Reviews with content warning for Toxic relationship - Such a Fun Age

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Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

lauraceae12's review against another edition

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challenging informative reflective fast-paced

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

4.25

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bloopyfloopy's review against another edition

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challenging informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

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grinslibrary's review

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emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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jonbrady's review against another edition

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informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Such a Fun Age is a proper page-turner about modern millennial living, privilege, white saviours and black fetishists and the kinds of micro-aggressions that permeate our lives.

Emira Tucker, down-on-her-luck Black twentysomething, takes a babysitting job for women-empowering blogger Alix Chamberlain - who sees herself, her upmarket home and her Cody family as the life-changing opportunity Emira has been waiting for. But when Emira is racially profiled in a supermarket and the incident is caught on camera, what flares up between the pair reveals much about both and how their race has dictated their lives and the struggles they face.

Kiley Reid’s debut has much to say about the modern power dynamics between Black people and white people, particularly the white people who are seen to make the grandest efforts and gestures to be “anti-racist”. Some of the bit parts aren’t as fleshed out as they could be, and the closing scenes perhaps amp up the conflict a little more than expected, but this is a great study that asks why, so often, Black people are characterised only by what they do for those with white skin.

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jesserebekah's review

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.5

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juliebean666's review

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emotional informative reflective 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? Yes

4.0

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erinla42's review

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challenging dark funny hopeful reflective fast-paced

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

5.0

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sporemiette's review against another edition

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challenging reflective tense fast-paced

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

4.75

All in all, Such a Fun Age was a pretty fantastic book. It did not hold its punches and I'm grateful for that fact. Reid is great in her use of foreshadowing, especially in the way that Alix progresses as a character. Speaking of Alix, wow. What a fantastically terrible person. She first comes across as a somewhat entitled but well meaning person who genuinely wants the best for Emira, but that facade quickly falls apart as soon as things don't go her way.

Alix's breakdown at the end of the book makes total sense for her character, and yet it's devastating nonetheless. And Kelly? His performative activism and fetishization of Black people makes my skin crawl.

With Kelly and Alix being such complicated and nuanced people though, I can't help but feel as if the main character Emira is a little underdeveloped by comparison. I understand that her whole situation is that she doesn't really know who she is and she's trying to figure what she wants in life but that never really gets developed until the very end of the book, in the "aftermath" chapters. Another gripe I have is that, at least in my addition of the book, the book description mentions how

the video that Kelly takes of Emira gets leaked, implying that is the main issue for most of the book when that simply isn't the case. The video being leaked happens near the end of the book.

I know it sounds stupid, but I feel like putting such a major spoiler in the book's description isn't the best way to go? Regardless of that minor complaint though, I definitely think that this book is worth a read anytime, especially if you're white and want to be an ally.

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