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@mollymay5000 It definitely wasn't torture porn. I've read a decent number of horror novels that go into that genre, and this does not tremble into that territory. Some people are sensitive about different things or make comparisons with genres they're unfamiliar with, but this felt more like romantasy with SA themes, which I would argue are in a lot of romantasy books. It's a little darker than most, but the story works through the issues in many ways, and the darker aspects are not glorified; they're addressed as awful. I would never have known it had any HP in it if I hadn't read that elsewhere; what inspired us when we were young is certainly not an endorsement & I didn't know about the influence until I read about it. I think reading it without outside influence, I felt it was dark & weird at first. There's a big backstory component in the middle that gives context to the initially unsettling elements, and I think that's a really clever bit of writing, but I think for some people it turned them off. You have this whole war between the holy and the necromancers that starts out from the holy having lost. There is SA in the novel, but I would not say it is handled poorly as a topic. It is handled in a somewhat romantasy way; we get depth, but some would certainly want more out of that depth. R. F. Kuang's The Poppy War trilogy seemed very similar to me in terms of tone, except a lot more happens in The Poppy War trilogy.

@mollymay5000 I ended up enjoying it, though it took a minute to get into, and a minute in this book is hundreds of pages. It is a bevvy of trigger warnings for sexual assault and related topics, so I understand why a number of people have been less than okay with it. I only found out after about 1/3rd of the way in that it was based on a Harry Potter fanfic, so I don't think the HP aspect of it really dominates the storytelling in any noticeable way. It is very dark, it has a tragic romance that is trying to fix itself, and it offers up a mythology that holds the world together but doesn't go too crazy with its own lore (there's enough there for it to stay engaging). I think it does a good job of building suspense and angst, and then delivering something new to the reader. The pacing is a little slow at the start, but it hits a really good groove (about a 3rd of the way in). I'd be curious what you heard, and let me know if you have any very specific questions about the story.