Reviews tagging 'Physical abuse'

The Bodyguard by Katherine Center

20 reviews

veronicakirchner's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

Katherine Center knows how to create an emotional roller coaster that feels like the most fun ride you’ve ever taken! The Bodyguard will have you in a LITERAL fit of giggles one moment, crying the next, then tensely stunned after that - all while tugging on your heartstrings.

There are many aspects of this book that I adore, but one really sticks out: the protagonist. The main character is an incredibly intelligent woman who recognizes her own unhealthy and petty patterns, but realistically (and often hilariously) chooses to go against her better judgement anyway. The scenes she finds herself in are magnificently tied to the overarching themes. And in the end, she learns some invaluable lessons about love and life that rounds out her thoughtful character arc. Plus, her POV highlights all the reasons why I love first person, single perspective - the comedic internal monologue amongst external chaos that becomes like a familiar favorite joke throughout the story.

I could go on and on about why I loved this book, but a review of it cannot compare to the unforgettable experience of actually reading it. So, I’ll just leave you with one final thought: READ THIS BOOK!

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

yotsuba's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional funny hopeful medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

fun read, I wont read it again but it was really cute and entertaining 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

tinkeringcheck's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional funny hopeful lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

First person romance is far from my usual, but I was completely taken in by the warmth and freshness of this story. Yes, it's a trope for the ages, but the healthiness of the relationship between the leads was such an unexpected delight. A male love interest with emotional maturity and an overabundance of green flags? Clear discussions of boundaries and feelings? It was a breath of fresh, Texas air and the best kind of romcom you can root for all wrapped into one wise, silly, hopeful package. I adored it. I adored all of these characters. And I especially adored Jack's family.

The one thing that stretched my suspension of belief was the bodyguard team's antics. There's a lot of telling us about how great they are, meanwhile what's shown is a lot of... high school level drama. I just wish we'd seen more of what made this team - and our lead by association - capable enough to be hired by a beleaguered celebrity. 

All that being said: Do not - do not! - go into this book expecting realistic drama or steamy romance. It's a bantery, feel-good, reverse bodyguard trope that runs on rom-com logic, but (mostly) in the best way.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

jkpiowa's review

Go to review page

funny lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

sebradley29's review

Go to review page

funny inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

queerbean's review

Go to review page

funny hopeful lighthearted relaxing fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

This is pretty good although it’s really predictive, very, I mean the plot twist didn’t blow my mind at all because I just knew.
i honestly enjoyed reading this thing. It was cute, a little surprising, romantic, cute again, interesting. But I think a certain tipe of person would like it more than me , or at least someone who enjoys reading this cliche appearance things (the short girl, muscular guy, you know, the steriotope) that are considered hot now days. I don’t, but most people do. (So do you know, it’s not full of blondes and skinnie girls and that Kind of straight esteriotipes, I’m just saying that the book was always mentioning the fact that they had diferent highs and muscular masses and in my personal opinion is a little cringe and not realistic enough to be “cool” or sexy, just annoying) 
Despite it, yeah, I would reccomend it, Jack was lovely and I actually loved the fact that hanna was able to fucking tackle him, that was awesome.
A good read 
3.75 ⭐️


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

bethrb's review

Go to review page

funny hopeful lighthearted relaxing slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? N/A
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This was silly fun, but Bratz/fashion dolls did not deserve the stray criticism they got here! 

Everything about those dolls and
Kennedy
felt so... 2010's feminism.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

thebookpaiges's review

Go to review page

emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

camillarossi's review

Go to review page

emotional funny lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

maeverose's review against another edition

Go to review page

2.5

Sadly, this did not end up working for me. It started out alright, The writing style didn’t put me off (It was a tolerable amount of cheesy) I actually enjoyed the first half for the most part. Fake dating is one of my favorite romance tropes, I liked the idea of a bodyguard trope, especially with the bodyguard being a woman. But then towards the end I started to lose interest. There were also several things that bothered me throughout the book.

Which are:
-Hannah is a very bad bodyguard. She kept protesting doing things that can’t possibly be as bad as things she’s had to do for other jobs, she’s trained to handle tense life threatening situations - yet freaks out and shuts down over a shirtless man in front of her… She’s a grown ass adult, has had sex with men before, and she just shuts down over a man’s undulating six pack (seriously why that word choice)?
She was completely clueless about Jack’s fears, nightmares and feud with Hank when she was told during the briefing about what happened with Drew. Isn’t she supposed to be good at analyzing people and assessing situations? And she was scared of cows??? That scene was funny to be fair but made zero sense.
Yes this is a cheesy rom com and I’m probably taking it too seriously but still.
-All the back and forth conversations/arguments where Hannah refuses to accept or agree to something but eventually gives in. It always went on way too long, was overdone and got annoying pretty quickly.
-Along those lines, Hannah needing to be told a million times that Jack liked her before she believed it. It started to come across as her just being completely clueless rather than insecure.
-mainly because of those last three things, but also just because of the narration, Hannah seemed very immature.
-a lot of body shaming
-internalized misogyny
-very heteronormative (every single character is cishet)
-Jack getting physically aggressive with his brother and smashing that plate
-I felt like there should’ve been a content warning for suicide attempt for the end of the book. Even though we’re told many times that things could get messy given Hannah’s job, the whole book was very low stakes up until then, and that kind of came out of no where. For a rom com especially, it seemed a bit much. It felt like she almost tried to keep that scene a bit lighthearted as well with the writing style, but that’s not a scene you can make light of imo. It felt a bit insensitive.
-
the fact that the villain was disabled and ‘ugly’, plus the villainizing of mental illness in general (no that ridiculous epilogue did not make up for it)

Expand filter menu Content Warnings