Reviews with content warning for Suicidal thoughts - Meine dunkle Vanessa: Roman

Very well written. Very uncomfortable read but that’s supposed to be the point. The language used was great, helped not only set the scene but helped with making me feel more confident reading. I wanted to stop knowing what I knew in terms of the theme but after 60 pages, I couldn’t put it down.

Content Warnings

taylorc19's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

As I was reading this book, I knew I was going to give it a good rating. I was immersed in Vanessa's narrative, taken back to my own time at a New England boarding school, feeling every emotion she felt throughout her high school years and beyond. I found myself comparing Browick to my own high school and feeling grateful that there were no teachers at my boarding school I ever felt uncomfortable or uneasy with. However, I didn't know I was going to give this book 5 stars until the last quarter of it. To me, a five star book means I don't have any criticisms of it, that I wouldn't do anything differently. It felt almost wrong to give this book five stars, as if I was condoning the abuse and disgusting relationships depicted. But I think those depictions are exactly why I can give this book five stars: they felt real and emotional and truthful. They didn't feel glamorized or romanticized. Vanessa is a devastating character. Strane is evil and diabolical and a pedophile while somehow also just being a man. He isn't overtly awful necessarily; the readers simply know he's bad because he's a forty-something year old man carrying out a relationship with a fifteen year old girl. There are so many times throughout the book my jaw dropped and my hand covered my mouth because of how twisted Strane was, but it never felt overtly graphic or like it was trying to sensationalize Vanessa's trauma. I don't have many more words because this book left me rather speechless.
Beautiful writing, beautiful storytelling, I genuinely have nothing but good things to say about this book. So devastating, so heartbreaking, so poignant. Vanessa was just trying to go to school.

Quotes:
"That seems the likely ending to this love story: me dropping everything and doing anything, devoted as a dog, as he takes and takes and takes." (6).

"The nine other students pack up their things and leave the classroom to carry on with their lives, to practices and rehearsals and club meetings. I leave the room, too, but I'm not part of them. They're the same, but I'm changed. I'm unhuman now. Untethered. While they walk across campus, earthbound and ordinary, I soar, trailing a maple-red comet tail. I'm no longer myself; I am no one. I'm a red balloon caught in the boughs of a tree. I'm nothing at all." (46).

"Sometimes it feels like that's all I'm doing every time I reach out-trying to haunt, to drag him back in time, asking him to tell me again what happened. Make me understand it once and for all. Because I'm still stuck here. I can't move on." (59).

"People will risk everything for a little bit of something beautiful." (84).

"I wonder if he really believes that. He touched me first, said he wanted to kiss me, told me he loved me. Every first step was taken by him. I don't feel forced, and I know I have the power to say no, but that isn't the same as being in charge. But maybe he has to believe that. Maybe there's a whole list of things he has to believe." (91).

"I get the feeling all he really wants is to leave part of himself inside me, to stake his claim, not to impregnate me or anything like that, but something more permanent. He wants to make sure he'll always be there, no matter what. He wants to leave his fingerprints all over me, every piece of muscle and bone. He pushes into me then, braces his legs against the arm of the couch and groans into my ear. It's strange to know that whenever I remember myself at fifteen, I'll think of this." (141).

"Even if we end up apart, right now he worships me-his dark Vanessa. That should be enough. I'm so lucky to have this, to be so loved." (159).

"Somehow I sensed what was coming for me even then. Really, though, what girl doesn't? It looms over you, that threat of violence. They drill the danger into your head until it starts to feel inevitable. You grow up wondering when it's finally going to happen." (193).

"To be groomed is to be loved and handled like a precious, delicate thing." (197).

"I try to imagine the same line paired with the Polaroids Strane took of me at fifteen, my heavy-lidded eyes and swollen lips, or with the photos I took of myself at seventeen, standing before a backdrop of birch trees, lifting my skirt as I stared at the camera, looking like a Lolita and knowing exactly what I wanted, what I was. I wonder how much victimhood they'd be willing to grant to a girl like me." (234).

"'I tortured him,' I say. 'I don't think you understand how much I contributed to everything. His whole life descended into hell because of me.' 'He was a grown man and you were fifteen,' she says. 'What could you have done to torture him?" For a moment I'm speechless, unable to come up with an answer besides, I walked into his classroom. I existed. I was born." (264).

"'Vanessa,' she says gently, 'you didn't ask for that. You were just trying to go to school.'" (265).

"He's always going to be old. He has to be. That's the only way I can stay young and dripping with beauty." (274).

"'Well, it's your fault, you know,' I say. A pause. 'Ok.' 'Everything wrong with me originated with you.' 'Let's not do this.' 'You created this mess.' 'Baby, go to bed.' 'Am I wrong?' I as. 'Tell me I'm wrong.' I stare up at a water stain stretching across the ceiling. Finally, he says, 'I know it's what you believe.'" (284).

"He knows everything about me, everything I've ever been and will be." (300).

"'Why does it matter so much to you?' she asks. I open my mouth, the word because poised to come out-because-because whatever happened to you couldn't have been so bad, because it's ridiculous for you to demand so much when I'm the one who bore the brunt of him. I'm the one marked for life." (315).

"'I just really need it to be a love story. You know? I really, really need it to be that.' 'I know,' she says. 'Because if it isn't a love story, then what is it?' I look to her glassy eyes, her face of wide-open empathy. 'It's my life,' I say. 'This has been my whole life.'" (319).

"He spreads my legs, buries his face into me, and there are tears in my eyes, on my cheeks. It's my birthday in two days. I'll be twenty-two. Seven years of my life defined by this. When I look back, I won't see anything else." (340).

"Looking ahead, I can see that, too-another classroom, another man at the head of the seminar table reading my name off the roster, his eyes drinking me in. The thought makes me so tired all I can think is I'd rather be dead than go through this again." (351).

"There must be a point where you're allowed to be defined by something other than what he did to you." (367).

Content Warnings

lululem's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

from the very beginning, this was a gripping novel. it has a somber tone to it the whole way through and i couldn’t help but keep wanting to pick it back up.

i knew going into this book that it deals with very dark themes and its a quite a depressing read, but i still wanted to check it out for myself. i think its hard and its ugly and its tragic but a wonderfully written book that captured me from the start.

Content Warnings

marihuitzi's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.25

Content Warnings

asimpson7's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was an interesting read. I would agree with many of the other reviews that this book is very dark and therefore I would not recommend for others to read this, especially if they have experience sexual abuse as it might be triggering. But this book was interesting in the sense that you are getting a glimpse into what some people who are abused live through and how they don’t view themselves as victims and believe they were consenting and wanted it. But I’m glad that towards the end Vanessa started to heal. Also how Strane dies is what I imagine to be fairly realistic in the sense that the victims don’t feel any sense of justice as he escaped retribution. Overall this book was well written as it made me feel incredibly sorry for Vanessa and disgusted by Strand and just so confused on how nobody did anything about it and how Vanessa didn’t think it was that bad.

Content Warnings

lindasoderlundd's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

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