Reviews with content warning for Child abuse - Black Sun

I was not sure what to expect even though I had heard great things. This was great. A little slow to start but once the story gets going you will be hooked! Looking forward to reading the sequel even though I've heard mixed things.

I liked all of the characters that we follow except Narampa

I appreciated the LGBTQIA+ rep and I think this may be the only book I've read with the use of xe/xir pronouns

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theespressoedition's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense slow-paced

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

4.0

What an absolutely wild ride this book was!

It started out with one of the craziest prologues I've ever read in my life. A little gruesome and definitely gave me the ick right off the bat, but also completely hooked me. The drama! The mystery! The horror! I absolutely had to know what came next.

The cast of characters was all over the place, in the best way possible. If you're looking for a wonderfully diverse cast, you're certainly going to get it with Black Sun. I'm not only speaking of sexuality and race, however. The personalities of these characters were so wide-ranging and totally blew me away. One moment I was positive that I had a favorite character and a least favorite character, then suddenly, my mind was changed entirely! I will say, however, that by the end of the book, I think Xiala and Serapio still take the top spots for favorite characters - for no reason other than the fact that they just fascinated me so much.

This story is filled with such incredible storytelling. There are characters that are convinced they can turn themselves to gods, characters that are fantastical creatures, and characters that can communicate with animals. While the world-building is similar to most adult fantasy novels (a bit slower-paced towards the beginning and picking up during the second half of the book), the characters keep you glued to the pages, dying to know what's going to happen. I wouldn't necessarily say that any of these characters had major growth during this particular book, but the way they were written made you want to see how their story progresses.

I did get slightly confused by the number of POVs and timelines throughout the book, which is the primary reason why this one didn't get a full 5 stars from me. But, if you don't mind new POVs being added halfway through or the timelines switching every other chapter, you'll be just fine! That's 100% a personal thing for me.

Overall, I can't recommend this enough. There are a few pretty gory moments, but nothing that lasts so long as to really bother (and I'm an incredibly sensitive reader). It's certainly unlike any other fantasy I've ever read and I can't wait to get my hands on the sequel!

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lindsloveslit's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

3.25

Black Sun starts off with heavy AF content. 😅 So much so that I reread the entire first chapter asking myself "did that really just happen?" 🤯 You KNOW it HAD to be good because it got me out of my reading funk. 🙌🏽But because of said funk, it took me a minute to get into it so, it's a 4 instead of 5 star read. Oddly enough, I think if I reread it I'd rate it higher, which I don't think I've ever said. 🤔

There were a lot of characters, locations, and time jumps throughout, which is generally a disaster for me. But, somehow? This worked masterfully. I love that it is a fantasy book based around Pre-Columbian Americas! I love how diverse the characters were! I LOVE that it started out with a character log! (When I started with book journals five years ago, it was because of lack of character logs/maps).

I desperately want this book made into a TV series. It was way too fantastical to squeeze into a movie. 📺

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yellow_star's review against another edition

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dark sad slow-paced

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

1.0

Spoilers: This opens with child abuse... child torture? Skip this book if you don't want to read about a parent lovingly stabbing their child. The rest of the book is not more cheerful. Please do not read this if you get devastated by books. If you are used to Grimdark books though this has an interesting plot, I just can't get past how dark this is.

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lolajh's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious reflective 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

Such a beautiful and interesting book that had each chapter being in a different place of the world in the book and a different point of view for each character, with the point of views being shown being Xiala (a queer woman), Serapio (a blind man) Naranpa (another queer woman) and a few minor chapters from Okoa’s point of view.

Xiala was an amazing character to learn about throughout this book. A pirate captain who had to work hard to gain the respect of her peers due to her being a female captain as well as a Teek, which is a female-only race in this world. She is targeted by racism, sexism and homophobia and is very confident and accepting of all her identities. There are minor flings and attraction between her and women throughout the book, and the highlighted romance being between her and a man. Seeing a heterosexual relationship with queer characters was really interesting because of how different love is experienced compared to typical heterosexual relationships. Xiala is also so strong independent from her love interest with her own goals and ideals. Her character arc was wonderful and relatable. Loved it

Serapio’s chapters were of great interest because of how the author describes his perception of the world being blind. This is done so well that when the chapter ends and switches to a different character I am still experiencing Serapio’s blindness and get confused on why appearances of things are being described because of how immersed and realistic his blindness is conveyed. Serapio’s disability also does not in any way weaken him; he is a strong physical fighter often underestimated by his opponents and him being able to see again is never a goal of his - it’s just accepted which was lovely to see.

Then Naranpa, my beautiful underrated queer ball of sunshine. In many reviews she is described as naive, which she can come across as at some points, but I just think she is a person trying to see the best in everyone and just has a lot of bad things happen to her. I love her very much. Naranpa’s chapters were also interesting because of her assassin ex-lover Iktan who is nonbinary and goes by xe/xir pronouns that are never disrespected by the characters except for

at the end where Okoa describes xir as a woman which I personally think took away a lot of xir character and I can’t really understand why the author decided to put that in

Iktan is my absolute favourite character of this book. Xir character was so interesting because of how badass and talented and feared xe is and if ONLY we got an Iktan pov so I could know how xe thinks and seeing xir having a character arc with different ideals that aren’t just what Naranpa thinks xe is thinking. There were also several more nonbinary and trans characters in this book going by they/them or xe/xir. One of these characters, Powageh, explained xir identity as being a “third gender” which wasn’t my favourite wording of it as it puts a binary onto something that is literally not binary. Something like “neither man nor woman” would have been better phrasing, but gender can feel different for everyone and if “third gender” feels like the right wording for xir then to each their own. Anyway, still loved this book and the diversity of the poc and queer characters all in a fantasy and science fiction world.

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readingelli's review against another edition

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adventurous tense medium-paced

4.0

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