Reviews with content warning for Blood - Black Leopard, Red Wolf

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Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

83 reviews

taleofabibliophile's review against another edition

I just wasn't finding myself bothered about reading this. I tried to give it a good chance as I've heard if you get so far in its worth it, but I just don't think this is for me.

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rubyellen95's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional sad 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

4.25

Trigger warnings for most things that could be triggering so proceed with care. A dark tale of a man who was hired to find a missing boy ten years ago and tells his story to an inquisitor after that same boy has died.

Magic, myth, mystery and graphic psychological horror abound wrapped in a queer romantic adventure about love, family, found family, masculinity, and pride.

There's also misogyny but it's explored as a character flaw of the character that most displays it.

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rusya's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional 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? It's complicated

5.0

One of the best books I've read.

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bodiesinbooks's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

4.25

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f18's review against another edition

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4.0

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annemaries_shelves's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

tldr; incredibly violent with intensely misogynistic characters (especially the main character/narrator who has severe parent issues) but a super compelling story/atmosphere with incredible worldbuilding you're just thrown into. Also Sogolon is amazing, and knowing what her breasts look like doesn't change that fact.

Because this was a buddy read I didn't give up in the first 50 pages. Despite having read and loved A Brief History of Seven Killings, I had a harder time reconciling/handling the extreme violence and sexual, graphic nature of James's writing this time. However, it really took a turn 150 pages in and I was sucked in (like many reviews suggested would happen). The violence and the references to women's breasts never ceased, but the writing and worldbuilding and plot really compelled me to continue reading a chapter a day. James really doesn't hold his readers' hands through the novel, he expects you to keep up - something I found refreshing this time around. The ten and nine doors, which are introduced halfway through the novel, are such an inventive twist on magical doors/portals, and I loved every paragraph dedicated to them. I hope they show up again because there's so much about their existence - how they work, how long they've been around, etc. - that we don't know.

I will say that a lot of the rape, sexual assault, and violence doesn't have a strong emotional component. There's so little emotional reflection and trauma processing from every incident,

including the non-consensual bestiality with hyena women shapeshifters

, that it was only the shock value that stuck with me. When I compare and contrast with female authors writing similar violence, there's such a stark difference in how the emotional aspects are handled. Part of it is due to the unreliable, intentionally unemotional (except anger) main character whose perspective we're in throughout the text, and part of it is due to James's writing choices. Since he did (or rather didn't) have a similar approach in A Brief History, I'm inclined to think it's just a (largely negative, to me) aspect of his writing.

My other main critique is the pacing is a little off. He will spend so much time having his characters travel, and explore the world and their pasts, and then build-up to a key action sequence or information reveal. And then it's over in 2-5 pages. And we're on to the next scene. For example, the Darklands are hailed as big and scary and fucked up (think Mirkwood or Fangorn Forest of LOTR but wayyyyy worse) and then it was a short chapter. I was constantly disappointed that we didn't spend a lot of time in key action scenes, or seeing the fallout of the characters actions.

Like in Dolingo, there's a slave revolt after it's revealed that the city uses slaves in the walls and interiors to mechanically manipulate the city. And we're thrown in the middle of the action with very little pages dedicated to it.

I'm hoping that some of it's intentional as the sequels are intended to explore the same events through different perspectives. Like Sogolon's.

Speaking of Sogolon - she's one of my favourite characters. For all that James can't seem to ignore women's breasts in his writing, he sure knows how to write (mostly tough) female characters that exist wholly in and of themselves, and are constantly pointing out the inequities and problems women face in this world. All the female characters had great insights into both Tracker (our MC) and the world's attitudes and actions towards women.

There's also a lot of queerness throughout the book. This world both accepts and villifies homosexuality and it's talked about in a lot of violent, less than nice ways. Yet, throughout the novel, Tracker, and other gay characters, come to terms with their identities - however, this is NOT a novel about exploring your sexual identity and becoming comfortable with who you are. That's very much tertiary, almost subtext, element.

That said, I was rooting for Mossi and Tracker so hard, since Leopard kinda ditched for middle of the book.

In addition to the queer elements, there's a fair amount of discussion (really mostly through dialogue) of gender roles, women as witches, slavery, skin colour, and tribal/political conflicts. James really packed a lot into his fantasy mythology novel!

Finally, I will say that the final section felt disjointed. The main portion of the story finishes in Section 4, with Section 5 as an interlude of 4 years in verse. Section 6 then rushes through the second tracking of the child (which is mentioned at the beginning of the book) with unsatisfactory explanations of what's happening and lots of missing information. Again, I can only hope that it's explored in the sequels because as an ending to what was up until that point a relatively standalone novel, it was a bit of a letdown. We very much ended in the middle of the grand, mythological, story.

Overall, for those who can handle (or want to handle) *really* dark, violent, sexist/misogynistic (from characters, not the author himself) fantasy, I recommend giving Black Leopard, Red Wolf a try. It's a long read, and there's a bit of work on your end (maps and character lists are provided) but a worthwhile story if you jive with it.

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