, honest, not too chatty, placable, forgiving, they might twist our threads so we find love and earn our heart's weight in gold...But I don't believe in anything that supposes it knows me better than I know myself."

I'm going to say it again... "I don't believe in anything that supposes it knows me better than I know myself."

The religious trauma inside me was leaping for joy.

I've always been a character development reader. This ticks all of my boxes. All of the characters have arcs and display growth. Some more drastic than others.

AND THE CLIFF HANGER?! OMG I was screaming.

I can't wait to read the next one.

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azrah786's review against another edition

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4.25

 **I was provided with an ARC through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review**

CW: violence, blood, injury, self harm, body horror, gore, death, death of parent, murder, emotional abuse, racism, sexual content (non-explicit)
--

A fast paced, dark fairytale story following an unapologetic, self-serving seer with a penchant for twisting the truth; a just as headstrong and arrogant crown prince she is always butting heads with and a prophecy that ties the two of them and the fate of the kingdom together.

Now none of these two leads are the most likeable of characters and you want to just shake the both of them on various occasions but their banter? *chef’s kiss* This isn’t your usual enemies to lovers pairing, they have more of a hate to “oh no these intense feelings I have for you and the fact that you get me plus are really attractive is messing with my head” going on and I couldn’t get enough of it.

Though the spotlight is very much on Violet - the control and power she has over her own destiny and her role as primary seer of a kingdom hanging in the balance. I was absolutely enraptured by the curse elements in the story and Chen beautifully wove the tensions of the foretold prophecy and political situation together that I just couldn’t put the book down!

The worldbuilding and magic are super fascinating however, they are an already established element of the story and weren’t expanded on as much as I had hoped. Also there were also some great side characters that I can’t help but wish had more page time.

That aside I really enjoyed this one and need the sequel yesterday!
If you like morally grey characters that aren’t always likeable and all the fairytale vibes with a dash of darkness then this book is for you!
Final Rating – 4.25/5 Stars 

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dianaschmidty's review against another edition

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

3.5

I have a lot of conflicting feelings about this book.
The romance was surprisingly different, though it did take the “one has a knife to the throat while the other professes their love” trope a little too far. I loved their chemistry, and though I usually like slow-burns, it worked well for these characters to not have a long build up.
I was confused by the writing at times though, since it got a little repetitive and yet still left me with questions unanswered about the world of the book.
I did love Violet’s internal monologue and her commentary of the people around her was hilarious, but I also have never been as confused about a main character’s motives as I was about Violet’s. I like an unreliable narrator, but I felt like it didn’t make a ton of sense for her to be that unreliable.

Am I really confused by this story? Yes. Will I read the next book? Toady hell yes!

Thank you to NetGalley, Delacorte Press, and Gina Chen for providing me access to this book in exchange for an honest review.

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noellelovesbooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious fast-paced

3.75

 

I received an ARC of this book, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.


Content Warnings
: Death, self-harm, blood, gore, murder, racism, child abuse, violence, and some sexual scenes.


After reading the summary of this book, on Netgalley, I knew I wanted to dive in. I’m a sucker for fantasy novels that follow someone who’s labeled morally gray.


We meet Violet, the Kingdom seer, who works closely with the King to ensure peace and prosperity for their land. Everyone trusts her divination except for the crown Prince who’s determined to prevent her from continuing as Seer once he’s crowned King.


Since Violet was brought to the castle, when they were children, Prince Cyrus and her have fought loudly, and openly, for all to witness. Both stubborn they refuse to see eye to eye or find common ground. So when the King instructs Violet to grow close to Cyrus to ensure he believes her divination of meeting his true love, Violet’s at a bit of a loss.


I was fully invested, from the very start, and ended up reading this book in one day, practically in one sitting. The beginning and middle were strong and had me invested in Violet, her powers, and her potential friendship with Cyrus. I did find myself struggling to stay immersed the closer we got to the end though. The development of a tentative trust between Violet and Cyrus was shown throughout the book but the ending had it feeling a bit rushed, like one minute there was trust then immediately none, and then back to trust. I wish a little more time would have been spent on the ending for the back and forth to make more sense to me. This could honestly just be a me issue but I just felt like it didn’t line up with what all we’d learned previously.


The way the story ended has me hopeful that there will be another book. If this is a standalone I’d be sad, as I felt it didn’t tie up everything it should have. On either Goodreads or Storygraph, I saw something saying it was book one in an untitled duology so I’m hopeful that we’ll get another book. 


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