Reviews tagging 'Blood'

A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes

93 reviews

hannahhansa's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative reflective 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? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War

Moderate: Child death, Death, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, and Murder

Minor: Animal death, Gore, Infidelity, and Blood

catkop's review against another edition

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Death, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, and Blood

racheltheduke's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.0

She isn't a footnote. She's a person.

Natalie Haynes weaves a beautiful and emotional tale of women left behind in the mythos of the Trojan War. 
When Homer asks the muses to sing to him for inspiration for his next epic poem, Calliope tells him the stories of these women.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual content, Slavery, Violence, Blood, and Murder

kiandrareadsbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death

Moderate: Death, Genocide, Gore, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Slavery, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Animal death

sarah984's review against another edition

dark informative slow-paced

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

3.0

I liked the idea of this book, focusing on war’s effects on women and a sort of discussion on the meaning of heroism, but the execution just felt really weak to me. The muse character basically outright states the book’s theme at least three times, in case I somehow missed it, the overpopulation motif with Gaia is boring and ridiculous, and the tone of some parts is really weird (Penelope’s letters at times feel like a comedy sketch). The book also mostly focuses on noblewomen and goddesses which I feel is a missed opportunity in a book about women and war.

The chapter about the Amazons was interesting though and I found Cassandra’s point of view compelling, so three stars.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief

Moderate: Ableism, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death, Infidelity, Mental illness, Rape, Slavery, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Death of parent, Murder, and Pregnancy

Minor: Eating disorder, Incest, and Cannibalism

poppywarphan's review against another edition

★★☆☆☆    I gave up 

This is probably the first book I've ever dnf'd after barley 40 pages. I have to return it to the library but I doubt I will ever borrow it again to finish. 

So I had extremely false expectations. What I was hoping for was a story, an adventure even, set in the time of the Trojan war about women. I was also excited when I saw goddesses mentioned in the description.

I'd describe it as a collection of short stories about various women and goddesses with themes of war, loss, grief etc. And by short I mean "somehow there were 5 stories in 40 pages" short, the shortest being only 2 pages. They ended before I could understand what exactly was going on so I couldn't connect to any of them. They also didn't really seem to be connected to each other in any way. 

This definitely wasn't the read for me. The writing was good I guess. Maybe my rating is too harsh but I was extremely disappointed and bored.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Child death, Death, Violence, Blood, and Grief

askard's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Child death, Gore, Rape, Violence, Blood, and Murder

laneport's review against another edition

challenging dark funny reflective sad slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Sexual violence, Violence, Kidnapping, and Grief

Moderate: Mental illness, Pedophilia, Blood, and Murder

oliverlang's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional relaxing sad slow-paced

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

5.0

I adored The Song of Achilles when I read it last year and this book picked up almost where that one left off, with a bit of an overlap and I loved every second of it. The two compliment eachother wonderfully despite being from different authors. I loved stepping back into that world.

Read this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Infidelity, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Pregnancy

augustinecarmichael's review against another edition

adventurous emotional reflective sad 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

4.5

all i wanted was a book that didn’t focus on men in its story, and this has been marvellous. i feel like i read this at exactly the right time. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief

Minor: Animal death, Death, Domestic abuse, Rape, and Blood