Reviews with content warning for Deadnaming - Girl, Woman, Other

Reviews tagging 'Deadnaming'

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

95 reviews

kaylamoran's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I really loved the way all of the stories linked together! As I was reading each person's story I was so excitedly looking for Easter eggs from the other stories, to see how they interacted. Seeing it all come together at the end was satisfying

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emmajanereads's review against another edition

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challenging hopeful informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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annadroid's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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booksjessreads's review

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adventurous emotional funny slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

My favourite read of 2020. An absolutely fantastic narration of 12 people of colour in Britain. This novel also reaches into short-story territory as each of the chapters could be a short story in its own right, but they are all interlinked in some way which brings it together as a compellingly written novel. Each story is portraying the diverse characters of POC diaspora and each story often shares turmoil from that characters life, but ends usually with something aspirational.

One review I read about this said 'her idiosyncratic prose rhythms imitate the wayward impulses of inner thought' and I have never been able to express that any better. What I really loved about the writing style was that the narration or conversations within the novel often wove into the characters inner thoughts through these prose rhythms, so you could get a feel for how the character was outwardly performing to others in comparison with their inner thoughts. I will admit, I was a little put off in the beginning about her lack of punctuation, but after the first chapter, I managed and it actually worked really well.

I have seen a lot of backlash about the lack of punctuation, but what I really loved about that was what it symbolised - that just because something is universally known, that doesn't mean it is right or should be followed, drawing parallels with racism that is so covertly (and sometimes overtly) rife in British society. Alongside, this her writing was poetic, compelling, blunt in places and soft in others. A well-crafted blend of emotions staggering throughout the novel.

Read the trigger warnings first, but this is a really amazing novel and a must-read for anyone and everyone.

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beckycarter97's review

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emotional funny hopeful sad medium-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I enjoyed this book, and thought the stories told within it were interesting and cleverly connected. I found the pacing odd, while the book discusses the entire lifetimes of some of the characters, there is a level on which nothing happens in this book - it begins and ends only a few hours apart

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snowhitereads's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

It took me a while but I finally finished Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo.

Let me tell you… It was a ride.

It is one of the rare books that lives up to the hype.

I can definitely see why it earned the booker prize for 2019.

This book is made of layers upon layers and stories woven into other stories that in the end create a full picture.

The characters really do seem real and are incredibly well developed.

It spans numerous generations and socioeconomic backgrounds and it is truly diverse, not just in terms of ethnicity, gender identity or sexual orientation but also in terms of points of view.

It brings to the table problematic and controversial topics and opinions but it doesn’t shy away from demonstrating how discriminatory and extremist they can be . It discusses privilege and the many forms it can take and the hardships of immigrants.

One thing I really appreciated, although very hard to read about, was the portrayal of

an abusive wlw relationship

. It is an issue rarely talked about, but it’s a reality for many people so it’s important to bring awareness to that.

On a completely different note, I did not expect so much wlw content in this book. I don't even remember anyone mentioning it, it was a pleasant surprise for me, but I probably would have read it much sooner if i knew haha.

Cw: domestic violence, rape, racism, suicide, drug use, deadnaming, miscarriage, infedelity, toxic relationship, homophobia, transphobia, racial slurs

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tashayns's review

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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sophieduncan's review

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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hollyd19's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

This gorgeous, full, moving book follows the loosely connected lives of twelve Black womxn throughout England. I’d liken it a bit to the musical RENT, with a glorious cacophony of people existing in imperfect concinnity.

What I found most mesmerizing about Evaristo’s novel is the way it deftly arouses empathy for each flawed, fully human character. The level of interconnectedness of each story varies, but ultimately highlights the validity of varied experiences, the truth that we cannot understand the depth of a single person’s life or internal narratives, and the need for radical compassion above most anything else.

Stylistically, GIRL, WOMAN, OTHER is unlike any book I’ve ever read. Each chapter illuminates the life of a specific character, and is delivered in a train-of-thought style with nearly no punctuation. In a way, it felt like sitting at a loud dinner party with people who love each other actively reminiscing and telling stories simultaneously. Once I got into the flow of it, I found it perfectly fit the spirit of the book.

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tachyondecay's review against another edition

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challenging emotional lighthearted reflective sad slow-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Every once in a while, I stop and just think about how everyone else around me is totally engrossed in their own life. I don’t mean in an egotistical sense. I mean … just as I am wrapped up in living my life, with my own beliefs and struggles, my moments to myself and my moments given to others … everyone else goes through all this too! Except they aren’t me, or I’m not them, and therefore I don’t know what it’s like … sorry, am I getting too deep? Anyway, Girl, Woman, Other is an unconventional novel that basically seeks to remind us of theory of mind. Bernardine Evaristo tells 12 interlocking stories that expose us not just to the lives but to the minds of 12 Black people. In so doing, she reminds us that when we look at someone, when we judge them, when we wonder why they think or behave the way we do, maybe we should stop and consider where they come from—not just in place but in time and society as well.

