Reviews tagging 'Addiction'

The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold

64 reviews

mattyyreadsbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark informative sad medium-paced

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Violence, Trafficking, Alcoholism, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

violetturtledove's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction and Alcoholism

Moderate: Classism, Death of parent, Mental illness, Sexism, Domestic abuse, Grief, Miscarriage, and Pregnancy

Minor: Child death, Trafficking, and Physical abuse

karenreadsbooks's review against another edition

informative

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, Murder, Addiction, and Alcoholism

Minor: Body horror

Focuses on the lives of these women rather than their gruesome deaths

jenny_d's review against another edition

informative sad slow-paced

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Infertility, Sexism, Trafficking, Child death, Death, Death of parent, and Domestic abuse

vixenreader's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.75

It is good to see the victims of Jack the Ripper as human beings instead of faceless statistics to be gawked at. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Miscarriage, Murder, Physical abuse, Alcoholism, Misogyny, Toxic relationship, Violence, Addiction, Alcohol, Body shaming, Mental illness, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Child death, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Forced institutionalization, Grief, Trafficking, Gun violence, Infidelity, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, and Rape

Minor: Racism, Gore, and Xenophobia

There is a lot of talk about the abuse within the workhouses and dissolving of familial dynamics.

walkie_check's review against another edition

dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Abandonment, Addiction, Alcohol, Classism, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexism, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Violence, Sexual harassment, Sexism, Police brutality, Physical abuse, Misogyny, Infidelity, Forced institutionalization, Trafficking, Religious bigotry, Miscarriage, Kidnapping, and Child death

louiseisabed's review against another edition

dark emotional sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Trafficking, Death, Domestic abuse, Rape, Alcoholism, Pregnancy, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Addiction, and Alcohol

Moderate: Murder

jordangddrd's review against another edition

dark informative slow-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction and Alcoholism

dckathleen's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

Everyone has heard of Jack the Ripper. Years ago I read Patricia Cornwell's book theorizing on who Jack the Ripper was, and over time I've read some other theories on the identity of the killer. The victims have never been treated as actual people with lives and families and stories of their own. They are dismissed because they were poor and were assumed to be prostitutes and their violent murders are described in great detail. 

This book is a biography of the canonical five victims. It traces their lives with as much information as is available and contextualizes it by explaining what it was like to be a poor woman in Victorian London. In some cases we learn about how these women grew up and then about their adult lives. We learn about marriages and children and glimpses of happiness. We read about how working people hovered over an abyss of dire poverty at all times, where an illness or turn of circumstances could take a family from a safe apartment to a workhouse or homelessness in the blink of an eye. Once they were in that position it was nearly impossible to get out. 

Several of these women were alcoholics, a few did engage in sex work, but several did not, they were dismissed as prostitutes after their murders because they were women in the poorest parts of London.  Several had children. There's very little concrete information on one woman, but even in her case the author gives us an idea of what her life might have been like. 

The author doesn't describe their deaths at all nor does she speculate about the killer. This book is about the women.

I found this to be a compassionate book and even beyond these particular women I feel like I have a better understanding of the incredibly tenuous lives of poor families in this time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Classism, Addiction, and Child death

rach59r's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder and Sexism

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Grief, Domestic abuse, Alcoholism, Death, Death of parent, and Classism

Minor: Addiction, Child death, Violence, and Classism