Reviews tagging 'Addiction'

L'impero del vampiro by Jay Kristoff

94 reviews

teaforghosts's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-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? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Bullying, Child death, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Outing, and Alcohol

rooree's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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

4.75

Really liked it, straight into book 2. The method of telling a story through the main c narrating his story worked a lot better than I thought it would. Classic gothic vampire genre. Good character development as well as plot development. Overall plot reveal is probably quite slow (definitely done across the three books), but the events that happen through the development of that plot are quite fast paced so works quite well. Brilliant narrator.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcoholism, Death, Homophobia, Grief, and War

whatlisareads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Violence

Moderate: Addiction

jadehusdanhicks's review against another edition

adventurous dark reflective tense slow-paced

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

3.0

An ambitious start to a series this book is a monster at over 700 pages. I found its format to be quite unique in its format of our tale being dictated as a story to the enemy of our protagonist. You see two sides of Gabriel , the darkened drunk who’s lost his faith, family and friends  and the silver saint, national hero who still had hope and may have been the key to our problems. 

With days death, the light is nearly gone making it perfect for the vampires to rise and walk in the day when they previously couldn’t.  This story definitely focuses on worldbuilding to set the scene for the rest of the series, but also sets a tone of revenge between Gabriel and the Voss ruler. I enjoyed how intricate the world is, with nations broken down into main and indigenous areas as well as establishing a ruling religious system as well as opposing pagan beliefs. 

From grief to religious trauma, death to homophobia, murder to betrayal, and more this book covers a lot of tropes and topics and can certainly be a hard read with its length and depth. For some it may be confusing to follow at points as we jump from the story back to a scene of our MC being made to tell the story for documentation so it isn’t linear in its timeline  but it was a unique choice to format which certainly had me intrigued. 

It’s a shame that kristoff is the author as honestly i enjoyed this and would continue the series but with his fetishisation of wlw minors and appropriating and criticising Māori culture  in nevernight i morally can’t support him as an author and wouldn’t have purchased had i know this beforehand. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gun violence, Homophobia, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail

bohboh's review against another edition

Not great writing. Mishandling of French and generally uncomfortable sexism / misogyny plagues it. My eyes hurt from rolling them so much at the descriptors for the supposed macho-manly Silversaint knights. I do not understand the appeal, and reading about the dozens of controversies surrounding the author online, I'm quite comfortable leaving this one DNF.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

nesstayls's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Even though this had quite a slow start, once the characters and world were established, the twists and turns really kept me on my toes. The slow reveal to the backstory of the main character was well done. The exploration of religious themes and faith really helped cement the motives of the characters and overarching plot. The action scenes kept me hooked and I will definitely be reading the next book to see how this all turns out.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Religious bigotry, and War

Minor: Drug use and Homophobia

mathcatscats's review against another edition

adventurous dark

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.0

Dang. That was rough (complimentary)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Blood, Religious bigotry, and Death of parent

rouyuriko's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad 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

5.0

Wow. Fantastic book. If you find yourself not loving the main character at first, hang in there. The way everything comes together at the end is wonderful. While covering a very dark world with a lot of hatred stemming from religious zealotry, the themes are well handled and there is a beautiful light in the ending message.

I borrowed this from the library but love it so much I want to buy a copy. The illustrations are also gorgeous! I don't even like vampire stories normally.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Cursing, Death, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Animal death and Child death

Minor: Homophobia

thicgrilly's review against another edition

adventurous dark 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? It's complicated

5.0

A wonderfully built world and character development which is so immersive that you may hate the author by the end. A brilliant read that still lingers in my thoughts daily.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Cursing, Death, Violence, Blood, Murder, and War

jyorbin's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.75

Loved the world building and the tone of the book. The performance on the audiobook was really good. Great book if you like vampires and vampire hunters.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction and Cursing