Reviews with content warning for Misogyny - Intermezzo

Reviews tagging 'Misogyny'

Intermezzo by Sally Rooney

41 reviews

waybeyondblue's review against another edition

1.75

reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

What happened between Conversations with Friends and here? 😭

Peter's POV was almost impenetrable. Both main characters - two brothers - unlikable. Plot was drawn out and uninteresting. And I really didn't like the portrayal of disability ('I can't possibly be in a relationship because I'm disabled' - wtf) or neurodivergence.

DNF about three quarters of the way through, but should have given up sooner.

Content Warnings

kerriski's review against another edition

4.0

challenging emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

carojust's review against another edition

3.25

emotional hopeful reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I understand the appeal of Sally Rooney's storytelling, yet I personally have a hard time with it. There are beautiful, interwoven character studies in "Intermezzo" with relatable conflict in family and romantic love. But it feels like an excruciating wind-up for a couple pages of emotional release, rendering the majority of the book dramatic and airless. I'm inner-monologued out.

This book covers a lot about grief, and loneliness and the complicated nature of love. It basically illustrates what happens when an entire family doesn't believe in therapy or communication, so you watch a lot of toxic self-soothing and mommy issues playing out.

You'll like this if you have similar family dynamics, and like experiencing unstable narrators finding their way to redemption. Lots of TWs.

Content Warnings

stindex's review against another edition

3.75

challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

ironicaster's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This was an absolute joy to read. This is my first novel by Sally Rooney so, of course, the writing style took me a bit to get a grasp on, especially Peter's chapters. The characters felt incredibly real, they all had their flaws, and all their motivations and actions made complete sense - I understood the characters almost immediately. I shed a few tears, I'll admit.

This is an amazing book about grief, loss, love, and family, but most importantly, what conditions make life tolerable.

Content Warnings

juditkovacs's review against another edition

1.0

slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

What I did not have a problem with in this book:

the lack of quotation marks for the dialogue – Some people always complain about this and I do not get why. It is very clear what is and is not dialogue.

What I hated in this book:

the cliché autistic character written by a non-autistic author – and him being mocked by his own brother for it, and this not getting addressed.

the wishy-washy religiousness

the relentless abelism featuring the “convenient for the plot disease” – aka the unnamed mysterious health issue one of the love interests. That only prevents her from having a normal sex life. But otherwise she is living on her own, maintains a full-time university lecturer job, has an active social life and is involved in the community, and has time for an on-and-off-again romance with one of the male protagonists. The especially disgusting part about this is that the main protagonist is more than willing to live with this condition. It is she, the disabled person, who wants to turn herself into a martyr, but at the same time string him on forever. Disgusting representation of disability from on of Time’s 100 most influential people in the world of 2022.

the cringey sex scenes

the prudish fear of “what will the townspeople think”

the polyamory phobia – I hate love triangles in books. So this coupled with the constant avoidance and disgust the characters show for the very obvious solution to their situation (I do not want to call it a problem) was very annoying. Is Rooney trying to trigger the liberals or the conservatives with this? She was after all “the top debater at the European Universities Debating Championships in 2013”. She literally puts debate edgelord Ben Shapiro’s famous “facts don’t care about your feelings” line in the mouth of one of the main characters. And honestly this book would have been a lot more interesting if instead of chess it would have featured a debate society. A university debate champion brother versus his practicing lawyer brother (you know someone who debates in the real world with real stakes) and their conflict and avoidance of their childhood traumas and grief over their father? Sounds great, and unlike most authors Rooney could write this from experience. Instead we got this fake, poorly put together shit. I will not speculate about the reasons for that, since I no longer care.

the agesim (we cannot have a relationship because I am so much older than you + you cannot have a relationship with a woman who is older than you, but at the same time...)

the hypocracy (… I can have a relationship with a woman who is younger than me) You could say this is part of the plot, but it is never addressed or resolved. As far as I am concerned this is yet another lazy plot device. Why did she write this like it takes place in the ye olde 1600’s?

the fake working-class struggle whining (I can’t make my share of rent this month because I am not being payed by this company, so I’ll just go stay at my dead dad’s house, which is technically my house now, for free)

the yoda-speak – I saw some reviews mention that Rooney claims this is inspired by James Joyce. I have not read any of Joyce’s work, but I have watched nine Star Wars movies. My conclusion: The Yoda is strong in Peter.

the poorly written suicidal thoughts

the lack of believable characters all throughout

the length – please hire some editors again, I beg you. Not every book needs to be 400+ pages.

Overall this really was the last chance I gave to Rooney. I thought Normal People was ok, but nothing memorable. I intensely disliked Beautiful World Where Are You, and promised myself not to give in to the hype for her next book. Then came the hype for Intermezzo. So I bought it. And ended up hating it again. But with this I am well and truly done.

Content Warnings

emily3954's review against another edition

3.0

dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I feel like I just read an entitled, gross, selfish man’s perspective on heterosexuality, with a specific spotlight on the *males* need to protect a *female*. It was pretty icky.

But the three women featured in this book were strong, pretty cool woman.

Overall, every character in this book was highly complex and nuanced. Rooney does a great job really fleshing out the good the bad and the ugly interworkings of people’s thought patterns, especially when one of the main characters repeatedly goes down mental spirals.

The lack of quotations marks throughout the book was a fascinating mind game, constantly checking and rechecking if the narrator in that chapter said that out loud or in their head. That being said it was challenging to read.

Overall I felt like I really had to work mentally to follow along with this book, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But the whole time I felt this book would be a quarter in length if every character just had a therapist.

Content Warnings