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bea_reads_books's reviews
234 reviews
The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee
adventurous
emotional
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
The Dead Girls of Hysteria Hall by Katie Alender
emotional
mysterious
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
This book showcases a lot of problems with “white feminism”, as it were. The mother is a professor of women’s studies, but instead of having any meaningful discussions about prejudice, she just occasionally says things like “you know I don’t like that word” with a sigh when the father says something sexist. She’s used as the butt of a joke, or as a way to say “lol moms right?
This book also reeks of ableism, and is shockingly cishetero-normative for being set in a historical asylum. Realistically, these places would be filled with queer people, neurodivergent people, and disabled people - not just pretty white girls whose dads didn’t like that they had boyfriends. While it is true that women and girls deemed “promiscuous” or “troublesome” were often institutionalized, they were far from the only demographic to suffer such a fate. Refusing to acknowledge this and contributing to the erasure of people like myself, especially when writing about such a heavy topic, is irresponsible at best and extremely harmful at worst. The history of our mistreatment is not a frivolous plot point to be played with for spook-factor.
I also really hated the climax of the plot. The main antagonist of the book is an amalgamation of dark energy supposedly created by some great injustice in the asylum’s past. And what great injustice might this be? Not the forced and traumatic institutionalization of hundreds of women and girls; not the horrible mistreatment of these innocent people; not even the deaths of the women in the house. No, rather the “great injustice” that makes the house evil is the death of the warden, a horrible man who championed the suffering of the women under his watch, and who was murdered by his own daughter because he locked her away from her baby and subjected her to what is essentially torture. Placing the death of their tormentor over the suffering and deaths of hundreds of women and girls is, in my opinion, disgusting. Why was their torment not enough of a “great injustice” to generate any paranormal power?
This book also reeks of ableism, and is shockingly cishetero-normative for being set in a historical asylum. Realistically, these places would be filled with queer people, neurodivergent people, and disabled people - not just pretty white girls whose dads didn’t like that they had boyfriends. While it is true that women and girls deemed “promiscuous” or “troublesome” were often institutionalized, they were far from the only demographic to suffer such a fate. Refusing to acknowledge this and contributing to the erasure of people like myself, especially when writing about such a heavy topic, is irresponsible at best and extremely harmful at worst. The history of our mistreatment is not a frivolous plot point to be played with for spook-factor.
I also really hated the climax of the plot. The main antagonist of the book is an amalgamation of dark energy supposedly created by some great injustice in the asylum’s past. And what great injustice might this be? Not the forced and traumatic institutionalization of hundreds of women and girls; not the horrible mistreatment of these innocent people; not even the deaths of the women in the house. No, rather the “great injustice” that makes the house evil is the death of the warden, a horrible man who championed the suffering of the women under his watch, and who was murdered by his own daughter because he locked her away from her baby and subjected her to what is essentially torture. Placing the death of their tormentor over the suffering and deaths of hundreds of women and girls is, in my opinion, disgusting. Why was their torment not enough of a “great injustice” to generate any paranormal power?
The Lesbiana's Guide to Catholic School by Sonora Reyes
emotional
funny
hopeful
sad
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? Yes
5.0
The Monster of Elendhaven by Jennifer Giesbrecht
dark
mysterious
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Ugh this really hit the spot for me. My absolute favorite kind of deliciously fucked up.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Self harm, Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Animal death, Child death, Sexism, and Grief
Minor: Gun violence, Sexual assault, Medical content, and Stalking
Force of Fire by Sayantani DasGupta
Did not finish book.
Did not finish book.
I would’ve loved this as a kid but I just couldn’t make myself pay attention
Song of Silver, Flame Like Night by Amélie Wen Zhao
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-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
3.5
Okay I have a lot of thoughts, mostly positive but let’s start with the negative.
This book has a lot of things that I’m realizing are common with “romantasy”, which I am learning is not my thing, so take my opinions with a grain of salt. If you love fantasy romance, these things probably won’t bother you.
First, structurally this book felt rushed. There were typos and weird run-on sentences (not a ton, but definitely enough that I noticed). There were times where the wrong word was used (i.e. “Dredges” when the author meant “Dregs”).
