Reviews tagging 'Physical abuse'

The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy by Mackenzi Lee

4 reviews

fantasticalsam's review against another edition

funny

1.5

In contrast to the first book, which had a structured and tight plot, linear character development, and problematic regarding race in a way that made it difficult to tell if it was a criticism of the historical time period or not...this book bore no such unclarity.

This novel is orientalist and racist in a seemingly inclusive way that does not challenge settler-colonialism or racial bias. It's a coming of age novel, but the racism inherent to how Felicity (white main character) sees Sim (Algerian queerplatonic interest) in the first and second acts isn't ever actually addressed. Rather, the bias is written off as Felicity being distrustful of "pirates", but the group was saved by pirates last book - and in this book again! None of this character's choices make sense if she's not racist, and the fact that Sim doesn't ever call that out and is smitten with her (and, kisses Felicity without any hint of permission at one point which harkens to the predatory masculine/racially masculinized lesbian trope in a deeply uncomfortable way) is wrong.

It did have the unfortunate pairing of (1) the most nonsense plot I've ever seen, and (2) an incredibly funny line every hour or so that made it a very funny book to check out from the library and make fun of with my spouse. I wouldn't recommend it.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Gore, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Violence, Blood, Islamophobia, Fire/Fire injury, and Colonisation

20sidedbi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging funny informative reflective medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Sexism, Blood, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction and Racism

Minor: Alcoholism and Physical abuse

psliz's review

adventurous medium-paced

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

4.0

loved the feminism, the deus ex machina and magical realism at the end? not so much

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny

Moderate: Animal death, Drug abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Racism, Medical content, Kidnapping, and Acephobia/Arophobia

Minor: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Homophobia, Slavery, Blood, and Death of parent

hmatt's review against another edition

adventurous lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

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

3.0

This one lost me midway though. The change in tone

, basically at the point where they leave Zurich on,

made it feel like 2 separate books to me. And, while I appreciate the ~strong female lead/ace rep/all of that, of course I do, most of it seemed very heavy-handed and clunk-ily stuffed into the narrative via long internal monologues from the main character. 

Perhaps this is another case of me not loving YA as a genre but continuing to read it because it is both more lighthearted and includes a wider variety of queer narratives than the other genres I like...

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Sexism, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, and Acephobia/Arophobia

Moderate: Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Physical abuse, and Death of parent

Minor: Animal death