Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson

13 reviews

aleyajo's review

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

Giggling and kicking my feet, Brandon you’ve done it again. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Torture, Violence, Death, Blood, Body horror, and Gore

thecheeseowl's review

adventurous dark emotional hopeful 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

3.75

I have a lot of mixed feelings about this book.
*Spoilers ahead*
 one hand the world building in this book is fantastic with a magic system that was fully thoughtout and brings a lot to the world. But I don't think it was explained to the audience as well as it could have.

I like Seubron, Siri, Vivenna, and Lightsong. They are fun to root for and bring a good through line throughout the book. But most of the other important characters changed sides late into the book causing me to lose in vestment in all of them. It got to the point where most of reveals started to feel cheap.

The book unceremoniously kills Blushweaver. Her death was only used to develop Lightsong as a character and did not feel like it was a natural conclusion for her story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, War, and Blood

Moderate: Gore

shlymiller's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful 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? It's complicated

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence

Moderate: Blood, Torture, and Gore

Minor: Physical abuse, Racism, and Pregnancy

lakinglaze's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny 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

5.0

I loved this book so much! I know I said Elantris is now my favourite Brandon Sanderson novel, but this comes in as a very close second! The more I think about it, the more I love it! I really hope we get additional books! The characters are great! I had such a blast speeding through this book! 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Confinement, Violence, War, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Blood, Animal death, Body horror, Abandonment, Gore, Torture, Toxic friendship, Fire/Fire injury, Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

chris_reads's review against another edition

emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, War, and Violence

Moderate: Alcohol, Blood, Confinement, Sexual harassment, and Misogyny

Minor: Gore, Rape, Torture, Trafficking, and Vomit

imbored_soillread's review against another edition

adventurous challenging mysterious 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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Gore, and Grief

Moderate: Sexual harassment and Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Sexual content

lebolt's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny lighthearted fast-paced

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

3.75

I'll admit this book gets off to a rocky start, and has some other rocky moments, but the typical Sanderson ingenuitiy in the magic system, as well as a cast of genuinely likeable characters, keeps enough momentup to get to the good stuff. And the good stuff is great! One of the most satisfying stories I've read by Sanderson - and all in a relatively short volume! Definitely worth a read even if you havent read any of his other work. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Gore, Kidnapping, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Vomit and War

Minor: Animal cruelty and Rape

No spoilers: This book is pretty brutal despite its lighthearted tone. Female characters are repeatedly and forcefully stripped and/or viewed naked by others. One of these characters is a teenager. Kidnapping, torture, and contemplation thereof are recurring themes and are used frequently as plot devices. Body horror for zombie creatures is recurring. Aftermath of torture of animals is shown. Forced marriage, as well as related and unrelated sexual violence, is discussed repeatedly as a threat to female characters. Poverty and starvation are vivdly described.

cookiecat73's review

dark funny mysterious slow-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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Kidnapping, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Alcohol, Police brutality, Toxic friendship, War, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Confinement, Xenophobia, Classism, Murder, Religious bigotry, and Misogyny

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Rape, Torture, Child abuse, Colonisation, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Pregnancy, Body horror, Sexual content, and Suicide

Minor: Ableism, Child death, Grief, and Gaslighting

ldorina's review against another edition

adventurous medium-paced

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

4.75

The short review: In my opinion the best thing about Warbreaker is that it brings us an incredibly detailed and lively fantasy world with a mind blowing magic system you've probably never seen before and a lot of discussion about religion without taking sides. It also has a cast of realistic lovable characters and some interesting relationships (though it's true that there are some tropes too). Brandon Sanderson does a solid job with character development, as well. For the most part, there isn't much action in the book but the plot is compelling enough to keep reading. However, it's obvious that characters and worldbuilding are the stronger elements of the novel. I think there's room for a sequel but Warbreaker is great as a stand-alone.

And now let's get into the indepth review. Warning: SPOILERS ahead for the rest of the review!

We start with a prologue that features Vasher, one of the secondary characters, after he has got himself thrown into prison. I think it's an excellent opening because:
1. The reader gets immersed in the story right away as they get to know the arguably most interesting and mysterious character who is also in the middle of an action that brings up the question: 'What is his motive?' And of course there is Nightblood, the talking sword that can kill without being completely pulled from its sheet, so we keep reading.
2. It introduces the magic system which is the key element of the whole book and in the first 11 pages we learn the basics of how it works.
3. There's some action too keep us interested.
4. We don't know it at this point but the title 'Warbreaker' refers to the name Vasher was given when he returned (Warbreaker the Peaceful) so it's fitting that the book starts and ends with him as a way of framing the story.

In the first chapter we get to know the two main characters, Siri and Vivenna, the sisters from the royal family of Idris (and also their father, the king). The fact that these two girls are basically yin and yang is clear from the beginning, they are like Arya and Sansa Stark from GoT, with Siri being the adventurous younger princess who likes to be out in nature, talking to common people and causing her father a great deal of trouble by being rebellious, skipping her classes, shitting at propriety and not controlling herself at all. On the otherhand there's Vivenna, the older, more mature, calmer sister, who - unlike Siri - was born to be a queen and is responsible enough to try to live up to the task from early childhood by obeying her father's commands, studying hard and respecting the 'rules' at all times. The difference is visible just by looking at the hair of these two. Thanks to the royal locks, that show how a person is feeling if they don't focus on regulating the color (great piece of world-building by the way), Siri's hair color is always changing, letting the people around her know about her mood, while Vivenna's stay the same modest dark brown.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Death, Gore, Kidnapping, Confinement, Murder, and Violence

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Cursing, Grief, Torture, War, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Rape, Addiction, Alcohol, Child death, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

cognitivedisaster's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-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

4.25

Read it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Classism, Gore, and War

Minor: Rape, Sexual content, and Torture