Second - and this is something I really disliked about the From Blood and Ash series - there is a lot of infodumping that is often, for some reason, repeated? Like we get a lot of the same information two or three times over, which made the book longer than I felt like it needed to be.
Third, it was kind of insta-love-y. I mean, the book takes place over a long enough period of time that it isn’t necessarily insta-love, but I personally felt like there were odd leaps between romantic moments, so it felt like we really rushed through the main characters bonding, which made the stronger emotions seem a little unfounded.
Fourth, and this is a very specific to myself complaint, I didn’t like Lan’s characterization very much. I’m getting really tired of every female main character being essentially a cardboard cutout of each other. She’s snarky and sassy, but has to be taught everything, but is also somehow a prodigy at everything she does, all while seeing herself as able to handle a lot, yet she’s constantly crying over something. (This isn’t to say that strength = emotionless, it’s just that her character feels set up to be more withdrawn and to keep her emotions inside, but then she’s falling over a lounge chair like a Disney Princess to sob uncontrollably.)
Lastly, I disliked the fact that Lan has no positive female relationships. Her mother is dead before the book starts; her supposed best friend is murdered like two seconds after we meet her (and Lan almost never thinks about her afterwards); her boss is a horrible person; and the only two female characters she meets for the rest of the book have instantaneous conflict with her that never gets resolved. I'm tired of reading about women and girls who only ever get along with men. Jenifer L Armentrout does this as well: Poppy and Seraphina both have exactly one positive female relationship who they are supposedly close with, but we don't see these women for practically their entire series. Every other female character is a villain or competition for her love interest, or else hates her for no apparent reason.
ON TO THE POSITIVES
I’ve been comparing this book to From Blood and Ash because they’re share a genre and I had some overlapping complaints, but all of the positives of this book are where we differ from that comparison. For instance, this book had a much more present and coherent plot, one that didn’t make me feel lost and confused every two chapters. I felt like the story was actually going somewhere. It also had a really cool magic system, which I did not feel like we got in FBaA.
Additionally, this book has actual themes about things that matter, and I thought they were handled in a much better and more responsible way. There is a recurring theme in Jenifer L Armentrout’s books of the “big bad” being a sexual predator. It happens because the love interest is just as murder-y and selfish as the bad guy, so she needed a way to differentiate so that we the readers would know why it’s okay for Sexy Lover Boy to be a heartless killer and not Evil Nasty Guy. It felt so lazy and frankly, just rancid overall, especially when it continued happening over and over again in each book of hers that I read.
On the flip side, in Song of Silver, Flame Like Night, we do see threats of sexual violence, but in the context of colonizers and invaders wielding their power over their victims, who have no leverage to say no. We also see villains who are actually just bad (greed, violence, lust for power, etc) without needing to make them rapists to show who we’re supposed to root for.
I thought the overarching points of this book were very important and relevant, especially in the context of current world events. The fact that horrific atrocities have been committed upon your people does not give you the right to turn around and do it to another people. Just because your people have hurt each other does not mean that violence against you is justified or “not that bad”.
The last thing I’ll say is that I really loved the setting and magic. It was so vibrant and I felt like I could really see and hear the places and events I was reading about. I know I’ve mentioned it at least twice now, but seriously this magic system might be one of the coolest and most unique I’ve read about recently (probably tied for first place with the magic system in Faebound).
Overall, it’s a good book, but this genre just isn’t my style. I plan to read the sequel because I’m very curious about where the story goes from here, but I don’t think I’ll be picking up more of this author’s books after that.
This book has a lot of things that I’m realizing are common with “romantasy”, which I am learning is not my thing, so take my opinions with a grain of salt. If you love fantasy romance, these things probably won’t bother you.
First, structurally this book felt rushed. There were typos and weird run-on sentences (not a ton, but definitely enough that I noticed). There were times where the wrong word was used (i.e. “Dredges” when the author meant “Dregs”).
