Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold

6 reviews

carlaah1984's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, Alcoholism, Sexism, and Misogyny

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Body horror, Child death, and Gaslighting

A well-researched and engaging look at working-class women in victorian times, highly informative about the lives and realities of the victims and the humanizing storytelling they all deserved—great conclusion to tie into modernity.

isabellaeastwood's review against another edition

informative medium-paced

3.5

In an ideal world serial killers names would never be spoken or written down, and they will be forgotten in history. Unfortunately, especially in this day and age, this will never happen. So instead focusing on the victims and what lives they lived is another way, Rubenhold explains, to silent the killer.

The reader is able to imagine their lives and its provides such an insight into 19th Century Whitechapel. The research is great, and the book flows so well. Even when she has to put caveats, the flow of the story remains intact. There will be times when there was limitations in research or assumptions made using secondary sources. Often Rubenhold has to put her historian hat on and question the newspapers and the inquests written during those times. This is not historical fiction, this is an attempt at writing the history using sources, facts and expertise.

The book is split into five main parts, retelling the life's of the five victims. By the third I was tempted to give this 4/5 stars. I was thinking, 'this might be my first five star read that is fiction'. But alas, I got tired of the rhetoric. I know that when writing essays you have to have 'Point, Evidence, Explain', but constantly reminding the reader that not all of these women were prostitutes got a bit tiring, 'show, don't tell'.

However, this book is very important and I cannot wait to read her other books

"It is only by bringing these women back to life that we can silence the Ripper and what he represents. By permitting them to speak, by attempting to understand their experiences and see their humanity, we can restore to them the respect and compassion to which they are entitled. The victims of Jack the Ripper were never 'just prostitutes'; they were daughters, wives, mothers, sisters and lovers. They were women."

⭐⭐⭐ for story 4/5 ⭐ for the history retelling. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Domestic abuse, Miscarriage, Alcoholism, Body horror, and Death

karenreadsbooks's review against another edition

informative

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, Murder, Addiction, and Alcoholism

Minor: Body horror

Focuses on the lives of these women rather than their gruesome deaths

daisymaytwizell's review against another edition

challenging dark informative sad medium-paced

4.0

I love Rubenhold's whole manifesto for this piece, and she accomplishes it in spades. Rubenhold gives these women the best eulogy possible after what is clearly intensive research, and avoids any sort of sensationalism around the stories.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism

Moderate: Murder, Body horror, and Child death

Minor: Sexual content, Trafficking, and Toxic relationship

While this is a book around the Jack the Ripper victims, the focus is primarily on their lives before the murder - the murders themselves are not shown or described in detail, and the horrors of being poor in Victorian London are discussed sympathetically and by necessity.

olivianw's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

A fantastic book!
Completely gripping, without sensationalising the story. Hallie Rubenhold treats each woman with respect and care. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Grief, Hate crime, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Misogyny

erinjulia's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Body horror, Violence, Toxic relationship, Suicide, Terminal illness, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Miscarriage, Mental illness, Infidelity, Infertility, Gore, Domestic abuse, Alcoholism, Addiction, Child death, and Death