Reviews tagging 'Sexism'

Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt

12 reviews

mysimas's review against another edition

Made it half way through… The idea of the witch all chained up, with her eyes and mouth sewn shut just randomly haunting the town was interesting and unsettling, and the way the townies tried to live normal lives around her and camouflaged her from visitors made for my favourite take-away from the whole story.

But the writing style, the characters, the misogyny all put me off. This is one of those books that’s written a little like watching a movie: the action is described but there’s no additional value to the text. The character work didn’t go deep either, and especially the ‘police’ guy came off annoying and incompetent. I skimmed ahead to see how it ends and feel no need to stick around for the rest of the journey.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Confinement, Death, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual violence, Suicide, and Torture

Moderate: Domestic abuse and Death of parent

karmandala's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Animal death, Mental illness, and Torture

orange_chocolate's review against another edition

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? It's complicated

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Sexual assault, and Suicide

ravensalwaysreading's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

4.0

Up until the last chapter every character made me think "wow, you can really tell this was written in 2012 by a guy- the bigotry did not age well" and then the ending happened and made everything make sense and I was so pleased while simultaneously being horrified. Highly recommend!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Blood, Antisemitism, Islamophobia, Grief, Religious bigotry, Suicide attempt, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, and Injury/Injury detail

turtleofhades's review against another edition

dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

4.75

This book. This book is gonna leave me with nightmares for the next little while.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Grief, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Gun violence, Misogyny, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Toxic friendship, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Animal cruelty, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Gun violence, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Torture, Blood, Islamophobia, Grief, Murder, Abandonment, and Classism

monstersinspace's review against another edition

dark sad tense slow-paced

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

2.0

This book is very obviously written by a man, and a man obsessed with Steven King no less. It reads like a book written in 1970, casual sexism and all. There are only three named female characters who actually get to talk. The constant unnecessary groping of the character who was a victim of domestic violence was so unnecessary and added nothing to the story. I only suffered through the meandering end in the hope that something satisfying would come about from the witch, but was let down completely. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body shaming, Bullying, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Fatphobia, Gun violence, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Suicide attempt, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

tbd24's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-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

2.0

First things first, if you haven’t read this book yet, check the trigger warnings bc hot damn. Literally everything is graphic.

I have a difficult time rating this because i feel like, technically, in some ways, it was a pretty good book. The writing was lush and evocative, and sense of horror well maintained and accentuated with moments of humor or banality or otherwise. However, I feel like the book had a lot of problems with realistic character choices. Tyler and Jaden are the only two people who feel like fully realized characters who have motive and personality and make wise and unwise choices. Every other named character makes choices that are convenient to the plot and every unnamed background character (the citizens of black springs, who seem to number in the thousands??) are just a faceless mass of mob mentality. I feel like the author spent little time convincing me that thousands of people would make the irrational choices they did, and more time moralizing that humanity is stupid and hopeless and violent. I am already biased against this opinion so i guess take this with a grain of salt. The last 25% of the book is just hitting you over the head with “people are stupid and violent and humanity sucks”, down to steve’s final decision to

let his wife and son die in a fire for literally no reason, after already realizing that Catherine had no power over the situation

. I understand this is a horror novel but it’s just truly boring to me when authors act like the end is fated and don’t even bother to make the characters choices make sense.

Beyond this, the main problem I had throughout the whole book was the authors blatant sexism. The only woman in this book with anything like power or agency was the literal witch, who’s literally wrapped in chains with her mouth and eyes sewn shut. Every description of a woman fell neatly into category of “ugly old hag”, “mom”, or “sexual object with no personality”.  Not even any bitches! Sometimes women would cross contaminate, and be an ugly old hag who was at least worth it for the tits, or a mom who still put out every night for her husband. Even in moments when it made absolutely no sense, the author found a way to get a woman naked (ie;

the head council guy groping Griselda bizarrely, Jocelyn having a hallucination of being fucked by a boar, or the fact that she was inexplicably naked at the end???? literally why was she naked???

). Obviously the first red flags were that none of Tyler’s friends were girls, and Matt apparently had no friends, and all of the adult women were hysterical and/or completely reliant on their husbands, but I was lulled into a sense of hope by  Catherine being possibly powerful and maybe secretly the moral was that people discredit women but noooo the author made sure to remind you that catherine was a woman with tits too. Like, it was so jarring every time it happens bc I’d be immersed in a tense scene and then completely taken out because the author just HAD to mention boobies RIGHT NOW ( I literally laughed out loud at

the jocelyn/boar scene, i was so excited to have a moment of her pov and her taking action but nope fucked by a boar and as soon as she finds a man she becomes completely feeble again

). I just quite literally felt like the author never imagined anyone but a white cis man reading his book. I don’t even want to talk about Griselda. 

Anyway yeah I think that’s it. Some very stunning moments of evocative writing. Some equally stunning moments of sexism, nihilism, and general senseless violence. Not really my thing

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Hate crime, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Blood, Excrement, Police brutality, Islamophobia, Medical content, Grief, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

marina_michelle's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Vomit, Grief, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Bullying, Racism, Sexism, and Car accident

bubblescotch's review against another edition

dark tense slow-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

2.5

Was I not supposed to laugh??? At the

baby boob milk pâté nipple thing

at the end???? Because???

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Misogyny, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Violence

Moderate: Rape, Sexism, and Islamophobia

bert_does_horror's review against another edition

Love the concept; love the theme. However, the book is a slog to read for well over the first half, with cringy characters that are impossible to connect with. The balance between humor and tension is way off. Mainly because the humor is that of a 15 year old ass, who wants nothing more than to talk about boobs AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. Listen, I like the whole “people being the real monster” trope, but without enjoyable characters stuck in the situation, I find I’m just waiting around for people to die. And with this story, you will be waiting around for a while.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Sexual violence, Suicide, and Violence