Second - and this is something I really disliked about the From Blood and Ash series - there is a lot of infodumping that is often, for some reason, repeated? Like we get a lot of the same information two or three times over, which made the book longer than I felt like it needed to be.
Third, it was kind of insta-love-y. I mean, the book takes place over a long enough period of time that it isn’t necessarily insta-love, but I personally felt like there were odd leaps between romantic moments, so it felt like we really rushed through the main characters bonding, which made the stronger emotions seem a little unfounded.
Fourth, and this is a very specific to myself complaint, I didn’t like Lan’s characterization very much. I’m getting really tired of every female main character being essentially a cardboard cutout of each other. She’s snarky and sassy, but has to be taught everything, but is also somehow a prodigy at everything she does, all while seeing herself as able to handle a lot, yet she’s constantly crying over something. (This isn’t to say that strength = emotionless, it’s just that her character feels set up to be more withdrawn and to keep her emotions inside, but then she’s falling over a lounge chair like a Disney Princess to sob uncontrollably.)
Lastly, I disliked the fact that Lan has no positive female relationships. Her mother is dead before the book starts; her supposed best friend is murdered like two seconds after we meet her (and Lan almost never thinks about her afterwards); her boss is a horrible person; and the only two female characters she meets for the rest of the book have instantaneous conflict with her that never gets resolved. I'm tired of reading about women and girls who only ever get along with men. Jenifer L Armentrout does this as well: Poppy and Seraphina both have exactly one positive female relationship who they are supposedly close with, but we don't see these women for practically their entire series. Every other female character is a villain or competition for her love interest, or else hates her for no apparent reason.
ON TO THE POSITIVES
I’ve been comparing this book to From Blood and Ash because they’re share a genre and I had some overlapping complaints, but all of the positives of this book are where we differ from that comparison. For instance, this book had a much more present and coherent plot, one that didn’t make me feel lost and confused every two chapters. I felt like the story was actually going somewhere. It also had a really cool magic system, which I did not feel like we got in FBaA.
Additionally, this book has actual themes about things that matter, and I thought they were handled in a much better and more responsible way. There is a recurring theme in Jenifer L Armentrout’s books of the “big bad” being a sexual predator. It happens because the love interest is just as murder-y and selfish as the bad guy, so she needed a way to differentiate so that we the readers would know why it’s okay for Sexy Lover Boy to be a heartless killer and not Evil Nasty Guy. It felt so lazy and frankly, just rancid overall, especially when it continued happening over and over again in each book of hers that I read.
On the flip side, in Song of Silver, Flame Like Night, we do see threats of sexual violence, but in the context of colonizers and invaders wielding their power over their victims, who have no leverage to say no. We also see villains who are actually just bad (greed, violence, lust for power, etc) without needing to make them rapists to show who we’re supposed to root for.
I thought the overarching points of this book were very important and relevant, especially in the context of current world events. The fact that horrific atrocities have been committed upon your people does not give you the right to turn around and do it to another people. Just because your people have hurt each other does not mean that violence against you is justified or “not that bad”.
The last thing I’ll say is that I really loved the setting and magic. It was so vibrant and I felt like I could really see and hear the places and events I was reading about. I know I’ve mentioned it at least twice now, but seriously this magic system might be one of the coolest and most unique I’ve read about recently (probably tied for first place with the magic system in Faebound).
Overall, it’s a good book, but this genre just isn’t my style. I plan to read the sequel because I’m very curious about where the story goes from here, but I don’t think I’ll be picking up more of this author’s books after that.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Genocide, Racism, Sexual violence, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Death of parent, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
Banyan Moon by Thao Thai
challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I can’t believe this is a debut novel 😦 This is genuinely such an incredible book I don’t even know how to put most of my thoughts into words. It kind of reminds me of Hula by ‘Iolani Hakes which I read earlier this month. There are similar themes of generational trauma, imperfect people just doing their best, and the rifts that form between mothers and daughters and how they change over time. There were so many emotional moments, so much I relate to despite being little like these women outside of also being a mother.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Physical abuse and Violence
Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Pregnancy
Minor: Misogyny, Racism, Sexual content, Medical content, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail