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cassiebartelme's review against another edition
4.0
Graphic: Body shaming, Cursing, Domestic abuse, and Emotional abuse
torturedreadersdept's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Infidelity, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Lesbophobia, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Gun violence, Racism, Dementia, and Pregnancy
blackbird300's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Body shaming, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Lesbophobia, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail
alexisgarcia's review against another edition
4.5
this is a very important story that needed to be told. there is not nearly enough representation of abuse in lgbtqia+ relationships which is necessary to raise awareness and encourage the support of the victims of abuse.
Graphic: Cursing, Domestic abuse, Hate crime, Infidelity, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Grief, Pregnancy, and Gaslighting
inoshiiro's review against another edition
5.0
I have often thought about and participated in the discussions surrounding queer representation in media. I've heard two opposing arguments thrown around frequently: "queer representation is too morbid and sad, and portrays us in a negative light" and "queer rep shouldn't just be all sunshine and rainbows, it's not realistic". I feel like this text tackles both of these arguments, even if that might not have been the author's central purpose. Media representation often reflects the 'reality' of those who hold power in society. As Machado notes, this is the same for history. The people in power are the ones writing the narratives. The way this memoir discusses the author's experiences alongside tackling the societal erasure of domestic abuse in queer female relationships is masterful. The format of the chapters were so creatively put together. The way parts of the text was repeated and emphasised was something I had never seen before (then again, I am not a huge nonfiction reader). I particularly adored
The writing was emotive and beautifully composed, keeping my eyes glued to the pages until I physically couldn't keep them open anymore. The short length of the individual parts kept my short attention span captured, and I found myself half-way through the book before I even realised.
I think this book has crawled it's way into my favourites, and I would definitely consider re-reading or looking into more of Machado's works.
Graphic: Cursing, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Drug use and Lesbophobia
Minor: Suicidal thoughts
creativerunnings's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Body shaming, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Outing, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Alcohol
michaelanormand's review against another edition
4.5
Graphic: Cursing, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Grief, Gaslighting, and Alcohol
bookishmillennial's review against another edition
I enjoy most books for what they are, & I extract lessons from them all. Everyone’s reading experiences are subjective, so I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not, regardless if I add stars or not.
Find me on Instagram: @bookish.millennial or tiktok: @bookishmillennial
This was a powerful memoir full of vignettes -mostly in a linear fashion- which told readers the story of Carmen's experience being in a toxic and abusive long-term partnership. She tells this memoir in second-person POV, saying "you" but describing herself and what she did and felt during these experiences. No review can properly express how much this memoir packs a punch, and shines a light on domestic abuse within lesbian relationships. Carmen notes that this isn't meant to be harmful representation of what a lesbian relationship is, but is simply to shine a light on the domestic abuse that also happens in queer relationships, not just heterosexual ones.
Carmen provides references of books and articles on this topic at the end of the book, and I can only imagine how painful recounting all of this, and publishing this must have been for Carmen, so I'm grateful to her for sharing this with us. The chapters are all named "Dream House as ____," which work really well, and some of the chapters are one page long! It's short but may take some time for readers to digest, as it does contain such heavy content. Take care while reading, but I will absolutely be reading more from Carmen in the future!
I highlighted SO much in this book, but here are some quotations that stood out to me:
Putting language to something for which you have no language is no easy feat.
“Why do we teach girls that their perspectives are inherently untrustworthy?” I would yell. I want to reclaim these words—after all, melodrama comes from melos, which means “music,” “honey”; a drama queen is, nonetheless, a queen—but they are still hot to the touch.
But house idioms and their variants, in fact, often signify the opposite of safety and security. If something is a house of cards it is precarious, easily disrupted. If the writing is on the wall we can see the end of something long before it arrives. If we do not throw stones in glass houses, it is because the house is constructed of hypocrisy, readily shattered. All expressions of weakness, of the inevitability of failure.
Your scary aunt said, apropos of nothing, “I don’t believe in gay people,” and from the back seat—empowered by adulthood—you said, “Well, we believe in you.”
You wish you could accurately describe the bone-deep ache of walking on that campus, the too-late realization that you’d fucked up your whole life by not having sufficient ambition. Who are you? You are nobody. You are nothing.
I had figured out exactly nothing. I came of age, then, in the Dream House, wisdom practically smothering me in my sleep. Everything tasted like an almost epiphany.
You wanted that drive-across-four-states desire. You wanted someone to be obsessed with you. How could you accomplish that?
How do we direct our record keeping toward justice?
We deserve to have our wrongdoing represented as much as our heroism, because when we refuse wrongdoing as a possibility for a group of people, we refuse their humanity. That is to say, queers—real-life ones—do not deserve representation, protection, and rights because they are morally pure or upright as a people. They deserve those things because they are human beings, and that is enough.
Most types of domestic abuse are completely legal.
In one trip, she can listen to 75 percent of an audiobook. If she is driving at sixty-five miles per hour, and the average length of an audiobook is ten hours, how many months will it take for her to realize she has wasted half of her MFA program driving to her girlfriend’s house to be yelled at for five days? How many months will it take her to come to terms with the fact that she functionally did this to herself?
“My queen,” the letter said, “your words are very pretty. And yet they cannot obscure the simple fact that I have seen your zoo.”
What is the value of proof? What does it mean for something to be true? If a tree falls in the woods and pins a wood thrush to the earth, and she shrieks and shrieks but no one hears her, did she make a sound? Did she suffer? Who’s to say?
Dream House as Proof:
So many cells in my body have died and regenerated since the days of the Dream House. My blood and taste buds and skin have long since re-created themselves. My fat still remembers, but just barely—within a few years, it will have turned itself over completely. My bones too. But my nervous system remembers.
In trying to get people to see your humanity, you reveal just that: your humanity. Your fundamentally problematic nature. All the unique and terrible ways in which people can, and do, fail. But people have trouble with this concept.
You will wish for it anyway. Clarity is an intoxicating drug, and you spent almost two years without it, believing you were losing your mind, believing you were the monster, and you want something black and white more than you’ve ever wanted anything in this world.
Graphic: Cursing, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Toxic relationship, Violence, Gaslighting, and Alcohol
scifi_rat's review against another edition
4.5
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Sexual content, Lesbophobia, and Sexual harassment
Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Biphobia, Body shaming, Bullying, Cancer, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Fatphobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Religious bigotry, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
charlie_cheese's review against another edition
4.5
Graphic: Cursing, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, and Gaslighting