horourke's reviews
93 reviews

Almost DNF which is insane considering the book is only 160 pages long. Maybe if she spent less time bragging about how good of a writer she is and more time actually writing good prose I would have enjoyed it more. A memoir that begs the reader to pity and adore its author without doing any of the legwork to elicit those emotions. Like the Vanity Fair profile said - she really only has one story to tell; her own. And she’s told us countless times over the last 10 years, so much so that now finally in book form, it’s incredibly underwhelming. 

Kinda like “The Bear” if everyone was sluttier and there were more drugs…

I really enjoyed this book! It’s a fresh take on the classic coming of age tale as we join our protagonist, Tess, through her first year in NYC. We get to witness her senses, desires, and knowledge grow during her time as a back waiter at a popular restaurant. She was so naive at times that my heart hurt for her, but that’s all part of growing up. 

this novel was absolutely brutal. spent a night sobbing as I finished it. great commentary on how society at large - and the state specifically - both exhalt and revile mothers, the unrealistic standards mothers  (especially WOC) face, the dangers of the surveillance 

state, and how our justice system is always more punitive than rehabilitative. the double standards added in by juxtaposing the men’s and women’s schools was a nice (but heartbreaking) touch. 

I have complicated feelings about this. I both hated and loved it at the same time. The prose is excellent, but also self-important and dense. The characters are complex, but also extremely unlikeable. I guess what baffles me the most is Eve, the narrator, and her worldview. It just is something I can’t empathize with at all. For me, Nathan always appeared transparently manipulative and coercive, playing with many women like his toys. Even so, the narrator struggled throughout the entire novel to recognize this, and his other partner still seems under his spell. I just don’t understand how such an unhealthy relationship dynamic can be so paradigm-shifting for multiple women?? It also surprised me how Eve was so unsure of herself and kept flip-flopping with her core values and beliefs. Like damn girl you’re almost 30, make up your mind!! Have a backbone!!

also if a man, or anyone for that matter, told me they intuitively “knew” my desires and that I secretly had a rape fantasy, I would punch them in the face. WTF!! and she kept seeing him afterwards. Again, the whole dynamic is baffling to me. Nathan claims to “know” what women want and provide it for them, but for me it seemed like he was just a good fuck and overly confident. His charm enraptured far too many women and I just wish they could be freed from his grasp.

Weird and off putting, but not in an enjoyable way. Dialogue was incredibly stilted and weirdly formal. Writing style didn’t impress me and the stories bored me at times 

This collection came highly recommended but I didn’t really connect with it. The prose was unnecessarily dense and difficult to understand - I often found myself zoning out and having to re-read the same sentence multiple times. The stories in this collection are also so vastly different from one another that it almost felt like whiplash. 

this is the first time i’m returning to this book since college. I feel as though I have a deeper understanding for the characters now - when I first read it I felt heartbroken by their actions, but now I can better appreciate their complexity. I was much less sad this time around. While Connell and Marianne can be frustrating, their relationship is fascinating and profound. To be loved is to be changed 

This novel is both tender and daring. The characters are all fully realized, complex, and flawed. Despite their flaws, they’re all written in such a way that you can’t help but feel empathy toward them. I didn’t care for Preston and Robert’s chapters as much as Karina and Louisa’s - but I was still utterly enthralled by this book. 

quick read, interesting concept, but the “twists” were very predictable. either the author doesn’t trust the reader to make connections or she purposefully wrote the narrator as a clueless idiot. ending was a let down 

I have thoughts!! while I love Mona Awad’s writing style and the way she utilizes magical realism to make real-world critiques, this felt a bit formulaic. especially following “alls well,” this novel was another tale of “lonely-tragic woman stumbles upon something fucked up and barely escapes.” This novel did feel a bit more personal with the mother-daughter relationship, but when I finished reading it I felt unsatisfied. When examining the main character closely, it seems she exists in a vacuum, with little depth outside of her mother-daughter relationship and obsession with beauty. We only see her in California as an adult and Montreal as a child - everything in between is blank. I would’ve liked to see her as a more fully fleshed character (especially with the word count of this novel, there’s room to do so!!).

There were too many questions still lingering -  why was Tom Cruise/Seth there? did he visit other insecure children? what happened to the other Rouge members? For such a long novel, the tender ending seemed out of place and a bit rushed. 

I did like the critique of Western beauty standards and the beauty industry as a whole, but honestly it had kind of the opposite effect on me. now I just want to invest in a skincare routine lol. 

Overall I liked but did not love this novel. I want to see her take more risks with her writing and try just once at an unhappy ending. For an author whose hit novel leans so much upon the concept of “killing your darlings,” she has yet to do so with any of her protagonists.