Scan barcode
katrinadalythompson's review
dark
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
ana3333's review
1.0
An impressively bad take on race relations. Black characters exist in this novel just to be luridly tortured, without any acknowledgement of their agency or personhood.
I almost gave up after the first chapter, which hinted this was going to be one of those gruesome slave narratives that focuses on physical torture. However, I decided to keep going under the assumption that Martin was going somewhere with the point she was trying to make. Unfortunately, it never evolved into a remotely thoughtful book.
I suppose you could argue this book is an attempt to characterize the typical plantation wife, and the lack of respect for any black characters is just to show the protagonist's mental state. Even if that's true, this was still a pretty bad book though. It's poorly paced and just sort of meanders around without any resolution. The protagonist doesn't really experience much growth or make things happen. She primarily just sits there being resentful while things happen around her, which doesn't make for that compelling of a story.
I almost gave up after the first chapter, which hinted this was going to be one of those gruesome slave narratives that focuses on physical torture. However, I decided to keep going under the assumption that Martin was going somewhere with the point she was trying to make. Unfortunately, it never evolved into a remotely thoughtful book.
I suppose you could argue this book is an attempt to characterize the typical plantation wife, and the lack of respect for any black characters is just to show the protagonist's mental state. Even if that's true, this was still a pretty bad book though. It's poorly paced and just sort of meanders around without any resolution. The protagonist doesn't really experience much growth or make things happen. She primarily just sits there being resentful while things happen around her, which doesn't make for that compelling of a story.
meg_31's review
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Valerie Martin is an incredibly talented writer. To be able to create a story with such an unlikeable narrator that you still want to read to the end, is a skill that you don’t often come by.
It’s not a classic slave narrative in that you’re forced to sit on the side of the oppressor and only fed their racist views and justification of the treatment of their slaves. You don’t get to indulge sympathy for the enslaved people. It’s uncomfortable in the most eye opening way.
It’s not a classic slave narrative in that you’re forced to sit on the side of the oppressor and only fed their racist views and justification of the treatment of their slaves. You don’t get to indulge sympathy for the enslaved people. It’s uncomfortable in the most eye opening way.
bibliobethreads's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
festivefun's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
readingspells's review against another edition
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
I hoovered between 2 and 3 stars for this Women's Prize for Fiction winner. In the end I decided to be generous and go for 3 but then I wrote this review and realised it doesn't deserve that.
It's saving grace is it's a short/quick read because this book is full of problems and in 2003 and I would have expected a book about the slave era in America to be more than just some raciest white woman's story.
Sure Manon is a victim too, of men, of a patriarchal misogynistic world but she that seems to have made her cold and viciously raciest. You would have thought she might have sympathy for the way the black slaves, especially the women, are treated but she doesn't. She sees them as either criminals or essentially livestock to own and use. Her humanity, well she doesn't have any particularly where slaves are concerned. She doesn't see them as human.
This book is about a white women, the slaves stories, their voices are silenced. I don't know if I am meant to have sympathy for Manon but I don't. Nothing about her warrants that.
Maybe 2003 white women shouldn't be writing slave stories any more!
It's saving grace is it's a short/quick read because this book is full of problems and in 2003 and I would have expected a book about the slave era in America to be more than just some raciest white woman's story.
Sure Manon is a victim too, of men, of a patriarchal misogynistic world but she that seems to have made her cold and viciously raciest. You would have thought she might have sympathy for the way the black slaves, especially the women, are treated but she doesn't. She sees them as either criminals or essentially livestock to own and use. Her humanity, well she doesn't have any particularly where slaves are concerned. She doesn't see them as human.
This book is about a white women, the slaves stories, their voices are silenced. I don't know if I am meant to have sympathy for Manon but I don't. Nothing about her warrants that.
Maybe 2003 white women shouldn't be writing slave stories any more!
neen_mai's review against another edition
3.0
The novel is quite short, yet it felt like an eternity. I hated Manon but could feel and understand her bitterness. I just wish that the author would give more glimpse of Sarah's story. It must be hard to weave it into Manon's voice, as she clearly despised Sarah from the beginning.
elle_ette's review against another edition
2.0
1.5 stars rounded up.
Manon Gaudet is the bitter wife of a Louisiana sugar plantation owner whom she has hated for nearly all their years of marriage for his cruelty and ignorance, his terrible ways with their money and with their slaves, one in particular named Sarah who Manon brought to their marriage as her personal property, with whom he has a bastard child. Through her eyes she provides a snippet of the life she leads, the hatred she feels and her crumbling family life against a backdrop of rebellion stirring.
I read this for the first time many years ago when I was completing my GCSE in English Literature, and picked it up again because I had vague memories of enjoying it. Those memories were false. Despite an intriguing premise, an awful tale of the horror and injustice of slavery told from the point of view of the plantation owner’s wife who hates the man as much as his slaves do could have made for an interesting perspective, but it falls incredibly flat with bland, dislikeable characters, all of whom have exactly zero redeeming features despite the plot angling for us to take some pity on them. Manon had the potential to become an interesting character as she embodies a lot of clever literary techniques such as the gothic double, and could have become an ideal parallel to Sarah for Martin to discuss the roles of women and forced detachment, but she quickly becomes two dimensional and despite being under the thumb of her abusive husband is arguably no better than him despite thinking that she is. The only character I felt anything for was Sarah, who in turn was an incredibly problematic representation and a cold, unpleasant character, if only for the situation she was in and her drive to make do when faced with the choice of do this or die.
