Reviews with content warning for War - The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, Band 01

Reviews tagging 'War'

The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, Band 01 by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu

56 reviews

thatpansyboy's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous emotional funny mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

wardenred's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous challenging funny medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Attempt the impossible.

A few years ago I really, really tried to get into the tv show based on this book because so many of my friends were gushing about it. Long story short, I just couldn’t vibe with it despite trying. Recently, the same friends started talking about it again, and about the fanfic for it that they were reading and writing, and the fanfic sounded interesting enough that I thought, hey, maybe I should tackle the canon again to be in the know. Maybe it will work for me better in book form.

It… both did and didn’t work for me better in book form. The super amateurish translation sadly didn’t help—the resulting prose was of such low quality and full of such weird turns of phrase that it was legitimately hard to focus on reading. Instead of getting immersed into the story, I kept poking at odd sentences and/or thinking, “I wonder what the actual author meant to say here and what the effect would be if I could read it in Chinese“ (sadly, I don’t know Chinese).

But despite that, when I did manage to get immersed, it was pretty good? Wei Wuxian was an entertaining and interesting protagonist to follow, and I was fascinated by the worldbuilding. And the plotty bits were seriously good. Actually, in a weird turn of events, I was more interested in all the external/setting-focused plottiness than the relationship developments, especially when it came to the main relationship. Apparently, no matter the medium, the hype and I are just. Completely on different pages with this story. It’s strange, because the tropes here are the ones I usually enjoy, and the dynamic should be pulling me in, but every time the book focused on Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, I was like, “Yeah… cool… can we another evil ghost encounter or something now?“

Guess it’s one of those cases where a popular story just doesn’t resonate with me enough, but I’m still glad I gave it a chance and I’m actually interested in picking up some other danmei books now.

Content Warnings

josamawi's review against another edition

3.5

adventurous dark funny lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

Content Warnings

bookcheshirecat's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous funny mysterious medium-paced

“If you walk the night road too often, sooner or later, you'll run into ghosts.”

➽ I wasn't really planning on reading this series, but my friend loves it, so I had to see why she was so obsessed with it. Fortunately, this story was right up my alley and I ended up falling in love with it as well 💞 This was my first danmei story and it already set the bar high for any other books I'll be reading in the future! The story follows Wei Wuxian, who was once a renowned cultivator before turning to the dark arts and dying a horrific death. Years later, he's resurrected into the body of a scorned young man called Mo Xuanyu who sacrificed his life to get revenge on those who wronged him. I was immediately fascinated by the world, especially as I hadn't read about this specific subgenre before. The focus of the world is on the cultivation of spiritual power and the hunting of ghosts and demons. While there are many clans that practice cultivation, the bigger, more powerful clans (the Jin, Jiang, Lan & Nie clans) have the greatest influence.

➽ I loved the switch between the present day and the flashbacks. Right from the beginning, you know that something happened to make everyone revile Wei Wuxian as the 'Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation' but there is still so much about the past we're only slowly uncovering. I love the mystery of what happened in the war with the Wen Clan and how exactly Wei Wuxian died in his first life. I guess we'll be getting a lot of flashbacks over the course of the series and slowly keep seeing the bigger picture. Things are already exciting in the present day as well, as there's a dangerous ghost arm on the loose!

➽ The heart of the story are of course the characters! To no one's surprise, my favorite is Wei Wuxian, as I love mischievous, morally grey characters. While everyone talks about him like he's the devil personified, you start to question how much of it is just gossip and rumours that went out of control. While Wei Wuxian practices an unorthodox path of cultivation, he cares about protecting the young juniors he encounters on a Night Hunt. I loved his playful personality and humor, he's my kind of character, especially since there also seems to be a tragic background story! Our second main character is Lan Zhan, an old acquaintance who is held in high esteem in the cultivation world. He's a man of few words and often it's difficult to tell what he's thinking. I loved their dynamic from the start as they're such different characters. We even get a flashback that shows their first meeting back in their youth. Wei Wuxian has to maintain the identity of Mo Xuanyu, the man whose body he now inhabits, but staying close to Lan Zhan might be a good idea for now!

“Young man, sometimes in life there are a few sappy things one must say.” “What?” Jin Ling asked.” ’Thank you’ and ‘I’m sorry’,” Wei Wuxian replied “there’ll come a day when you’ll say them through tears.”

Content Warnings

bruxinha_fc's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

itsnotalakeitsanocean's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

I've been meaning to re-read this series now that all of the volumes are out and I've bought them; mostly because having to wait for each new release left me forgetting where the last volume left off each time. I'm happy to report that it's still entertaining on a re-read

and has some delicious re-read value as to why Lan Wangji acts the way he does around Wei Wuxian

.

Unfortunately I can't rate it much higher because:

a) There's a lot of instances where the story flashes back to past events but the transition between past and present is clunky and left me scratching my head trying to figure out what happened where and when (even with a timeline of everything explained to me).

b) This is an extremely minor nitpick but there are so many instances Wei Wuxian is described as laughing or cackling in response to a lot of situations. This wouldn't be so bad if it was one or two situations but I feel like it's overdone to the point it feels like if anything mildly amusing happens, he'll be cackling like a hyena.

Content Warnings