Reviews

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

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ardoreira's review

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1.0

j’ai rien compris

monstar's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

libvin96's review

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2.0

I really wanted to enjoy this book due to all of its critical acclaim and recommendations from friends, but most of it was just too over my head and difficult to appreciate, even after reading people's interpretations of the collection to gain better understanding. Machado's ability to cross genres and tap into unexplored places in her writing is genius. As far as trailblazing goes, this collection is a masterpiece. Her descriptions are impeccable. I personally just did not enjoy constantly grasping for straws to figure out what she is trying to communicate, desperately attempting to connect dots and to find some takeaway, in nearly every single piece.

My favorite pieces were The Husband Stitch and Inventory. The settings were creative, and I could appreciate the symbolism of the green ribbon and entitlement in The Husband Stitch and the backdrop, suspense, and exploration of sexuality in Inventory. My least favorite piece was without a doubt the insufferably long SVU spinoff. While much more inventive than your typical fanfiction, it still hardly seemed much more than that.

Jen Corrigan writes the following on Medium:

"Many of the stories are ambiguous by design, reflecting the liminal spaces and identities within which many women exist, and the reader is left trying to piece together clues to form a conclusion. Even the title has ambiguous meanings, as it is not named for a story in the collection. While sometimes this open-ended form of storytelling can come off as hackneyed in the hands of an amateur, Machado is anything but."

I think Corrigan nails my problem with this book; I'm too much of an amateur, passive, leisure reader to delve deep and to figure out what Machado was trying to do. Her purpose is to be ambiguous with these stories and to leave us grasping to piece them together. While this does speak for Machado's brilliance, it still doesn't make for an enjoyable reading experience for all fans of feminist literature, necessarily. We're not all English majors and literature experts.

nikkimul's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

angreadseverything's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

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

2.25

haircurtains's review

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“I have no shame. I have felt many things in my life, but shame is not among them….i have never had less of an obligation to anyone in my life, you aggressively ordinary woman.”

“You never live with a woman, you live inside her”

“The she picked up my water and drank deeply of it, until the water had filtered through the ice and the ice was nothing but a fragile lattice and then the whole construction slid against her face as she tipped the glass higher and she chewed the slivers that landed in her mouth.”