Reviews tagging 'Death'

Babel by R.F. Kuang

1062 reviews

bwoo's review against another edition

challenging dark sad 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: Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Murder, Cultural appropriation, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

ivana's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective 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

5.0

I should not have read the last 50 pages while on my period 😭😭😭 This was devastating and so so important. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Alcohol, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Drug use

Minor: Addiction, Slavery, and Sexual harassment

julchen_wei's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark hopeful sad fast-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Death of parent, and Cultural appropriation

Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, Suicide, Blood, and War

zoemay's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• 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 abuse, Death, Drug use, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual content, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Islamophobia, Grief, Religious bigotry, Murder, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Colonisation, War, and Classism

seforana's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious 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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Confinement, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual violence, Suicide, Violence, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

mostlykenny's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring 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? It's complicated

5.0

this was very tense, but so intriguing. A must read for sure !! ⭐️

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Colonisation, and War

Moderate: Child abuse, Racism, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

i cried hard when Robin was explaining to Victoire that he’d been thinking about death and that it was the only way for escaping and that Victoire would have to leave him behind. That whole conversation messed me up brutally.

irammy's review against another edition

adventurous challenging informative reflective 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? Yes

5.0

I absolutely devoured this book and was quickly immersed into this world, which at first glance didn't seem to differentiate from Victorian england. Despite being a work of fiction it was a great way to learn about the history and motivations between colonisation and abolition as the book attempts to provide a (fictional) perspective from voices that aren't often represented in history textbooks. The interspersion of real historical quotes particularly aided this. As a mixed race person I can relate with Robin's conflict between trying to blend in versus fight for the rights of the oppressed. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Torture, Violence, Death of parent, Murder, Colonisation, and Classism

avery_hutchinson's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense fast-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 beautiful, insightful, and utterly heartbreaking. It brought so many concepts to light through its rich world-building and complex characters. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Racial slurs, Racism, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, and Colonisation

Moderate: War

Minor: Vomit

halebop's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense 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

4.25

Character development was really great. Reader gets to really know and understand the MCs and their complicated feelings. Big themes of imperialism/oppression/racism. Very emotional read. The pacing felt off to me though, it was pretty slow until the last 150 pages when 75% of the plot happened. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Sexism, and Xenophobia

Minor: Death

applesodaperson's review against another edition

adventurous emotional sad slow-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

4.0

Geez so this book took me absolutely forever to read. Because right after I started it, I got a bunch of library books that I ended up reading first. But even once I got back into it, it was long. Because it is over 500 pages, and the font size is pretty small. And overall, I did like this book, but there was also a lot that I didn't like.
I unfortunately did not like the magic system in this book, because even after reading 500+ pages about it, it still felt confusing, and just not very cool. It almost felt overly complicated. And holy cow the sections where they were just talking about linguistics and etymology were so mind numbing and boring. It felt like I was there in the lecture with them. And I just wasn't engaged because etymology isn't something I am interested in. 
I liked Robin as a protagonist, because the narrative gave him room to make mistakes and grow, but the side characters all just blended together.
Something this book did really well was its commentary on racism. There was so much nuance around it and the characters all experienced it in different and very personal ways. It was just very well done and impactful, and the setting of 1800's England made it even more intense. Because as bad as it is today, discrimination against people of color was even worse back then. I just liked how significant it was to the story and I feel like I learned a lot.
Overall, this was a good book, but not the best book I have ever read. It did make me want to read more from R.F. Kuang though.
Read a personal copy. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Violence

Moderate: Racism