Reviews tagging 'Incest'

Weyward by Emilia Hart

197 reviews

imchelsi's review

dark emotional hopeful sad 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

This book was a phenomenal read.  The three storylines were expertly woven together, showing us women across centuries taking back their power. This book deals with some tough topics. Please read trigger warning before picking up this book as I neglected to do.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Incest, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Abortion, Suicide attempt, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Death of parent

Minor: Cancer

ccmarie_'s review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexual assault, Blood, Stalking, Abortion, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Animal death, Incest, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Car accident, and Death of parent

kris10akemi's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

Only maybe a spoiler but marking just in case.

Idk if this was the intention, but my main take away was men suck and there’s nothing like an empowered woman. I do love how the characters came to this realization by finding messages that were passed through the generations, but it’s also devastating how these women shared the same awful experiences over centuries. I think it does speak to the power of sharing your story and how it helps women recognize abuse. In terms of spookiness, Violet cast the type of spell I’d love to cast on all abusive men and I was living for it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, and Violence

autumn's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

I'll be honest - I originally gravitated towards this book because of the absolutely gorgeous cover artwork. I know, they say not to judge a book by its cover, but this is one that absolutely lived up to my expectations. 

I was uncertain, at first, how much I would take to the shifting POVs, since it wasn't just a character shift, but a timeline shift (which was new for me), but reading through the experiences of the Weyward women as they each lived was immersive and engaging.

Generations apart, so different and yet so much the same, the stories of the Weyward women rang true to my own, and the lives of women I have known, leaving me reading while holding my breath.

I hesitate to say that a fiction book helped me work through trauma of my own, but after one particular chapter, I found myself setting down my Kindle and staring into space, realizing that the sympathy I had for the main character was something I should grant myself, as well. That's powerful stuff, right there.

This book is intriguing, gut-wrenching, painful, and triumphant, and one of my favorite reads of 2024.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Abortion, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Incest and Rape

bookiesncreme's review

dark hopeful tense

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Incest, Rape, Blood, Vomit, and Abortion

Moderate: Domestic abuse and Physical abuse

Minor: Suicidal thoughts

sayben6's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Domestic abuse, Incest, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Blood, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

missjaward's review against another edition

dark mysterious fast-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? Yes

3.0

SPOILERS AHEAD three women's stories from different age spans.

In 1619 Althea is on trial for potential witchcraft, accused of putting a spell on her friend's husband, John, to kill him after finding out he was abusing his wife (Althea's friend Grace who was being beaten up because she could not provide him with an heir), Althea is actually involved in his death by proxy when 'her' crow causes his cows to stampede and kill him. Althea is found not-guilty in trial and very bizarrely at the end invites a local boy into her house to have sex with her one time so she can get pregnant and have a daughter. That was a bit weird.
 
Violet 1942 - doesn't know much about her own dead mother and lives a lonely life in a grand house. Her cousin comes to visit and rapes her (let's not forget not only was she a child but this is quite incestuous). When she becomes pregnant she is cast out of the family home into her mothers old poor cottage where she finds her mother old 'recipe/concoction' books and induces her own miscarriage. Its never really explained why her father chose the mother in the first place as she was obviously from such poor background and never seemed to care about her. Why would a man with all the riches and wealth choose someone like her (who he himself calls strange) without actually being truly in love with her? She lives the rest of her life without children but has visions of her brothers kid suffering in the future (she sees visions of a car accident and a horrible man), so she chooses to leave all of her possessions to her when she dies rather than try and make contact again. hmm.  the cousin also basically gets away with the rape, although it is alluded that Violet puts a curse on the family home so it is infested with bugs until her death

Modern day Kate - finds the courage to leave her abusive relationship when she realises she is pregnant. She flees in the night to the cottage left to her and tries to start anew. While I totally get fleeing the abusive relationship - there is no real thought to what is going to happen after the baby comes. Unless its reported in the right ways, the father is likely to find out and demand visitation because he is so controlling anyway. She also keeps blaming herself for her dad's death after he was hit by a car when she was distracted by a crow (the crow in question being her aunts - so really did she ultimately kill her brother?!) 

The endings of each story were pretty predicable. The only one I really didn't like was Altheas where it was so important to her to have a child that she just randomly bedded a guy from the village once so she could be impregnated. I quite liked the end of Kates story where she was able to almost use her witchy powers to have the birds and spiders attack Simon making him leave. I think I would have preferred more of the witchy elements rather than just the abusive men storylines but heyho.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Incest, Infertility, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Grief, Abortion, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

bmatth3's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful mysterious 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Domestic abuse, Incest, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Medical trauma, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, and Classism

Moderate: Infertility

Minor: War

kitfkat's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious sad fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Alcoholism, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Incest, Infertility, Miscarriage, Medical content, and War

acourtofsaraflames's review

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

4.0

The audiobook is good and I recommend this format. I feel if I had tried reading instead of listening then I would have DNF’d. 

I was expecting more witchcraft than trauma reading this. Most reviews mention to read the content warnings and I agree. I tried to add as many as I could remember. At the height of the stories there’s abuse, mostly physical, and unwanted/unplanned pregnancy. I don’t want to spoil anything further so I’ll leave it at that but read the rest of the warnings in case something may be triggering to you. The beauty behind this story is the resilience of the three women and how their stories are connected. The women are alike and intertwined in more ways than one. We get their POV’s that take place over 400 years. 

A couple of my favorite quotes (spoiler free):

“Witch. The word slithers from the mouth like a serpent. Drips from the tongue as thick and black as tar. We never thought of ourselves as witches, my mother and I, for this was a word invented by men. A word that brings power to those who speak it, not those it describes.”

“There are enough men in the world already” 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape and Abortion

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Incest, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Grief, Medical trauma, Car accident, and Pregnancy

Minor: Infertility, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Murder, and War