This feels like Colleen Hoover decided to try writing a literary masterpiece. I love a good weird read and the premise really hooked me but I just… ugh. It was just trying SO HARD to say something without saying it (but then stating it directly on the page throughout the book). I really wanted to like it because of the premise but I just didn’t unfortunately. Though I’m not surprised that booktok seems to enjoy it. It’s like a weird girl book for people who are PSL/Stanley Cup/Hydroflask/TSwift fans but want to be different so bad. Go read Virginia Woolf instead!

another 2.5⭐ *sigh*

i listened to the audiobook, which is pretty short, and that's the only reason why i finished it tbh.

while it does what it says on the tin, 'acts of service' is painfully dull and says very little. i feel that the main character, eve, paints herself as a lesbian, but is bisexual, and the novel very much feels like a male centred heteronormative book. eve has a girlfriend but begins seeing an m/f couple, in which the girl, olivia, does not acknowledge her in any way during their sexual encounters and has essentially no relationship with her. there is a rapport between eve and the guy, nathan, who is, plainly sexist, and a dominant figure to them both. i feel that lillian fisherman was attempting to laud some sexually liberating feminist statement, but this was not done in any persuasive way. olivia is a meek, passive character and eve is equally without agency. i actually really liked the writing, which is why it's not a flat out two stars, but the plot was lack lustre and the characters insipid. the bones of the story were there without the flesh.

The nuance! The relationships! The confusing self hatred for wanting men! 4.5

What in the queer 50 shades of grey lmao! Messy but funnnnn. We love drama. Prayers for Olivia!

*I re read this and mostly feel the same lol

Hmmmm.

I feel like i read two different books at the same time. One on the edge of a conversation we only dance around on convention and intimacy. The other a detailed preamble leading up to a pretty oddly referenced conflict point with the law suit.

I think I thought it was just going to be edgy and convention confronting. But i am uncertain where the law suit turn fits in….

‘we love what disturbs us if it chooses us and tells us how we matter.’

through closely examining the intricacies of a three-way relationship, this novel is offers a poignant analysis of feminine desire, male power, and the dynamic which exist between.

eve’s sexuality lies at the heart of her personality. the role she plays with nathan and olivia reinforces this; after all it is her body which lays the foundation upon which their relationship is built. nathan is the main driver of ths dynamic, responding to her statement that all women are made to serve the male gaze with the words ‘not like you’. eve often sees her sexuality as a source of autonomy, but with her purpose obviously poisitioned at the hands of nathan, fishman asks us to consider the age-old question of ‘is a woman capitalising on her sexuality liberation from male power, or just a reinforcement of it’?

but eve is not that straightforward. she is aware of this dynamic, noting in the final chapter, ‘whether it’s a capitulation or rebellion, you know, you’re fucked either way’.

to put it simply, eve is a contradiction. whilst she feels that her body gives her a sense of power, she is aware that this may only be a fantasy. whilst she admires her girlfriend, romi, for her loyalty, eve still strains against the constraints of monogamy, wanting both freedom and security at once. whilst she feels a perverse sense pleasure in olivia’s subjugation - ‘yes, I was a woman capable of delight in being measured against other women’ - she feels a need to impress her, to be approved by her. these conflicted feelings towards olivia illustrate an unspoken but inevitable rivalry which exists between women as a result of masculine desire, and the subconscious yet conflicting emotions which can arise as a result: ‘was it true of all of us? how would we love each other, then?’ eve’s bisexuality adds another layer to this already complex relationship, and already complex discussion.

both shocking and familiar, the novel’s nuanced, candid narrative of desire, sexuality, and power reads like a revelation. i think i could write about this book for days. highly recommend!