I’m not even going to attempt to summarize each of the 12 stories, because I am lazy. Let’s just say that Evaristo’s characters are drawn from a diversity of backgrounds, yet they also share experiences by dint of how society perceives them. Almost all of them are women (one is non-binary), all of them are Black (although that is complicated and erased for one), all of them are British yet are either immigrants or have tangible connections to immigrant parents or grandparents. Evaristo’s characters span generations, classes, careers, sexualities, and attitudes. They are artists and parents, cleaners and mathematicians, teachers and farm wives.

Girl, Woman, Other’s writing is closer to poetry than prose. The paragraphs are more like verses, with capitalization and line-breaks creative rather than conventional. Description dominates over dialogue, which is conveyed at a distance. In this way, Evaristo seeks to provide a sum-over-stream-of-consciousness of histories: her characters grow from girls to women in a matter of pages, learn hard lessons, move through the world and make decisions that set their lives on certain paths. This is beautiful yet also frustrating, this style—I don’t like it, but I also understand its use here, and I don’t mean to say it’s bad. I just don’t make a habit of reading novels like this, and I won’t pretend that it didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book.

I appreciate the myriad ways Evaristo interrogates the intersections of sex, sexuality, and race. Her characters are often queer—some of them openly so, some of them only experimentally or quietly. Trigger warnings for this book abound: rape and sexual violence, racism, abuse, xenophobia, misogyny, etc. Part of Evaristo’s theme is this idea that even though these characters explain Blackness and femaleness in very different ways, they are some level united by these identities by dint of living in white supremacist Britain. Meanwhile, these characters are complex and fallible. In a way, these aren’t really even interconnecting stories. They are character sketches, like we’re getting a glimpse into Evaristo’s notebook, plans for a novel not yet writen.

I take issue with how Evaristo tells the story of Morgan, the non-binary (“gender-free” in Morgan’s own words). Evaristo begins by using Morgan’s deadname and the pronouns she/her, only switching up after Morgan chooses a new name and switches to they/them. I can understand why Evaristo does this, but as a trans person, I don’t like it. I want people to apply my name and pronouns retroactively—now that I am Kara, I’m Kara in 1989 when I was born, Kara in 2007 when I graduated high school, Kara last year before I came out as trans. It felt weird and compromising to be asked to look at Morgan in a way incongruent with their identity, even if the idea is supposed to be that this is the past. And here’s the thing: in a movie, or perhaps even a more conventional novel, there might be call for such convention—but this is not a conventional novel; this is a perfect opportunity for Evaristo to further her experimental form.

(As an aside, Morgan, Shirley, Penelope’s stories probably resonated most with me, since I’m trans and also a teacher. I don’t know what it’s like to be Black in England, but I know what it’s like to teach there!)

Indeed, as I considered Evaristo’s portrayal of Morgan, I started to understand the limitations of Girl, Woman, Other. It deserves its praise for the diversity of its sketches, for the complexity of these characters. Yet it also runs into the problem that plagues every author: you cannot possibly represent, with perfect fidelity, the experiences of people whose lives you haven’t shared. I’m pretty sure Evaristo understands this, that this is in fact part of the point of the book—but I wonder if this might go over some people’s heads. Girl, Woman, Other’s greatest strength is, out of necessity and probably by design, also its greatest weakness. In telling 12 stories, it sacrifices its ability to dive deeply into one. Each of these characters could have, do deserve, their own 450-page novel to portray them as fully and deeply as they deserve.

That’s what I thought about as I read this book. In a way, I really appreciate that I pushed through its unconventional prose—it’s always nice when a novel gets me thinking about the structures and strictures of literature, about what is possible within the boundaries of the conventions we set, or within the liminal spaces between conventions. Thus, the highest praise I can give Girl, Woman, Other is that it is the best type of experimental novel, in my opinion: it is an experiment born out of empathy, rather than the author’s ego; and it is intrinsically aware of its own limitations.

And more broadly, of course, I suspect that this book is a response to the dearth of Black female characters in so-called “mainstream” literature. It’s somewhat ironic (but certainly laudable) that this book won such accolades as the Booker Prize. Mainstream British (and Canadian) literature often ignores the voices of women and Black people, unless they embody Blackness and femaleness in specific ways, in ways that invalidate the autonomy and dignity of their bodies. Evaristo in this book pushes back against such ideas. This is a book filled with Black joy as well as Black pain. Hopefully its success paves the way for more Black women’s voices to tell the stories they want to tell rather than the ones that our literary gatekeepers deem theirs to tell.

Originally posted at Kara.Reviews.

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