Reviews tagging 'Murder'

Jade War by Fonda Lee

83 reviews

tpasta's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

3.5

The world building is incredible, somehow more captivating than the first book. However, the pacing was very slow. The events of the book span over 5 years and jump around to so many characters it was difficult to get invested into one of them. War is the essence of the book and I wish there had been a more compelling overarching plot. I found the first 30% and last 15% to be way too drawn out. Not sure if I will continue reading this trilogy.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War and Colonisation

Moderate: Racism, Xenophobia, Murder, Homophobia, Suicidal thoughts, and Violence

Minor: Rape and Abortion

reddeddy's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense slow-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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Cultural appropriation, Grief, Confinement, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Trafficking, War, Gore, Sexual content, Violence, Gun violence, Mass/school shootings, Suicidal thoughts, Chronic illness, Colonisation, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Medical trauma, Body horror, Classism, Death, Physical abuse, Abandonment, Blood, Racism, Xenophobia, Abortion, Death of parent, Drug abuse, and Torture

Moderate: Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Slavery, Sexual harassment, Toxic friendship, Addiction, Homophobia, Misogyny, Ableism, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Genocide, Toxic relationship, Rape, Deportation, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Sexual violence, and Cursing

Minor: Animal death, Biphobia, Body shaming, Self harm, Bullying, Religious bigotry, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Alcoholism, Dysphoria, Mental illness, Outing, Domestic abuse, Addiction, Vomit, and Infertility

loudmouthbooklover's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional informative inspiring tense fast-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Suicidal thoughts, Racism, Torture, Murder, and War

lunep's review against another edition

dark emotional tense fast-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

I am...speechless, like Fonda Lee herself said in the aknowledgments, this was even bigger and more ambitious than Jade City, and Jade City was already very big and ambitious, it was a very tough act to follow, but Jade War did it amazingly. I had no idea what was going to happen in this book, after the events of the first one, considering

the first one is called Jade City but it shows all out clan war, and in Jade War the Pillars make a public truce lmao

, but it had me hooked from the first moment, so much so that I don't know when I'll be able to read Jade Legacy because I'm back at working on my thesis with a class-like schedule and my director gives me deadlines and I can't let myself get obssesed with a book and being incapable of working lmao (same reason why I haven't watched the atla live action)
Also because my last review was long but focused on what I didn't like, I want to give more depth to my positive reviews so I'm gonna make a couple positive comments about what stayed with me the most:

• This book made me absolutely adore Wen. She didn't have too much screen time in the first, and her character at the beggining was clouded by Shae's view of her, so I loved getting to see more of her this book, and what we saw of her. I loved how she was there for Shae when Shae went trough rough patches, and how both of them helped each other and truly became friends and sisters. I loved how she wasn't scared of doing whatever she could to help her clan, and how she knew what her strenghts were and played to them. She's just amazing
  and I hope she gets better on book 3, I was seriously so scared at the end of the book when she, Anden, and Rohn Toro got attacked, I was literally screaming at my ipad
• I also loved Anden's growth, he was already one of my favorite characters from book 1, and I felt so much for him at the end of it and at the beggining of this one, but I'm glad to see he grew onto himself more fully. He's my baby

I'm very intrigued to see what happens now in Jade Legacy, but I'm also terrified lmao. I want the Kauls to be happy but honestly this series gives me very big tragedy vibes, like, how are they going to be able to live happy and in peace after all the bloodshed that has happened? This all started bc of Lan's death, and so many more people have died so far, how can it be possible for one side to survive and have no enemies trying to get revenge without having to wipe the whole side of their enemies? And how could they live in peace afterwards knowing they killed so many people? I can't wait to see how Fonda Lee ties everything up

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Misogyny, Alcohol, Murder, Sexual content, Racial slurs, Racism, Gore, Drug use, Cursing, Torture, Grief, Blood, Death, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Medical content, Suicide, Homophobia, Drug abuse, Xenophobia, Animal cruelty, Abortion, and Rape

Minor: Ableism, Infidelity, Animal death, Child death, Suicidal thoughts, Addiction, Sexism, Pedophilia, Vomit, Cancer, and Excrement

praaliine's review

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-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

4.5

i definitely liked this a lot more than jade city. was it a life changing read? almost. was it well-written and enjoyable af? YES. although this book is not wholly character driven, the characters are still the lifeblood of this story, so much that it feels like i’m reading an exclusively character driven book. i’m deeply interested in all the characters (minus bero. why is he even there?), and funny enough, they give me a lot to think about in real life. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Cursing, Gun violence, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Grief, Death, and Death of parent

Moderate: Drug abuse, Vomit, Sexual content, and Drug use

elizas's review against another edition

adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Gun violence, Murder, Death, Violence, and Drug abuse

laurenrrrrr1's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Violence, Torture, Murder, Homophobia, Physical abuse, War, Misogyny, Gun violence, and Death

ehmannky's review against another edition

challenging dark tense medium-paced

4.0

A really impressive followup to Jade City. The plot is impressive in scope and I thought there was a lot of great characters and development in terms of story and character. It did, at times, feel like the plot was a bit unwieldy, and a few plot lines I felt ended oddly pacing-wise. I think this is just more a symptom of how second books in fantasy series tend to be rather than a specific criticism of this series in particular. But I still really, really liked this continuation of the series, and this book's handling of a crime family/triad narrative has finally made me like this genre of storytelling. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, Violence, and Death of parent

alicelalicon's review

adventurous tense fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Addiction, Hate crime, Death, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, War, Blood, Murder, Racism, and Xenophobia

Minor: Abortion

matoyak's review against another edition

dark 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

2.0

A significant drop in quality from book one. The author's not great at writing romance, and this one really focuses on that a lot. The politics are interesting, and the family drama stays mostly good. Characterization is lacking, and important stuff is brushed over very quickly during timeskips off-screen. I have heard good things of book 3, so here's hoping the series recovers.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Murder, Violence, Xenophobia, and Torture