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Reviews tagging 'Rape'
Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space by Amanda Leduc
27 reviews
melodyseestrees's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.75
My specific edition was somewhat difficult to read due to either the font or the spacing of the lines. I was unable to get used to it during my reading. This may just be an issue for my copy though. The material inside was insightful and informative.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Medical content, and Bullying
Moderate: Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, and Rape
good_names_dont_exist's review
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical content, Ableism, and Bullying
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts and Rape
danimacuk's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
2.5
I wanted to like this book, but unfortunately it was pretty disappointing to me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism
Moderate: Body shaming and Bullying
Minor: Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Confinement, Death, Grief, Kidnapping, Medical content, Rape, Terminal illness, and Violence
missisis's review
dark
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
4.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Ableism and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Rape, Incest, and Fire/Fire injury
puttingwingsonwords's review against another edition
dark
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
It was very interesting and I enjoyed the way it wove a narrative out of the author’s personal stories, fairy tales and research. I’m always afraid I’ll get bored and stop retaining information when listening to a nonfiction audiobook, but with this one I was always engaged and just wanted to keep listening! If you have any interest in disability history and/or fairy tales I recommend this book! It’s not a light read as far as the subject matter goes — through the ages disabled people have experienced & still experience terrible violence and discrimination — but I never found it depressing (at least not for long). I learned a lot & saw the deeper history behind some things I already knew.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism and Bullying
Moderate: Medical content, Mental illness, Misogyny, and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Abandonment, Child abuse, Rape, and Murder
morgan_the_moth's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical content, Ableism, and Bullying
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Rape
dazzle_spider_reader_1212's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Minor: Rape and Suicidal thoughts
lilacs_book_bower's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
sad
fast-paced
4.0
Please see content warnings. In addition to discrimination against disabled people, the narrator also experiences extreme depression and wants to not exist anymore. It is hard to rate memoirs and this work is part memoir and part essays, so my rating is more applicable to the essays content. I really liked her perspective and I hadn’t considered the fairy tales from the disability aspect, so I appreciated it overall. It feels a little on the nose to say, this is an accessible text, regarding writing about disabilities, but it is an accessible read. The author writes clearly and engagingly. This could serve as a good intro for people wanting to learn more about disabled people and the challenges they face. The author looks at disabilities in fairy tales and how they are dealt with, and what that could mean for the world in which the stories are being told. For abled people, it is easier to see ourselves in fairy tales and other stories, or imagine ourselves the princess or brave hero. But disabled people often see themselves as someone to be fixed, or even the villain, rather than also being able to see themselves as the heroes and heroines.
However, as the chapters went on, the fairy tale connection/analysis felt like it was just name checked, with very brief discussions. From additional info at the end of the book, I read that one chapter was published as an article. While I am not sure if it was before, during, or after the writing of the book, that chapter had stood out to me, even before I knew it was published elsewhere. I can see the connection the author is making, but it felt a bit like, one of these things is not like the other. Unfortunately, the text also felt a bit repetitive toward the end; it felt like it lost purpose or focus. The author asks a lot of questions about dreaming of a different world or life, "What would it mean to a disabled girl to see X?" "What if the world looked like Y?" I did appreciate that she wrote about different models, like Medical model and Social model, etc, as those were not terms I had heard, so I definitely learned something, and I am very glad to have read this book.
(Amusing side note: I swear a Booktuber described this as fairy tale re-tellings about disabled people, and I clearly didn't look at the sub-title, so I was quite surprised to read the forward and discover this was non-fiction.)
However, as the chapters went on, the fairy tale connection/analysis felt like it was just name checked, with very brief discussions. From additional info at the end of the book, I read that one chapter was published as an article. While I am not sure if it was before, during, or after the writing of the book, that chapter had stood out to me, even before I knew it was published elsewhere. I can see the connection the author is making, but it felt a bit like, one of these things is not like the other. Unfortunately, the text also felt a bit repetitive toward the end; it felt like it lost purpose or focus. The author asks a lot of questions about dreaming of a different world or life, "What would it mean to a disabled girl to see X?" "What if the world looked like Y?" I did appreciate that she wrote about different models, like Medical model and Social model, etc, as those were not terms I had heard, so I definitely learned something, and I am very glad to have read this book.
(Amusing side note: I swear a Booktuber described this as fairy tale re-tellings about disabled people, and I clearly didn't look at the sub-title, so I was quite surprised to read the forward and discover this was non-fiction.)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Body shaming, Chronic illness, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Ableism, and Bullying
mmatti300's review
hopeful
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
Damn. Leduc’s writing is superb and her grasp of the matter is so profound, I’m ready to go riot on the streets for better disability representation right now. I’m so glad I heard about this book and I will be recommending it to anyone interested in representation and even just media. It’s so accessible and so well-written.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Emotional abuse, Ableism, and Rape
overbooked207's review
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
📖 Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space by Amanda Leduc Book Review 📖
9th and last book of January 2023 and 9th of the year:
“I have nothing to prove to the world because the world has everything to prove to me. It is the world's responsibility to make space for my body, my words, my lopsided gait - our bodies, our words, our ways of moving through the world - to hold my childhood dreams of being a princess and a superhero close and help me understand that there is no need to want to be either. To start telling different stories about a body that might just look like mine, and reshaping the world to fit them. I am already enough. There is no need to be more.” - Amanda Leduc.
Discussing the portrayals of disability in fairy tales throughout history and how those representations influenced the people and world around them, this nonfiction book was informative and is one I definitely recommend! I also highly recommend picking up more books like this afterward to continue learning such as Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century edited by Alice Wong! TWs for ableism, abuse, body horror, bullying, cancer, chronic illness, depression, gun violence, incest, medical content, mental illness, rape, and suicidal thoughts📚🌹🗡🧜👨🦽🦻
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Body horror, Physical abuse, Ableism, Terminal illness, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, Body shaming, Medical trauma, Medical content, Bullying, Chronic illness, and Emotional abuse