Reviews with content warning for Alcohol - Animal

This is the perfection I needed -- what "The Guest," "Fruit of the Dead," "My Year of Rest and Relaxation," "Eileen" and "Boy Parts" couldn't deliver, what "Rouge" came close to.

The destructive pretty girl plot has been overdone and exhausted, insultingly predictable, but Lisa Taddeo shows that it can be thrilling, done with power, nuance and poignancy. The pacing of this book needs to be studied, it's art.

You start with the idea that this book is about a vile woman, and then you see it's really about vile men, and as you shakily come closer to the truth, you realize this has always been about mothers and daughters. This is a love story to women, to see our pain and our strength, to realize how much of our self-hatred is from women hatred, to understand that the minute we are born, we are bloody prey, we are subjugated and destroyed, and we are connected more than we know.

Content Warnings

ktwoolen's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I loved this story but as a mother I was so triggered and disturbed by so much of the dialog and imagery. Truly a heartbreaking read for me. A lot of reviews said it’s about how being in your 30s can make you want to kill- but to me it was about how parent trauma and send you on a spiral of self degradation, and how being treated like you’re disposable by everyone that’s ever come into your life can make you want to kill.

Content Warnings

judyhagan's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional funny sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Evocative, poignant, gut-punchingly heart-rending, harrowing: I was rapt until the end. I don't have words for how this gripped me and tore me apart.

Content Warnings

laedyred's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This is one of the best novels on the effects of generational and sexual trauma I have ever read. This is not a story of redemption or hopeful new beginnings. Joan is an utterly real person, and we see the contradiction and pain living inside her without the fluff of a character built to be a turned-hero. The first half of the book is a stream of consciousness and can drag at times. However, a piece like this is not to entertain. Its goal is not to inform or enlighten. This is an expression of pain taken at face value. Those who have not experienced what Joan describes cannot fully grasp what this text does. Although feminism is a huge motif, the modern interpretation of the "girl boss" is nowhere seen. Joan's rage mimics the violence that builds through oppression and abuse, steering her to act out. She is not a hero, but she is also not an anti-hero. She is a person, she is a woman, she is an expression of those who know.

Content Warnings

clairebartholomew549's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I don't know how to feel about this book. I resonated with a lot of its themes and assertions about the ceaseless violence men commit against women and the ways our entire inner lives are shaped by the men we're exposed to, and I appreciated Joan's unabashed commitment to voicing the darkest parts of herself. But I found the plot kind of tiring, definitely disturbing, and vaguely performative; it felt a little redundant of other books I've read like it before, like The Girls and Bright Young Women, and it was not an enjoyable read.

Content Warnings

kendoge's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
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

4.25

I loved this but holy hell was it tough to hear. I listened on audiobook and the narration was amazing. The prose was beautiful and incredibly well written but so difficult and heart wrenching. This gave me every emotion and thought I wanted Nightbitch to give me. The content warnings are as long as the book.

Content Warnings

More...