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4.12 AVERAGE
4.12 AVERAGE
an extremely polished, well-written novel about a young woman who kills rapists. Truly what I needed in my life right now to help me process all of the violence against women that happens around the world every day. warning: the ending will crush you in a million little pieces. but it'll be worth it.
I wish the voices were a bit more distinct and though the ending was appropriate, I wish it had transpired a bit differently. But damn, Stuff to Think About galore in this book and I loved the story and the characters and all the undercurrents running beneath the book.
“But boys will be boys, our favorite phrase that excuses so many things, while the only thing we have for the opposite gender is women, said with disdain and punctuated with an eye roll.”
LOVE. [a:Mindy McGinnis|5351825|Mindy McGinnis|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1379437958p2/5351825.jpg] crafts a story saying everything that needs to be said. At times it's brutal, heartbreaking, and also so lovely that I found myself putting the book aside because I didn't want it to end.
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
4.25 stars
The first hundred pages were a little slow but, the reading experience became a runaway train. I really did like Alex's character. If McGinnis could keep writing these hard hitting YA contemporaries, I would read them all the time.
Trigger Warnings: dead body, slut-shaming, misogyny and sexism, victim blaming, rape, sexual assault, pedophilia, mention of child pornography, substance addiction, underage alcohol consumption, murder/s, death of a sibling, graphic animal death, graphic animal abuse and cruelty and fire, specifically arson
The first hundred pages were a little slow but, the reading experience became a runaway train. I really did like Alex's character. If McGinnis could keep writing these hard hitting YA contemporaries, I would read them all the time.
Trigger Warnings: dead body, slut-shaming, misogyny and sexism, victim blaming, rape, sexual assault, pedophilia, mention of child pornography, substance addiction, underage alcohol consumption, murder/s, death of a sibling, graphic animal death, graphic animal abuse and cruelty and fire, specifically arson
This is a dark book - trigger warnings peppered throughout - but it is so good. It's unflinching. It shoves the worst parts of humanity in your face and demands a response.
This book rips apart rape culture, sexism, the dangers of stereotypes, in a small town with little opportunity for its students to grow in any capacity. Yet they all do grow.
There's so much to unpack in this story and I'll be thinking about it for a long time.
This book rips apart rape culture, sexism, the dangers of stereotypes, in a small town with little opportunity for its students to grow in any capacity. Yet they all do grow.
There's so much to unpack in this story and I'll be thinking about it for a long time.
"Sometimes I forget for one second and it hurts.
It’s a different kind of pain than the constant, the weight that hangs from my heart. It swings from twine embedded so deeply that my aorta has grown around it. Blood pulses past rope in the chambers of my heart, dragging away tiny fibers until my whole body is suffused and pain is all I am and ever can be.
But sometimes it swings just right and there’s a moment of suspension when I can’t feel it. The rope goes slack and the laws of physics give me one second of relief. I can laugh and smile and feel something else. But those same laws undo me, and when it swings back there’s a sharp tug on my heart to remind me that I forgot."
-- Mindy McGinnis, The Female of the Species
===========================================================
If I could highlight this whole book, I would.
The Female of the Species is a very important book which tackles everything you know about slut-shaming, rape culture, and the hate competition you are probably familiar with if you have been through high school everywhere. It's a very unapologetic and bold book, it doesn't shy away from the bad parts, it doesn't shy away from all the wrong dogmas we'd thought of before, back in high school when we could have known better.
Which is what makes this book so good.
The Female of the Species is not so much of a thriller book. In fact, it's more accurate to be called as a book about Alex, because even though there are three first-person-povs here, they all revolve around Alex. And even though each of the point of views sounds very distinct from one another, with complex and multi-dimensional character depth with all of their brilliance and flaws, this is still a book about Alex.
Alex killed the murderer of her sister, she was a loner with no friends whatsoever and didn't quite know how to communicate with beings other than her late sister and animals. Peekay was just dumped by her longtime boyfriend because he was interested in Branley, the popular and gorgeous and sex-with-legs who seduced him. And then there's Jack, a perfect jock with perfect grades and looks with reputation regarding his sexual escapades, Branley's best friend--and more, who was suddenly interested in Alex due to his guilt over what happened three years prior.
Now, I laughed at that point. Because. I don't know. I hated everyone in this book at first, except Alex because surprisingly, I understood what she was doing, why she did what she did, but also beneath all that silence Alex was probably one of the wisest characters in a book I have ever read. I disliked Peekay because the self-righteousness she felt at the beginning mirrored mine from back when I was sixteen and I hated to be reminded. I disliked Jack almost throughout the book, until at the end I realized that I hated him because he kept telling us that he hated himself in not so many words, and that was something I could relate to.
But as the book progressed and I got glimpses of why everyone was the way they were, I was struck speechless by how thorough this book was, because it felt so real.
Alex is an amazing character, and I think the author does well in making her the point of spear, her weapon to tell the readers the important message of what she wanted to say.
The characters development is great, though I personally think it could have been done better if only this book was longer than it actually is. The change between Alex and Jack feels too abrupt, like there is an event I am missing, but to be honest, the romance in this book doesn't matter to me as much as the message and the friendship between Alex and Peekay does. I still feel that, even after the end, Peekay is the one who understands Alex more than anyone. Even Jack.
