Reviews with content warning for Sexism - Eileen

Reviews tagging 'Sexism'

bugcollector's review

challenging dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

0.75

At last, I'm done with this book, and it only took me 12 months!

Eileen starts off funny and cunning. A bit suicidal, but mainly stuck in her place craving an escape:
▫️ "Icicles hung from the rafter over the front door, and I stood there imagining them cracking and darting through my breasts, slicing through the thick gristle of my shoulder like bullets or cleaving my brain into pieces." (p. 3)
▫️ "If my daydreams from back then cane true, one day I'd have found him splayed out at the bottom of the stairs, neck broken but still breathing. 'It's about time', I'd say with the most bored affect I could master, peering over his dying body." (p. 5)
▫️ "He was a cruel character. Imagining his parents beating him as a child is the only path to forgiveness that I have found so far. It isn't perfect but it does the trick." (p. 6)
▫️ "I could be very dramatic with my self assessments." (p. 8)
▫️ "I imagined what relief I might feel if I could lie on Dr. Frye's couch just once and confess like some sort of fallen hero that my life was simply intolerable. But, in fact it was tolerable. I'd been tolerating it after all." (p. 22)

As I read on (until about p. 50) Nothing made me want to pick this book again for a long while. I Ended up reading Moshfegh's newest book from this year, Lapnovka, and regretted it dearly, which put me off from this one even more. Determined to cut down my currently reading list before the new year, I found myself working hard to read through it this weekend.

My problem with Eileen is that she stays stuck in the place for most of the book. Near the very end something interesting happens, but by then you have fallen asleep.
Her routine isn't unique, and there's so much you can read about her hating everything, her repeating that she's a new girl now and those things happened in the past, her saying it's the last time she went to the prison, the last time she saw her father, the last time she saw an icicle drop, yada yada yada.
Eileen ends being relatable relatively fast. She is deeply disterbing, pretty vile, and endulged with some hard topics (Moshpeg loves bringing poop and masterbation to the conversation)

I think the plot sounds promising, centering a young girl seeking an escape.
But you won't get an escape with it, you'd end up wanting to escape from it.

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ameliasbooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.75

The story had huge potential, but made me feel uncomfortable, unfortunately for the wrong reasons most of the time.
Telling the story retrospectivly was a weird decision and made the book less suspenseful. It also could have been definitely shorter, which was mainly caused by the author underestimating the reader and over explaining every single characteristic or situation important for the story.

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caitlinderocker's review

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dark funny mysterious reflective medium-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

4.0

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hannahlouise_'s review

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dark mysterious sad slow-paced

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

3.5

not my favourite moshfegh book but a dark, intense read and i was genuinely surprised at points. definitely preferred to death in her hands but nowhere near myorar at least to me

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bookishgoob's review

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dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

An older Eileen details her last few days in her home town as a 24 year old.

Sometimes disgusting and outrightly human, Eileen delved deep into the mind of a woman of the 1960’s. It makes you think “can I admit these things about myself when i’m alone?” The way that Eileen willingly admits that she has an obsession with bowel movements, the way that she looks at the teenage boys in the prison while maintaining that she isn’t a pedophile, and her unhealthy obsession with Randy is something so wrong that it is actually right. It’s these deep thoughts that some people have that they will never ever admit. the way she fantasizes about dying, and even killing her father may make you think she is actively insane; but are these not things we think about often? Thinking of how the people around us would react if we disappeared. How we would feel if our parents who abused us just one day dropped dead? I don’t necessarily think Eileen is “unhinged”, we as a culture just don’t view “femininity” to be anything more or less than dainty, submissive, cutesy, quiet, and agreeable. Eileen is none of those things and because of that, the mind automatically jumps to her being unhinged. I feel like this story really encapsulated the human experience and the human brain when we’re left alone. completely. It explores the idea “are these feelings platonic or romantic” when it comes to your first same sex crush. I’m not sure if she really knew or ever figured it out, but it’s something i myself and many other people have gone through. Feeling as though we’d do anything for this person to like us a little bit more, trust us, need us, WANT us. It’s an ostracizing feeling. The way that Eileen was so easily manipulated by Rachel set off alarm bells in my brain. Eileen is so perfectly an adultified person. Someone who was a victim of emotional incest in her youth. forced to be her parents caretakers when she was still learning how to care for herself. The fact that she is so “vulgar” and “disgusting” is so scarily the way an adult who was a victim of adultification would act.

The plot twist was so mind boggling. I thought for sure I had figured out what the plot twist was going to be, but i didn’t and that was exciting. Eileen was such a complicated and real person. An unreliable narrator at its best. I don’t think i’ll ever revisit this book, though. It left me feeling the way requiem for a dream (2000) did. It was off putting, nausea inducing, and downright uncomfortable. The fat shaming/fat phobia really sucked to read, but it was also very telling of Eileen’s no filter personality. The way that she looked at others is no doubt how her parents saw others and forced her to have that same rhetoric as they forced her to care for them. It’s seen especially in the way that Eileen talks about herself, and how near the end she talks about her mom buying her clothes a size too small so she would try and fit normal into those clothes. This book details so greatly the effect that adultification abuse has on children as they turn into adults. The inability to form long lasting, healthy, and real relationships. The inability to decipher right from wrong. The way that they see the world. It’s scary how well it was depicted. Eileen was a really great read. Slow at first, it doesn’t truly pick up until the last chapter “Christmas Eve” but, the foreshadowing is so incredibly important that even though it was slow paced, it had a reason to be slow paced. The pacing wasn’t an issue like it is in other slow paced books. I really enjoyed this read, but I feel like i have to go cleanse my brain to feel normal again.

Triggers: Child Abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, pedophilic thoughts, confinement, fat phobia, death, death of a parent, vomit, feces, incest, murder, suicidal thoughts, homicidal thoughts, miscarriage, toxic friendship, toxic family, abuse, alcoholism, drug use, graphic descriptions of bodily functions (bowel movements, sweat, masturbation, menstruation, not washing hands after the bathroom, etc)

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weisej's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

Plot-Twist der Wahnsinn. Ich liebe, wie abgefuckt dieses Buch ist. So absolut absurd. Vor allem die Interaktionen zwischen Eileen und Rebecca und Eileens Wahrnehmung von Rebecca. Das Buch ist völlig pessimistisch, düster und deprimierend auf eine sehr befriedigende Art und Weise. Ich war in der Stimmung für einen leidenden Charakter, in dessen Leben alles scheiße ist und wurde von Eileen nicht enttäuscht. Wirklich alles. Love it. Love Eileen. Sie ist die Verkörperung von "Wenn sie vom Hochhaus springt, springst du hinterher". Alles ist soooo schön absurd abgefuckt. <3 Spannend ist auch, dass die Vorgeschichte des eigentlichen Ereignisses den Großteil des Buches ausmacht. Die Origin Story.

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toffishay's review

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.75

Eileen is such a unique main character. She is horrible and interesting and lonely and sad and I couldn't stop following her. I do wish that the third act happened a little sooner and that we could have followed Eileen more after the action. And the end really did shock me! I really enjoyed this book, it is my favorite so far of Moshfegh's work.

Content Warnings