A review by unoriginalusername
Crier's War by Nina Varela

adventurous challenging mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.25

Has a bit of a slow start, with all of the world building necessary for the story. This is a queer sci-fi fantasy duet, focusing on a “forbidden love” aspect of our couple, war, overturning powers, deception, betrayal, and so much more. These topics can get a little heavy and possibly confusing, however, the author does a wonderful job of adding a map and a timeline to the book for easier tracking!

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Genocide, Slavery, Blood, War, Injury/Injury detail, Classism

Minor: Death of parent, Alcohol

This book deal with some heavy topics such as war, colonization, genocide (using this term loosely, will explain), and death This book contains two races: the Humans and the Automae. The automa were created for the humans, and were treated mostly like pets for the ultra wealthy. The tides changed, there was an uprising, subsequent war, and the Automa winning said war. The scripts flipped for the humans and Automa, and the humans are now treated as “less than”, with forced labor, mass deaths, raids, and the like. With topics like these, other smaller aspects (I.e. blood, injury, etc) are bound to be prevalent too. Despite the heaviness of the history, the book is very LGBT friendly with no apparent homophobia