peripetia's reviews
535 reviews

I'm soft dnf'ing this because I think I know exactly where this is going, but if it turns out that I'm wrong, I'm willing to continue.

I guess a big part of why this was a huge disappointment for me was that I was expecting a critique of capitalism and not a run-of-the-mill messy woman meets obvious romance.

I'm very conflicted about the writing style because on one hand, it is funny and also not too absorbed in its wittiness, but on the other hand, I'm getting tired of the way she describes her feelings as sensations in her body. I don't know how to explain that. I just feel there's too much of it.

Here's how I think this book will go. Let me know if I'm wrong.
- Aftter stubbornly making only stupid choices, the main character gets a redemption arc
- The main character gets over her anxiety and traumas through wholesome interactions
- The plot of the book revolves around the obvious romance with the male Mary Sue
- She realizes her co-workers are also people with their own problems and maybe she is also a little bit to blame
- Happy ending yay.

Tykkään kerronnasta, jossa hypätään hahmosta ja tilanteesta toiseen, mutta tässä tapauksessa se ei oikein toiminut (minulle) koska en vaan pysynyt perässä hahmoista, jotka olivat kaikki ihan samanlaisia nihilistisiä seksipakkomielteisiä inhottavia ihmisiä.

Vaikka olen yleisesti ottaen juonivetoinen lukija, tällainen all vibes no plot -tyyli toimii usein. Tässäkään juonettomuus ei niinkään häirinnyt, mutta tylsää oli.

Suurin ongelmani kirjan kanssa on sen uskomaton misogyynisyys. Joo ei tarvitse tulla kertomaan, että näin oli asiat tuohon aikaan. Ei ollut. Joo tässä puhutaan ikävästi myös mieshahmoista, mutta nimenomaan mieshahmoista eikä lainkaan samalla lailla.

Mulla on vahvasti sellainen fiilis, että Salama on näitä kirjailijoita, jotka ajattelee että kaikkihan tällaisia kelailee mutta ei vaan kehtaa myöntää. Jos tällaista on Salaman pään sisällä niin aika huolestunut olen.

Mutta tulipahan luettua. Vähän kyllä meni näin modernina lukijana ohi missä kohtaa se jumalanpilkka oli.

This was a pretty ok experience for me, a solid 3,5 stars. I think the reason why it wasn't the best was that I don't really go for dystopia fiction or YA, and while this was more dystopian than YA, the element was still there in my opinion.

I thought the prose was very beautiful. I'm not a huge fan of lyrical writing, and this book managed to be descriptive and beautiful without getting absurd. Dystopia fiction always includes a critique of the world we're currently living in (or at least it should), but I don't like over-explaining the past and how we got to this dystopian situation. In my opinion there was a little bit too much explaining here.

The book didn't go where I was assuming it would go, which is on me I guess, and I feel like it was me who ran out of steam rather than the book. In the end I wasn't interested enough to continue to the sequel, but I would definitely read something else from this author. 

 I honestly didn't fully like this book, but the subject matter and how it was handled was the thing that bumps this up to 4 stars.

The book had a great premise, a plot, and strong themes, but it got a bit ramble-y at times and literally lost the plot. There were too many chunks with nothing but ayahuasca and dialogue about various issues. Then again, I admit that I am a very plot-driven reader. Maybe some of these discussions could have been included in the plot itself.

In any case, this is a great book about violence against women, not just in Brazil but everywhere. 

This was a pretty interesting book. The biggest complaint people seem to have, and definitely something you inevitably consider while reading the book, is that the author is very unreliable. 

To me this just made the book more interesting. What is she perhaps lying about and why? Also, memoirs are never accurate depictions of real events, so hyperfixating on this book specifically is strange. (Her academic credentials are another story.)

What I also find strange about the reviews is that people have an issue with her describing herself as a sociopath. This is apparently a problem because the word isn't in the DSM (come on) and people she's choosing the term she prefers. 

First of all, this is not unusual. Kay Redfield Jamison, probably the most famous researcher of bipolar disorder and also bipolar, or, as she prefers to call it, manic-depressive. People have the right to self-determination.

