Reviews tagging 'Genocide'

Still Life with Bones by Alexa Hagerty

28 reviews

hannahmci's review against another edition

dark informative sad fast-paced

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Death, Police brutality, Colonisation, and Child death

siria's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.25

A powerful and difficult look at the work involved in, and the meaning underpinning, the recovery of the remains of the Disappeared. Alexa Hegarty here recounts her work as a forensic anthropologist in Guatemala and Argentina, two countries marked by horrific dictatorial violence in the twentieth century. Individuals and sometimes whole communities were tortured and massacred, their remains dumped in mass graves or tossed down wells or dumped out at sea. When it's even possible to recover these remains—the sea tends to keep its secrets; some wells plumb too deep to be excavated safely—restoring their names to them is another very difficult task. Still Life with Bones is an absorbing and elegiac account of the terror that the state can inflict, and the choices that people make in the face of it; Hagerty's commitment to a grassroots, community-focused recovery process is admirable. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Violence, Torture, Child death, Murder, Police brutality, Genocide, Grief, and Kidnapping

moonytoast's review against another edition

challenging emotional medium-paced

4.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, War, Murder, Violence, Police brutality, Genocide, Gun violence, Grief, and Death

Moderate: Child death, Torture, and Sexual violence

ehmannky's review against another edition

dark emotional sad slow-paced

4.0

A look at the ongoing efforts to recover the bodies of those murdered during the Guatemalan and Argentinian dictatorships in South American during the 1900s. It's a sad and difficult to read book, and there's just sort of a depth of suffering that comes across so matter-of-factually during Hagerty's recounting of her experiences assisting these teams. It's a hard book to feel particularly hopeful after, though it does feel you with admiration for the people who are actively looking to recover the missing. I also feel like it gives you a more concrete and human understanding of just what it means that the US supported these governments and encouraged this widespread violence. 

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: War, Violence, and Genocide

laurenkimoto's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Gore, Classism, Hate crime, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Racism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Miscarriage, Murder, Police brutality, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Grief, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Rape, Violence, Physical abuse, War, Blood, Child death, Emotional abuse, Body horror, Confinement, Death, and Torture

readingwithk's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative medium-paced

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Death, and Genocide

thepennotthesword's review against another edition

dark informative sad medium-paced

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Genocide, Gore, Medical content, Murder, Physical abuse, War, Death, Child abuse, Child death, Gun violence, Violence, and Antisemitism

purplemuskogee's review against another edition

emotional informative sad medium-paced

5.0

Alexa Hagerty has written an incredibly poignant and powerful book here - informative, precise, but also very touching. and kind. She describes her work as a student, moving from California to Guatemala, and then Argentina. I was more familiar with the events in Argentina than in Guatemala and I found her easy to follow without being vague or simplistic. Her meetings with the "disappeared"'s families added so much to the book, but I also enjoyed following her learning experience, getting more comfortable handling bones. She is also very honest about how the work impacts her mental life and how difficult it is to detach oneself, to go home and enjoy one's spare time without thinking constantly about the baby's skull found at the bottom of a well, or the details she notices and remembers when exhumating someone: a man's work boots, the same her colleagues all wear; a woman's lovingly embroidered blouse. 
It was such a beautiful and moving book; I think I will keep thinking about that one for a while.

Free ARC sent by Netgalley.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Genocide, and Murder