Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

The Sword of Kaigen by M.L. Wang

29 reviews

lauramcc7's review against another edition

adventurous emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death of parent, Rape, War, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Grief, Child death, Death, and Misogyny

ddnreads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark 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

How am I going to continue my reading challenge without dreading the downhill experience bcs how am I going to TOP THIS BOOK HOWWWWW

It's always a high fantasy with the most intense family drama and romance. Gut-wrenching beautifully written plot. It's a story of valuing tradition and power, a griefing mother, and undoubtedly angst romance. Women empowerment and community care. 

I love it so much. I cried with it. I healed with it. This is awesome end of the story.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Physical abuse, Misogyny, Rape, War, Fire/Fire injury, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Pregnancy, Sexual violence, Genocide, Blood, Body horror, and Miscarriage

susanatherly's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Death of parent, Murder, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Miscarriage, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, War, Infertility, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Child abuse, Vomit, and Child death

zeldazonks's review against another edition

dark emotional 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

4.5

An incredible book, I cried 3 times reading this. I have to admit that it ever so slightly lost me towards the end, I also would be so up for this to be a series so I'm gutted that I won't get more. The writing was beautiful, the journey we go on with the characters is so good (especially Mamoru) and the lore/world building was just amazing. I spent 75% of this book convinced it would be a 5* read but I do have a few gripes:

1) for some reason the very specific way that Misaki's extra curricular activities (trying to avoid spoilers) are written felt really incongruous with everything else and were kind of cringe to me. The superhero vibes were just jarring. 

2) I on the whole didn't mind the redemption arc of the husband, I spent a lot of the book waiting for it to happen because otherwise he would have been so cartoonishly villainous, but I think Misaki was very quick to forgive a specific incident involving Mamoru. 

3) I don't know if it's because it was meant to be a series and then plans changed, but there's so much set up for plot lines for future books and so the end kind of lagged for me compared to how incredible the first 2/3 of the book were. 

Having said that, the first 2/3 were so good, that I still loved it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, War, Gore, Death, Torture, Grief, Violence, Rape, Pregnancy, and Miscarriage

Moderate: Child abuse and Sexism

Minor: Homophobia

abirdiebooks's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I feel like I just read 2.5 mostly finished books instead of one cohesive story. This could have benefited from M.L. Wang waiting to get a bit better at building a story and world, a few more rounds of editing and some thrown out plot points. This feels like it should have been somewhere in the middle drafting stages (storywise, mostly not writing wise) and not a finished product. It IS sad that we won't get more though. If this book had been worked on longer and published later and as part of a more cohesive series set up it could have been excellent.

Potential triggers:

The casual moments of domestic abuse, both in thought, conversations, and actions could have absolutely either disappeared or been handled differently. The mention but complete lack of real discussion regarding marital rape was just. No

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Child death, Gore, Suicide, Miscarriage, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, War, Grief, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Body horror, Homophobia, Violence, Toxic relationship, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Rape, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Torture, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual assault, and Sexism

insomniacsun's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

4.5

Partiamo col dire che questo libro mi ha fatto singhiozzare miserabilmente. Scoprire che questo era uno spin-off di una serie interrotta mi è un po' dispiaciuto, ma dopo aver letto il motivo, rispetto e ammiro la decisione dell'autrice. Il suo nuovo libro è un'aggiunta sicura alla TBR. 

Con il cuore infranto e l'anima in pace, dedico una standing ovation a Wang per la sua capacità di sviluppare i suoi personaggi e i loro rapporti in modo così umano e struggente, senza soffocarli con elementi del worldbuilding tipici dei romanzi epic fantasy, bilanciando con maestria magia e protagonisti accattivanti. Per quanto abbia trovato l'arco narrativo di Takeru un po' più sbrigativo di altri, questo non l'ha reso comunque un personaggio debole, narrativamente parlando. 

Per quanto la trama e il suo sviluppo meritino pieni voti, alcune scelte stilistiche mi trattengono dal farlo: la scoperta dei legami di questo libro con una precedente serie ha reso più sensati alcuni miei problemi con la prima parte, quali l'eccessiva esposizione storico-politica in alcuni paragrafi. Suppongo che avrebbero dovuto rappresentare un semplice ripasso o un nuovo POV di una realtà che il lettore aveva già presente, ma da neo-lettrice di questo mondo l'ho trovato un po' ostico.

L'altro aspetto che ho trovato un po' grezzo, è stato l'approccio alla lingua. 
Prima di tutto il modo di rappresentare più dialetti in una stessa conversazione era troppo limitato: finchè si trattava di un'altra lingua solamente, il corsivo andava più che bene. Il problema è partito nell'ultimo terzo del libro, dove più lingue erano parlate simultaneamente. La presenza di traduttori nella mischia poteva essere usato meglio e avrebbe aiutato l'evitare transliterazioni ripetitive con cui l'autrice ha cercato di risolvere la questione. 
Inoltre, ho trovato confusionaria la decisione di non tradurre tutto dal giapponese, che era la lingua considerata principale dal libro: è stata una saggia scelta nei numerosi casi di espressioni e suffissi unici alla lingua, ma mi è rimasto impresso come un semplice conto alla rovescia sia stato semplicemente romanizzato invece che tradotto. 

Detto questo, the Sword of Kaigen rimarrà uno di quei libri a cui non smetterò mai di pensare per il livello d'intensità e coinvolgimento che ha saputo mantenere fino alla fine, soprattutto considerando il mio grande debole per i rapporti familiari intriganti.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Body horror, Suicide, Miscarriage, Grief, Rape, Violence, and War

kirsten1999's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, War, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

Moderate: Infertility, Murder, Bullying, Gaslighting, and Miscarriage

abken's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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

Perfect 100/100 book. One of my favorite books ever. Slice of life story for more than 50% of the book. It was emotional, it hit right in the feelings

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Grief, Rape, Sexism, and Medical trauma

toni_k's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Grief, Miscarriage, Suicide, Blood, Child death, Death, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Body horror, and Rape

mjadeh's review against another edition

dark emotional sad 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: Child death, Death, Rape, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Miscarriage, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Grief, Misogyny, Racism, and War