Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - Boy Parts

Reviews tagging 'Sexual content'

Boy Parts by Eliza Clark

288 reviews

sydneythekydneybean's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

3.25

Listen... when you pen this as "american psycho for hot girls," I expect "american psycho for hot girls." And it did fulfill that for about the first half. Irinia is so unreliable, messy, manipulative, and overall fucked-up; and hey, I love reading about messy bitches sometimes, but as soon as she stops hyper-focusing on her man-hating/loving photography and starts calling everyone ever a size 2 fat and dumpy, and is constantly thinking about carbs and her weight and blah blah blah, you do start to lose me.

The synopsis of Boy Parts says that Irina goes into a tailspin after she is asked to be a part of an exhibition and that tailspin centers around Irina’s relationship with her obsessive best friend, Flo, and Eddie from Tesco who has attracted her attention. Now, after reading that, I was expecting a lot of interaction between Irina and Flo, and Irina and Eddie. I expected to witness Irina's and Flo's toxic, unhealthy relationship bumped up to 1000. I expected Irinia to become bloodthirsty for the seemingly innocent, insecure, "perfect for the picking" Eddie. I expected violence, sex, manipulation, and like Black Swan levels of obsession. Irina's unpredictable, we don't know how much of her memory we can trust, and I wanted the book to almost gaslight me, as the reader, into believing shit that didn't happen because that's how Irina remembers it. And unfortunately, Boy Parts just didn't live up to my expectations.

I love this book's genre more than I love this book.

Content Warnings

j_c_a's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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gracepickford's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

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

1.0

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nenya's review against another edition

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challenging mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This book is unlike anything I‘ve ever read. It infiltrates your mind and completely twists your imagination. The main character is sickenly repulsive but so fascinating that you can’t stop reading about all the fucked up things she‘s doing.

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evelyncore's review against another edition

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challenging dark funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

Made me think about glass in the eye more times than I am comfortable with - amazing.

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jesselopod's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Superb audiobook reading. I thought it was awful but then I realised that it was just the main character that was awful. This book is what I wanted my year of rest and relaxation to be. It read like Effie from Skins got into photography and got infinitely more mean. At first I thought this book was gratuitously excessively unhinged, but as I kept reading I found the concepts the book was exploring really compelling.

Although I was frustrated that it took as long as it did to drop the hook into the story surrounding “my boy”, I really loved the way the author handled the slide into unreliability as Irena’s reality dissolved around her, and I really enjoyed the emotional roller coaster the author put you through as a reader, how she played around with empathy the reader feels for her alongside her unforgivable cruelty.

The ending was very abrupt. I like that there is no resolution to knowing what is and isn’t real, but I also felt the story didn’t really reach a conclusion either. With a tweaked ending I think I would have rated it much higher.

I viscerally hated reading much of this, it felt like watching a car crash, but I also didn’t want to stop listening to it. I don’t like horror as a genre, but I’m glad I read it.

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