Second, people seem to have zero issues with diagnosing her as autistic right after criticizing her own view of her own possible mental illness. This is just ridiculous.

Third, it is a bit annoying that she keeps repeating "I'm a socipath" but if it was "I have ADHD", I think it would be less of a problem because this is so common these days.

My biggest problem with the book is the cinematic narration style, especially towards the end where it gets, to put it in one word, <i>cringe</i>. Then again, someone who lacks social emotions could very well learn these narratives from popular culture and use them. She wouldn't even be the only one.

I also found the story relatable in some ways, mainly due to being an unemotional woman myself. I'm not a sociopath (or whatever you want to call it),  but it has definitely been a problem in my life - for other people. I have learned to mask that, which is tiring and boring, so I related to her. If I were a man, and if she were a man, our emotional reactions would be considered perfectly normal, but anyway.

In conclusion, interesting book. I really liked the author narrating the audiobook.

For me this was just fine. I don't even have much to say about it. I don't think it went really deep into exploring the topic, but at the same time, I enjoyed the mundane yet dramatic nature of regular, easy jobs. It was a bit boring though.

I just can't be bothered to finish this. This is such a formulaic and typical historical fiction novel and I find myself extremely bored.

I picked this up mainly because of the setting, as I am Finnish and I have never read a book or seen a movie or anything that is set in Finland but written by an outsider. The writer obviously has Finnish roots but is from the USA. The novel moves around the Finland/Sweden border areas.

And to be honest, I found listening to the audiobook narration difficult. It's ok to not be able to pronounce words that are foreign to you, but I still insist that as an audiobook narrator it's your job to try. This guy obviously had no idea. All he would have needed were a couple pointers and he could have done a good enough job.

I was fine with the pronounciation being what it was but I could not deal with Henrik's nickname being Ricky. That just made me laugh. I have no idea how it was spelled so it could be a pronounciation issue, but I can't figure out what his nickname could have been for this pronounciation to make any sense.

Similarly I had no idea what Laestadius' daughter's name was. According to the reviews, it's Willa. Good to know. 

DNF at 30%.

This has been on a my to-read list for a long time and I finally picked it up, fully expecting to be amazed and moved. I wasn't.

The time jumps were confusing and just felt kind of unnecessary. It was hard to tell which timeline we were following because they weren't very different from each other. The characters remained distant, expect for the anthropologist-widower, who explains his situation, thoughts, and feelings thoroughly.

I'm a very plot-driven reader and it takes a lot for a character-driven novel to hold my interest. If there is a plot in this book, I didn't grasp it, and the characters were too flat for me to be interested in.

Also I am once again confused about how people in the Mexican novels I've read make money. It's something that I pay a lot of attention to, unconsciously, and since this seems to be a pattern, I can't stop obsessing over it. 

DNF at 14%.

I've put this book "on a break" for like months now and I find getting back to it a bit of a chore, so I keep putting it off and now I think it's time to give up.

The setting and themes were interesting, but the plot was just incredibly slow and consistent mainly of giving the reader facts about the terrible situation in Sri Lanka at the time. Just didn't work for me as a novel. 

Tämä on todella helposti lähestyttävä, helppolukuinen, viihdyttävä ja kompakti tietokirja.

Totuutena ei näitäkään juttuja voi ottaa eikä se varmasti ole kirjoittajien tarkoituskaan, koska kirjan pääteesi on tulkinnanvaraisuus ja se, ettei oikeastaan mikään ole varmaa. Tässä siis on ihan selkeä argumentti, jota puolustellaan, mutta tämä on minusta aika päivänselvää ja normaalia.

En ole itse oikeastaan hirveän kiinnostunut kristinuskosta, mutta uskonnollisten tekstien tulkinta on mielenkiintoista. Oma taustani on islamin tutkimuksen puolella, joten perusasetelma on itselleni hyvin tuttu.

Tämä oli vaan hyvin yksinkertaisesti todella mielenkiintoinen ja kiva lukukokemus.