Reviews tagging 'Medical trauma'

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

1 review

bookedbymadeline's review against another edition

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

2.5

TW: discussions of eating disorder, transphobia, deadnaming, and misgendering

Beauty Queens didn’t fully grab my attention until about 200 pages in. Some of the sub plots felt so unnecessary and the pacing was off. It dragged a majority of the time and the footnotes slowed me down as they became more of a distraction that pulled me out of the story. 

It was a little all over the place and there were a lot of characters to keep track of. I think a few of them could’ve been removed as we don’t see them on a deep level anyways and are treated as simply background characters. I did enjoy the character development for the more center stage characters and their relationships with each other!

Since this book is satire, the jokes/poking at society could be funny at times but other times I cringed or rolled my eyes. I particularly had a hard time with all the body shaming/fatphobia and eating disorder discussions since I myself am in recovery for an ED. I think people who struggle with any of the below TW/CW should take caution if picking up this book.

Another aspect I was disappointed by was the transphobia and deadnaming. It was problematic and not the inclusive rep that the author might think she had done. The transphobia was addressed as being problematic at times by the characters but not very strongly reprimanded. The deadnaming and misgendering was never called out/addressed and occurred far too many times. Plus Petra being trans and who she used to be was used as a “shocking” plot device rather than forming a fuller character who could’ve been amazing. Even Petra herself acts as if she’s “not really a girl” because of her lack of bottom surgery when that’s not what determines someone’s gender. 

I didn’t hate it, it’s a strange read with important discussions on self esteem, misogyny, and racism hidden in between the unique plot line. I was really excited for this one but it just fell flat and I was really disappointed in the supposed LGBTQ+ rep. Maybe satire just isn’t my thing because it was a strange mix of emotions as I read this. I did like the ending though and it was a quick read once I got further into the book-if it had continued being slow and scattered I would’ve DNFd for sure.


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