Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

Heavenly Tyrant by Xiran Jay Zhao

29 reviews

sadhbh2525's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark 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? Yes

4.5


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ender24's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense 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

4.5


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madmantha's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

This book was much slower than Iron Widow, not to say that I didn’t enjoy it, it felt like a very natural sequence of events coming after the events ending the last book.

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pj99's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark funny tense medium-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? Yes

5.0

Love love love, "delightful to read" wouldn't be accurate, but I certainly enjoyed every dangerous turn.
After months of laughing at people describing this book as polical (bro did you even read the first one), I do actually see why this one gets called that (it's still silly).

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frinsreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • 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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calamitydane's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional inspiring tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

It's not often that a sequel surpasses the original story, but Heavenly Tyrant does this with maniacal fury and whole-hearted compassion at the same time. This book broke me, built me anew, and broke me again. A beautiful story of revolution and the conflicts that come with it, this is much more than an enemies-to-lovers romance. This book has easy-to-understand explanations of communist theory and discusses feminist revolution as well. It discusses racism, feminism, classism, ableism, homophobia and even ageism. I don't know of the last time a book felt like it really changed me the way this did. Cannot recommend enough.

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bookworm513's review against another edition

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challenging dark inspiring tense 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? Yes

4.75


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zombiezami's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny reflective tense slow-paced

3.75

Overall, I liked this. The beginning and end were the best organized, in my opinion. The middle really dragged. It’s not that I don’t like communist theory, not to mention communist theory inserted into fiction. I do! But tbh I’m here for the giant robot fights. 

The political range in the first book is a lot more simplistic. I get the sense that, for this book, the author had to include a lot of detail for people to understand, but it just didn’t feel like organic conversation a lot of the time. And it just went on for so long, I was like, ok we get it already!! I think a lot of the detail of the middle of the book could have been cut and it would still make sense.

Even so, I am enchanted by the world building in both this book and its predecessor. I like how the characters are evil, petty, anxious, vengeful, … just very colorful and memorable. I look forward to the third book!

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jacksons_books_and_music's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious tense 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

Last year, I said Iron Widow was one of the best books I ever read. I love the sequel even better!

The characters and the circumstances in which they have to survive are incredibly messy and imperfect. They have to make difficult decisions that are sometimes right, sometimes wrong, and sometimes it’s hard to say. I felt the characters were realistic and nuanced in an incredibly engaging way. I wish all my friends would read this series so we could all talk about it often!

The narration was great! I think it was very smart to cast two different narrators, even if one of them didn’t narrate often. 

Please keep in mind this book series is upper YA/New Adult, with content not meant for younger teens. In terms of content and trigger warnings, it would be easier to say what trigger and content warnings it doesn’t warrant. There is graphic violence and spicy content, falling short of explicit (depending on your definition).

I’m not sharing any further thoughts due to spoilers! I look forward to reading the third book in the series when it comes out!

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corabookworm's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

The majority of this book was like if George Orwell wrote queer feminist fantasy, and the last part was  toxic romance and sex and fast-paced action. I honestly enjoyed this book, though I felt like it was missing a lot of things I loved from Iron Widow. The love interests are totally different (Shimin is simply not present (BRING SHIMIN BACK), while Yihzi is an asshole and has no chemistry with Zetian) and the feminine rage, while there, doesn't get to be quite as murderous and crazy. It was at least interesting commentary on politics and what a post-revolution government would look like, and while I'm still a bit confused by the ending, I look forward to reading the sequel. Definitely a good book, just didn't pack as much punch as the first

Also, note: This book is much more adult than the first, I would not classify it as YA. Maybe NA.

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