The opening chapter harbours a lot of potential and I think this is what my memories must have hinged themselves upon because it goes downhill quite fast, and even quicker around the halfway mark. The struggles of enslaved men and women almost felt like a prop to set up Manon’s woe-is-me responses to comparatively trivial situations, and any attempts to address them were flawed and underdeveloped.
One thing that I did like however is that the book is told from Manon's perspective instead of Sarah's, which I think I am in the minority for. There is no doubt that most readers would be moved by Sarah's point of view, feeling her trauma as she speaks of slavery, sexual assault and the loss of her children, but telling it from Manon's perspective set the book on a completely different level; we are forced to recognise that for a long time, this was normal and unquestioned, so much so that to many white men and women, no matter the injustices that they faced themselves, it never occurred to them that they could be doing something wrong. Manon never understands that Sarah might aspire to be more than a possession, and again, I think that if better care had been given to the development of the women in this novel, this could have been much harder hitting than it inevitably was.
Despite being a quick read at just over 200 pages, Property left me with no feelings of resolution at the end, positive or negative. It is relatively well written up until the final few chapters where I got the distinct feeling that Martin simply didn’t know how to end it, so she decided she’d stop mid chapter and call it a day. An interesting concept about a delicate situation that simply was not done well or delivered with care, a commentary on women's rights and women as property regardless of their skin colour or social standing could have been something quite special, but as it stands I don’t really understand how this won such a prestigious award in 2003 when there were so many better contenders on the long list, aside from its accessibility as a simple read.
Manon Gaudet is the bitter wife of a Louisiana sugar plantation owner whom she has hated for nearly all their years of marriage for his cruelty and ignorance, his terrible ways with their money and with their slaves, one in particular named Sarah who Manon brought to their marriage as her personal property, with whom he has a bastard child. Through her eyes she provides a snippet of the life she leads, the hatred she feels and her crumbling family life against a backdrop of rebellion stirring.
I read this for the first time many years ago when I was completing my GCSE in English Literature, and picked it up again because I had vague memories of enjoying it. Those memories were false. Despite an intriguing premise, an awful tale of the horror and injustice of slavery told from the point of view of the plantation owner’s wife who hates the man as much as his slaves do could have made for an interesting perspective, but it falls incredibly flat with bland, dislikeable characters, all of whom have exactly zero redeeming features despite the plot angling for us to take some pity on them. Manon had the potential to become an interesting character as she embodies a lot of clever literary techniques such as the gothic double, and could have become an ideal parallel to Sarah for Martin to discuss the roles of women and forced detachment, but she quickly becomes two dimensional and despite being under the thumb of her abusive husband is arguably no better than him despite thinking that she is. The only character I felt anything for was Sarah, who in turn was an incredibly problematic representation and a cold, unpleasant character, if only for the situation she was in and her drive to make do when faced with the choice of do this or die.
The opening chapter harbours a lot of potential and I think this is what my memories must have hinged themselves upon because it goes downhill quite fast, and even quicker around the halfway mark. The struggles of enslaved men and women almost felt like a prop to set up Manon’s woe-is-me responses to comparatively trivial situations, and any attempts to address them were flawed and underdeveloped.
One thing that I did like however is that the book is told from Manon's perspective instead of Sarah's, which I think I am in the minority for. There is no doubt that most readers would be moved by Sarah's point of view, feeling her trauma as she speaks of slavery, sexual assault and the loss of her children, but telling it from Manon's perspective set the book on a completely different level; we are forced to recognise that for a long time, this was normal and unquestioned, so much so that to many white men and women, no matter the injustices that they faced themselves, it never occurred to them that they could be doing something wrong. Manon never understands that Sarah might aspire to be more than a possession, and again, I think that if better care had been given to the development of the women in this novel, this could have been much harder hitting than it inevitably was.
Despite being a quick read at just over 200 pages, Property left me with no feelings of resolution at the end, positive or negative. It is relatively well written up until the final few chapters where I got the distinct feeling that Martin simply didn’t know how to end it, so she decided she’d stop mid chapter and call it a day. An interesting concept about a delicate situation that simply was not done well or delivered with care, a commentary on women's rights and women as property regardless of their skin colour or social standing could have been something quite special, but as it stands I don’t really understand how this won such a prestigious award in 2003 when there were so many better contenders on the long list, aside from its accessibility as a simple read.
huncamuncamouse's review against another edition
4.0
This books serves as a great reminder that not every book needs to have a likable narrator. I think this could be an interesting book to read in a class on intersectional feminism. Manon (the narrator) is obviously in a terrible marriage and endures some tragic, traumatic events. But she is continuously unaware of her own position of privilege, instead imagining that the slave her husband has been "cheating with" (raping) enjoys more privileges and is, ironically, more free. This culminates in a truly disturbing scene once Manon and Sarah are alone in New Orleans together.
All-in-all, fascinating dynamics are in-play in Property, and I couldn't put this book down. I do think the book ended pretty abruptly. And although we're frequently meant to disagree with Manon's perspective, it might have been nice to see a section or two of Sarah telling her own story in her own words.
All-in-all, fascinating dynamics are in-play in Property, and I couldn't put this book down. I do think the book ended pretty abruptly. And although we're frequently meant to disagree with Manon's perspective, it might have been nice to see a section or two of Sarah telling her own story in her own words.
sparksinthevoid's review against another edition
interesting to read, but we should have a conversation about white authors writing the n-word (yes yes i know this was published 20 years ago)
book 4 for my american south module
book 4 for my american south module