Reviews

I Become a Delight to My Enemies by Sara Peters

mickraine's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

alanffm's review

2.0

I Become a Delight to My Enemies is a highly experimental book of poetry that tracks the abuses and consequential self-hating behavior of different women in a made up Canadian town.

There is a lot going on here thematically and Peters' ability to convey those themes is skillful and laudable considering that there is basically no plot for the first half of the book.

I have a problem with how one sided the issues in I Become a Delight to My Enemies are. So much of what the reader experiences is emotionally driven, dependent on one dimensional facades of men, and dependent on a generic understanding of patriarchal society.

The book does a lot of things right, but equally does some things terribly wrong.

emelynreads's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

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

4.0

First off, I'm so glad I chose to listen to the audiobook. What an experience! The audio is creepy and unsettling, with breathing and singing in the background of the narration, which was done by several different narrators adding to the rich listening experience. The auditory layers reminded me of what A24 soundtracks sound like. 

I'm not usually a poetry reader but this type of experimental loose fiction with poetic focus was so interesting. You follow different women and their experience living in a small town enduring abuse by the men around them. Was the "plot" obvious? No. This is an audio book I'll want to come back to and notice new things. 

I feel like this book would be more difficult to grasp in physical form, and the audio production is just too cool. 

lowercasepoet's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

lifeinpoetry's review against another edition

5.0

This is so good in a brutal, sometimes cathartic, way. I feel I could listen multiple times and catch something new every time.

I wouldn't recommend if you're in a fragile place since there's rape, incest, violence, etc.

literaryspine's review

2.0

I was confused for most of this...

tommlachance's review

4.0

gross and good

careinthelibrary's review

2.0

Part of my lack of enjoyment was my lack of understanding. I found it so hard to parse out meaning from these fragments. It left me wanting more substance, more information. It felt like just snippets of pretentious but biting poetry about sexual abuse and womanhood. For me, this is another failed experiment in experimental fiction because these themes of structural, systemic violence against women are too important to have their meaning and intention lost in convulted verse. We need to shed light on these issues, not cover it up with more cloaked meaning and implications.

Trigger warnings for rape, sexual abuse, incest.

cschwartz's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective fast-paced

4.0

cctheunicorn's review

5.0

Incredibly strange and lovely