And I think, like the effect Alex has on everyone in the book, I feel affected by it just as much. It changes a lot of my hard-ingrained way of thinking. It makes me realize a lot of things, and I'm so surprised because I used to think that after the many books I've read I thought there was nothing new I could learn.
I'm glad this book proves me wrong.
But despite what other people would say, The Female of the Species is a terribly sad book for me.
It’s a different kind of pain than the constant, the weight that hangs from my heart. It swings from twine embedded so deeply that my aorta has grown around it. Blood pulses past rope in the chambers of my heart, dragging away tiny fibers until my whole body is suffused and pain is all I am and ever can be.
But sometimes it swings just right and there’s a moment of suspension when I can’t feel it. The rope goes slack and the laws of physics give me one second of relief. I can laugh and smile and feel something else. But those same laws undo me, and when it swings back there’s a sharp tug on my heart to remind me that I forgot."
-- Mindy McGinnis, The Female of the Species
===========================================================
If I could highlight this whole book, I would.
The Female of the Species is a very important book which tackles everything you know about slut-shaming, rape culture, and the hate competition you are probably familiar with if you have been through high school everywhere. It's a very unapologetic and bold book, it doesn't shy away from the bad parts, it doesn't shy away from all the wrong dogmas we'd thought of before, back in high school when we could have known better.
Which is what makes this book so good.
The Female of the Species is not so much of a thriller book. In fact, it's more accurate to be called as a book about Alex, because even though there are three first-person-povs here, they all revolve around Alex. And even though each of the point of views sounds very distinct from one another, with complex and multi-dimensional character depth with all of their brilliance and flaws, this is still a book about Alex.
Alex killed the murderer of her sister, she was a loner with no friends whatsoever and didn't quite know how to communicate with beings other than her late sister and animals. Peekay was just dumped by her longtime boyfriend because he was interested in Branley, the popular and gorgeous and sex-with-legs who seduced him. And then there's Jack, a perfect jock with perfect grades and looks with reputation regarding his sexual escapades, Branley's best friend--and more, who was suddenly interested in Alex due to his guilt over what happened three years prior.
Now, I laughed at that point. Because. I don't know. I hated everyone in this book at first, except Alex because surprisingly, I understood what she was doing, why she did what she did, but also beneath all that silence Alex was probably one of the wisest characters in a book I have ever read. I disliked Peekay because the self-righteousness she felt at the beginning mirrored mine from back when I was sixteen and I hated to be reminded. I disliked Jack almost throughout the book, until at the end I realized that I hated him because he kept telling us that he hated himself in not so many words, and that was something I could relate to.
But as the book progressed and I got glimpses of why everyone was the way they were, I was struck speechless by how thorough this book was, because it felt so real.
Alex is an amazing character, and I think the author does well in making her the point of spear, her weapon to tell the readers the important message of what she wanted to say.
The characters development is great, though I personally think it could have been done better if only this book was longer than it actually is. The change between Alex and Jack feels too abrupt, like there is an event I am missing, but to be honest, the romance in this book doesn't matter to me as much as the message and the friendship between Alex and Peekay does. I still feel that, even after the end, Peekay is the one who understands Alex more than anyone. Even Jack.
And I think, like the effect Alex has on everyone in the book, I feel affected by it just as much. It changes a lot of my hard-ingrained way of thinking. It makes me realize a lot of things, and I'm so surprised because I used to think that after the many books I've read I thought there was nothing new I could learn.
I'm glad this book proves me wrong.
But despite what other people would say, The Female of the Species is a terribly sad book for me.
"So it comes that Man, the coward, when he gathers to confer
With his fellow-braves in council, dare not leave a place for her
Where, at war with Life and Conscience, he uplifts his erring hands
To some God of Abstract Justice—which no woman understands.
And Man knows it! Knows, moreover, that the Woman that God gave him
Must command but may not govern—shall enthral but not enslave him.
And She knows, because She warns him, and Her instincts never fail,
That the Female of Her Species is more deadly than the Male."
★★★★☆
3.50 STARS
I can say, this book has a lot of good quotes referring to sexism. How each words has a great conviction about the social stereotypes of the topic. That was the part that I liked the most. It was a tough read. For one, because it has a very sensitive topic. But the main reason was because I'm not into the entirety of the story flow. I actually went through this a few days more than my usual read. I am not entirely sure, but maybe because plot-wise, I was not rooting for it. It was average, for me, and I didn't see myself being attached to it. After hearing a lot of good things about this book, I set a very high expectation that I felt a surge of disappointment after reading and thinking that it didn't quite meet that expectation. And the way the ending was wrapped up, it just really threw me off.
3.50 STARS
I can say, this book has a lot of good quotes referring to sexism. How each words has a great conviction about the social stereotypes of the topic. That was the part that I liked the most. It was a tough read. For one, because it has a very sensitive topic. But the main reason was because I'm not into the entirety of the story flow. I actually went through this a few days more than my usual read. I am not entirely sure, but maybe because plot-wise, I was not rooting for it. It was average, for me, and I didn't see myself being attached to it. After hearing a lot of good things about this book, I set a very high expectation that I felt a surge of disappointment after reading and thinking that it didn't quite meet that expectation. And the way the ending was wrapped up, it just really threw me off.