Reviews with content warning for Genocide - The Blood Gift

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The Blood Gift by N.E. Davenport

9 reviews

mj1588's review

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adventurous dark emotional inspiring 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

4.5

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kjanet's review against another edition

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adventurous dark sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I will admit the first book had my attention all the way through with no stops. This one kind of lost me in some places. I feel like the buildup of beating these major powerful villains ended too easily (perhaps not for them, as they were fighting) but something about both major fights seemed anticlimactic. Also, the ending did wrap up MOST of the storylines, but left some open, which, was not horrendous. For some reason, the bigger threat at the end of the book reminded me a tiny bit of the ending of Dreams of Gods and Monsters by Laini Taylor.

Also, the main character’s personality also got kind of annoying. I know she is strong and powerful and whatnot, but her attitude did begin to grate on my nerves sometimes.

Regardless, still a great Duology (and the author leaves it open to perhaps a companion/sequel duology that takes place some time later).

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evemason's review against another edition

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adventurous dark hopeful tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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fleur____'s review against another edition

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adventurous 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

4.5

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thirdeyeangel23's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I have so many mixed emotions!!! The Blood Gift is book two in The Blood Gift Duology and boy was it an epic conclusion. Things pick up right where we left off at the end of The Blood Trials with Ikenna and her newly formed squad. Once you’re on the ride, you don’t get off until the very end. Grievances are sorted out, evils are slain, and justice is finally served, but for all the action you can feel that this was intended to be more than a duology. Davenport does an amazing job at tying up the story while keeping you on the edge of your seat, but we miss out on seeing a lot of character development. With there being a new team and budding romance there just wasn’t room for us to really see how deeply those relationships formed which is what I desperately craved for Ikenna. Overall I loved the story and appreciate how the author left hints for more to come from these characters.

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tinyjude's review against another edition

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challenging dark 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? Yes

3.75

Very solid sequel. I liked the growth in the interpersonal relationships and the vulnerable moments between the characters. I feel elated that I was so right about Caiman and Greyson asdfghjkl

Some plots didn't get resolved or weren't used at all after being important in the first half of the book. The writing was also repetitive at a lot of points, with the metaphors becoming exhausting and some constant phrasing interrupting the reading flow. At some points it resembled more a typical chosen-one narrative seen in young adult stories, than a new adult one but that's okay as I enjoyed the rage and violence and vindication we got. Not a biggest fan of the chosen-one narratives and unbreakable plot armor, but it was a fun read and for that I might check more from this author in the future.

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bookishmikay's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny 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

3.5

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shannnne_reads_words's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

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ebook_em's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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? Yes

3.5

The Blood Gift picks up where The Blood Trials left off and I was so excited to read more of Ikenna’s adventures.

Ikenna is such a compelling protagonist to begin with and I thought her character development was even better in this book than in The Blood Trials. Her anger and arrogance took on new, fascinating dimensions as she became more strategic and learned how to harness her gift. I was skeptical of the romance subplot in the first book but I came around to it in The Blood Gift. I also loved the found family elements within Ikenna’s squad and thought her encounters with the gods were really interesting. Similar to the Blood Trials, this book offers great commentary on colonialism, racism, sexism, patriotism, militarism, tyranny, and so much more.

Despite how much there was to love about this book, a few things frustrated me and ultimately lowered my rating. Without the trials in book one, the plot of the Blood Gift was variously driven by political intrigue, character relationships, and supernatural elements — but none felt fully developed. The world building usually happened through info dumps in dialogue, making it a bit clunky and hard to follow. A petty gripe is that the word “suffused” appeared so often that I was taken out of the story every time it appeared (all authors have overused words, so the fact that this particular one grated on me might just be a “me” problem). Finally, though this isn’t a complaint about the series itself, I wish I had known ahead of time that the books read like young adult novels; I have no problem with YA-ish writing but I was thrown off by incorrect expectations.

My favorite part of The Blood Gift was the last 20% or so — if more of the book had resembled the last quarter, I might have rated it 5 stars. Overall, this was a satisfying end to the duology and even though it didn’t meet all my hopes and dreams for the sequel, it was an enjoyable read.

My thanks to NetGalley and HarperCollins for an ARC of this book.

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