Reviews tagging 'Adult/minor relationship'

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters

11 reviews

zeus_strider's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Forced institutionalization, Emotional abuse, Murder, Child abuse, Sexual violence, Medical trauma, Gaslighting, Sexual content, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Confinement, Toxic friendship, Death, Pregnancy, Physical abuse, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, Drug use, Toxic relationship, Rape, and Misogyny

Minor: Child death, Abortion, Lesbophobia, Mental illness, Blood, and Abandonment

ranbara's review against another edition

dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

5.0

So facking good. What can I say.

It made me giddy. It made me blush, worse than before. It was like liquor. It made me drunk. I drew away. When her breath came now upon my mouth, it came very cold. My mouth was wet, from hers. I said, in a whisper,
'Do you feel it?'

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Abandonment, Torture, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Murder, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Lesbophobia, Alcohol, Misogyny, Blood, and Sexism

Minor: Child death, Alcoholism, and Racial slurs

nicnymh's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

It’s a good book in that it was well written, but as a book that is constantly touted as strong queer representation I was disappointed and a little horrified. Readers looking for healthy functional sapphic relationships or storylines should run in the opposite direction. Reads like it was written by a violent man who hates women, especially lesbians. Intense and pervasive sexual harassment of a teen by a family member, grooming and predator behavior. It’s intense, be warned.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Gore, Torture, Toxic relationship, Sexual harassment, Trafficking, Mental illness, Classism, Murder, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Lesbophobia, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Violence, Abandonment, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, and Slavery

anacereading's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Child abuse, Confinement, Death of parent, Murder, Misogyny, Physical abuse, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Sexual content, Adult/minor relationship, Domestic abuse, and Pedophilia

Minor: Vomit

kpwxx's review against another edition

medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Domestic abuse, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Torture, Violence, Abandonment, Ableism, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Outing, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Pregnancy, Animal death, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Self harm, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Child death, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

Minor: Dementia, Deportation, Stalking, Abortion, and Eating disorder

naiu_cs's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

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

3.5

It was quite exciting, even though it sometimes seemed to be dragged on for longer than was really necessary for the plot or the characters.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny and Sexism

Moderate: Murder, Violence, Child abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Cursing, Death, and Forced institutionalization

Minor: Alcohol, Classism, Death of parent, Grief, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, and Torture

emfass's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Forced institutionalization, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Death, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Bullying, Child abuse, Sexism, Violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Lesbophobia, Domestic abuse, and Misogyny

Moderate: Animal death, Animal cruelty, Sexual content, Mental illness, Drug abuse, Drug use, Rape, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Child death, and Trafficking

Minor: Religious bigotry

bethsbookshelf's review

dark funny mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

plot - 8
writing - 9
pace - 3
world building - 6
characters - 7
diversity - 7
ending - 8
enjoyment - 7

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Torture, Toxic relationship, and Violence

davidbowie's review

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Blood, Bullying, Confinement, Death of parent, Dementia, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Mental illness, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Misogyny, and Homophobia

kimmysanders's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Read as an ebook from the local library]

Books like this generally don’t hit my radar. I do love well executed historical fiction, but as you might know from reading my review of The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep, I’m not a Dickens person. Victorian England is not my particular wheelhouse. But I do like Korean film, and The Handmaiden, Park Chan-wook’s sumptuous 2016 film, follows the initial plot of this book relatively closely, so I was curious to read the original.

Because this is a suspense/mystery book, describing the plot too much would give up some of the twists, so once again I’m going to be light on details. The twin hearts of the story are Sue Trinder, a 17-year-old orphaned girl raised in a London thieves’ den by her adoptive mother Mrs. Sucksby with hopes of eventually doing something that will make her fortune, and Maud Lilly, a 17-year-old orphaned girl raised by her uncle in his lonely country house to be his secretary and reader. The two are connected by Richard Rivers (called Gentleman in London for his fancy ways), a conman determined to marry Maud for her inheritance and use Sue to help him by installing her as Maud’s maid. Once Maud and Gentleman are married, Maud will be declared insane and committed to an asylum, and Gentleman will inherit her fortune. That’s the original plan, but Sue and Maud are both keeping secrets, and nothing will turn out the way that either of them expect.

This is an exceptionally atmospheric book. You really feel the damp and slow decay of the Lilly house, the claustrophobic heat in Mrs. Sucksby’s London rooms. You can almost hear the clock tick and the soft swish of silks in the silence of slow passing hours. There’s a lot that doesn’t happen, which serves to set off the things that do. The narrative depends on its two main characters, and you are kept in suspense as to how you feel about them — whether you pity one and root for the other, love one and hate the other, or accept both with all their graces and faults. It’s quite effectively done, and until the end you’re not sure where anything is going or what will work out, if anything at all.

This is a long book, at 511 pages, and some of it does drag in places when you’re waiting for something to happen. If you can bend yourself to the pace, it’s worth it, but it’s difficult. Also, the content warnings for this one are numerous. There are very detailed scenes of involuntary confinement and medical trauma/abuse. There is also what Maud does for her uncle, which

could easily be considered sexual abuse of a minor or at the very least a deeply inappropriate adult/minor relationship

. There is a lot of child abuse, this being Victorian England. And of course, there’s sexual content, although it’s really not particularly racy by today’s standards.

I found this overall fairly enjoyable, if long. I had forgotten a lot of the main plot points from the film, and the third act is quite different altogether. Sue and Maud are flawed heroines but they’re thoroughly engaging, and in the end you cannot help but fall for both. Their story is quite lovely, in its own awful way, and they each have grit and beauty to spare.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Physical abuse, Sexual content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Murder, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Blood, Child death, Cursing, Death of parent, and Drug use