Reviews tagging 'Torture'

A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes

20 reviews

aseel_reads's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective 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? Yes

4.25

this was a great retelling of the trojan war/post-war events. it was easy to keep all the different characters in your mind and you switched from different perspectives. i liked the non-linear format of the story and Calliope's hard hitting sentences about the impact of war (lots of parts underlined). i liked that helen wasn't protrayed as the evil woman. just an overall great read. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual violence, Alcohol, Sexual assault, War, Child death, Death, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Murder, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Slavery, and Vomit

marareading's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.25

This book is a beautiful retelling of the Trojan war from the women's perspective.  It is a very unique retelling, and I love that the author took the time to write a book that left out all the stories we don't normally get in history. This is one of the few books where I recommend reading the afterword. It is short, and packed with information about how and why this book exists. 

I did love this book. given that the women weren't actively fighting the battles, it means that the stories are more disjointed, so it almost feels like short stories put together.  It all does come together in the end. It is beautifully written. You can feel the wrath, pain, and intensity through these stories. 

If you love retellings, this is a must read for a new take on a traditional story.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Child death, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, War, Animal death, Death of parent, Grief, Misogyny, Murder, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, and Violence

ashleycmms's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Sexual assault, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Alcohol, Emotional abuse, Grief, Pregnancy, Rape, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Ableism, Animal cruelty, Blood, Body horror, Child death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Confinement, Death, Infidelity, Suicidal thoughts, and War

jeannekmele's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

cws: rape, child death, slavery, war, grief/trauma, genocide mention, spoilers

An exceptional collection of nearly universal tragedy across its heroines, pyrrhic victories are the norm for women whose darkest moments shine with vibrant human spirit on the pages of A THOUSAND SHIPS.

So often left footnotes--wives, mothers, sisters, sluts and daughters written to live, die, and love for the storied men of old--any background knowledge of the classical canon will lend an unerring hand to the conclusions we know these women will come to. Yet you cannot help but root for their success, or their peace if no such thing exist; despite the ends long since written for them, their human resilience and fragility and the womanly grit behind it all almost feels as if history could rewrite itself this time.
It doesn't, of course, but this in of itself is the devoted intersection of care and craft.

Though ATS is tragedy from the first page to last, the deluge of misery and loss roils and settles with the comfortable shape of a story until you're left with a sense of resolution that is not gratifying, but it is real. And that is the way of tragedy, trauma, and war: these things cannot be reversed, nor smoothed over, nor sated.

Andromache's family, first husband and son are dead; but she has another husband, another son, and her freedom; perhaps that must be enough. Penelope loses twenty years of her life, marriage, queenship and motherhood waiting for a husband who never comes home to her. But there is a like man in their bed, and his name is Odysseus, and perhaps that will have to be enough.

What of Eris, the instigator? What of Helen, the adulteress, the end of a kingdom? It is very easy, in a song about war, to glorify and vilify to the whims of one's own biases, or heroes, or chosen themes. I don't believe you will find such binary in this book.

A mother kills children to avenge her own. Slave-owners and rapists (we'll save the discussion on rape, duious consent, and power in the classical canon for another time) show gentleness and provision to their victims, even when regarded as property. The selfish goddesses who set a decade of devastation and a death toll unnumbered are, themselves, steered from the shadows by intentions as selfless and pragmatic as they are genocidal.

I will quote Natalie Haynes' afterword: 'Survivors, victims, perpetrators: these roles are not always separate. People can be wounded and wounding at the same time, or at different times in the same life.'

It would be erroneous to go into A THOUSAND SHIPS expecting anything less than complex women with rich inner lives under extraneous circumstances. In the man-made disaster that is war, it becomes impractical and impossible to keep an orderly measure of right and wrong. The human condition warps into something immeasurable under such extreme duress. Though by no means a soothing read, I nonetheless devoured ATS as I haven't done with a book in a long time.

I will close with this: Grief is a long-lived creature with many faces that may come in any amount or combination at any time, in three days or five years, or decades hence. Grief is angry, and loud, and dead-eyed; it is wasting away and endless tears and twists in our chests that by right of anatomy shouldn't twist there; it is jealousy and accusation and cruelty and violence and submission and insanity.
Grief is ugly, and so often in contemporary western culture it is unsightly and to be repressed. In women, grief is mockingly anticipated, oppressively levied, and mercilessly culled. A THOUSAND SHIPS is an excellent read across the board, but for those who are processing grief and trauma, who may be unsure how to (especially women), it is a cathartic and humanizing portrait of the externally-inflicted and yet worst, most unacceptable parts of ourselves that are too big for our bodies, and too loud for the world.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Gore, Slavery, Violence, Murder, War, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Misogyny, and Suicide

Moderate: Child death, Infidelity, Emotional abuse, Incest, Self harm, Suicide attempt, Trafficking, Rape, Fire/Fire injury, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Body horror, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Classism, Death of parent, and Domestic abuse

Minor: Ableism, Death, Fatphobia, Eating disorder, Pregnancy, Vomit, Alcohol, and Confinement

marisa_n's review against another edition

adventurous dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Infidelity, Misogyny, Murder, Death, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Gore, Torture, Abandonment, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Genocide, Grief, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexual violence, Slavery, and War

marianneiriss's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Suicidal thoughts, Kidnapping, Rape, War, Adult/minor relationship, Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Murder, Sexual violence, Violence, Child death, Sexism, Sexual assault, and Slavery

Moderate: Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Xenophobia, War, Torture, Slavery, Infidelity, and Cursing

Minor: Alcohol, Suicide attempt, Incest, Abandonment, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Suicide, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, and Self harm

orlagal's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Child death, Colonisation, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Excrement, Fire/Fire injury, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Incest, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mental illness, Misogyny, Miscarriage, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Vomit, and War

lindseyhall44's review against another edition

emotional

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Torture, Toxic relationship, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Rape, Pregnancy, Physical abuse, Misogyny, Kidnapping, Infidelity, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Death, and Death of parent

asourceoffiction's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny informative inspiring mysterious sad fast-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

5.0

Oh my goodness I absolutely LOVED this book. It's a huge novel, not in length but in how much it encompasses and the number of women to whom it gives voice. From slaves to Amazon warriors to daughters to muses to gods, it tells the story of the Trojan War in a completely epic way. Even the structure is incredibly clever; it jumps around in chronology but you begin to see how small decisions tie into the rest of the story, and I just couldn't get enough. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Murder, War, Torture, and Slavery

thebespectacledbookworm's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny informative sad medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Child death, Death, and Grief

Moderate: Rape, Blood, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Animal death, Sexual content, and Torture