Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

680 reviews

lostatthelibrary's review

emotional reflective sad fast-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse and Toxic relationship

chrisnglaser's review

emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Bullying, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, and Gaslighting

kajasversion's review against another edition

challenging dark inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.25

I dont really go for memoirs, but I found this one’s writting style to be really interesting. The story was hard to bear through and I cannot even imagine what the author herself had to go through in order to write this. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Infidelity, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Gaslighting

standardchaos's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, and Gaslighting

chels_ro's review

dark emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced

4.75

a harrowing book that chronicles a queer abusive relationship with each chapter built around a prompt/trope that lands just personal enough to make you feel as though you are reading her diary. the unique structure through which the story is told is reason to read it alone. the only reason it wasn’t quite 5 stars for me is because i felt a few chapters didn’t add anything to the book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Homophobia and Infidelity

tenderbench's review

dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Minor: Vomit

wothmings's review against another edition

challenging dark hopeful reflective sad tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Gaslighting

Minor: Homophobia, Sexual violence, Religious bigotry, and Lesbophobia

jang's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, and Sexual harassment

rebeccaquinton's review

emotional reflective medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Lesbophobia, and Gaslighting

wardenred's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

5.0

Places are never just places in a piece of writing. If they are, the author has failed. Setting is not inert. It is activated by point of view.

This was a really difficult read for me, mostly because of the subject matter. The other did an excellent job conveying how it feels to be living in an abusive relationship: the visceral lack of safety, the walking on eggshells, the losing touch with what's real about your own self. This is a prime example of why memoirs as a genre fascinate me: I can't imagine how brave a person must be to write about these experiences so candidly. 

The narrative isn't quite linear, just like both the recovery from this sort of trauma and the trajectories of  getting into this sort of situations are never quite linear. The whole book reads almost as a collection of essays or journal entries, but they do form a complete story of a terrible, awful, no good relationship. There are a lot of metaphors and similes here, and the prose is flowery and lush; in some ways, all of that provides a kind of barrier between what's being described and the reader, but in other ways, it makes the subject matter hit harder.  

I don't expect to ever re-read this book, because getting exposed to some things once is perfectly enough, but I believe it will live rent-free in my head for a while. Especially the part about fantasizing about death because you forget just leaving is possible. Or the cockroaches in the clock. Or that poor snail. Or the phone that call that wasn't, after all, a break-up. Or, or, or.

And I've also written out a number of quotes, because damn, the prose here is so unfairly beautiful, with those perfectly placed words, and the rhythm, and the alliterations. I wish I was capable of crafting sentences like that.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Homophobia

Minor: Fatphobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, and Vomit