Reviews with content warning for Sexism - After the Silence

Reviews tagging 'Sexism'

After the Silence by Louise O'Neill

4 reviews

differentsisters's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

Content Warnings

danidamico's review

Go to review page

dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Loveable characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Al principio no le tenía mucha fe a esta novela porque el thriller doméstico no es de mis géneros favoritos. Sin embargo, me gustó mucho y nunca perdí el interes a lo largo de sus 400 páginas, es un relato muy bien construido. En Argentina existen varios casos de lo que se conoce como "hijos del poder", hombres jóvenes de familias con plata e influencia que terminan saliendo ilesos después de haber perpetrado crímenes atroces contra chicas más humildes. El asesinato ficticio de Nessa Crowley me recordó a esos casos reales, que dejan en evidencia la corrupción que posibilita ocupar una posición de privilegio en una sociedad patriarcal.

Es una decisión interesante elegir como punto de vista principal el de Keelin, una mujer que no cumple con los requisitos del estereotipo de "víctima" y que, más allá de los grises y las complejidades, también forma parte de la reproducción de la violencia. Es mi primer libro de Louise O'Neill, pero por comentarios que vi entiendo que sus textos siempre buscan incomodar (en el buen sentido), presentándote situaciones complejas que se escapan de lo políticamente correcto y de las respuestas fáciles. Sería ideal si la autora hubiese creado una protagonista pura y angelical como contracara de la monstruosidad de Henry, pero acá no hay víctimas perfectas. En mi opinión, todo esto permite que After the Silence pueda abordar ciertos temas, como la violencia de género y el machismo, sin caer en los lugares comunes. Ojo, tampoco creo que sea un libro revolucionario, pero está bastante bien y definitivamente opera con más profundidad que otras ficciones que andan dando vueltas.

La ambientación en la isla ficticia de Inisrún es super inmersiva, realmente se percibe ese aislamiento del resto del mundo, la sensación de claustrofobia aún estando en un lugar tan bello. Aparece un contraste entre lo sublime de la naturaleza y la violencia de las personas, como un juego de claroscuros. Si bien el ritmo de la novela es más bien lento y algo letárgico para un thriller, hubo escenas en las que genuinamente sentí la tensión; O'Neill logra transmitir los nervios incómodos y la frustración que produce ser testigo de situaciones de abuso en las que uno, como lector, no puede hacer nada para evitarlo.

Content Warnings

tabby2920's review

Go to review page

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Although 2020 is a sucky year for me, it's also been a year of reading enthralling and engrossing books and this one was no exception. Not only was this mystery thrilling and had me hooked until the very end (trust me, I was shocked at the conclusion), this book touched on issues with a thriller that you don't really see in other mysteries or done in compelling way that was written so well. Don't reveal too much but After the Silence takes psychological abuse in a whole new direction but on path that feels realistic and not far fetched. O'Neill has written a captivating tale full of puzzles and complexities of the human mind that dives into the question: how far will you go to protect the ones you love?

Content Warnings

tachyondecay's review

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Just absolutely devastating. But of course, I have come to expect that of Louise O’Neill.

After two brilliant forays into young adult novels, both well worth a read, O’Neill brought her unstinting criticism of patriarchy to her first adult novel Almost Love in the best and most scathing way possible. After the Silence is a more-than-worthy second adult novel. While both have passing similarities—depictions of emotional abuse, gaslighting, male partners treating women poorly—O’Neill looks at these issues from an entirely different angle. She forces us to confront not the darkest parts of relationships (particularly with men); rather she forces us to confront the greyest parts, the parts we seldom talk about because to admit they are present would be to admit our entire model of romance is broken.

Hopefully the description of the book is enough, but in case it isn’t, seriously, massive trigger warnings for partner abuse, gaslighting, controlling and manipulative behaviour, murder, etc. I struggled with this at times, and I have never had a romantic relationship, let alone a toxic or abusive one—I can only imagine how triggering this book would be for some people who have, and you should really, really think hard about whether you want to expose yourself to that before you read this.

But to be clear: if you are up for it, After the Silence is a stone-cold masterpiece.

On one level, this is a psychological thriller. A documentary crew arrives on the small island of Inisrún. They are investigating the unsolved murder of Nessa Crowley, who ten years ago was found dead during a party on the storm-embattled island. The islanders blame Henry Kinsella and, by association, his wife Keelin, who is our protagonist. As the story progresses, we must wonder whether or not Henry is guilty—and if so, is Keelin covering for him, an unreliable narrator?—or if the mystery goes deeper. In actuality, Henry is guilty of many other things—whether or not he is the murderer is not something I will spoil.

Do not expect a simple thriller here though. Almost from page one, O’Neill makes it clear that the psychology in this psychological thriller is far more focused on Keelin Kinsella’s relationship with Henry. The brutality of O’Neill’s depiction of abuse is in its very mediocrity. Keelin, having left a physically abusive husband and subsequently trained as a domestic violence counsellor, believes she knows what abuse is. So when Henry begins to control her, to encourage her not to leave Inisrún, cut her off from her credit cards, her phone, her friends, medicate her—all “for her own good”—and because he does it gradually enough, Keelin doesn’t see what’s going on. Or maybe she does, but she is too afraid to acknowledge it. Because you can’t forget the death of Nessa Crowley. You can’t forget the way it ostracized the Kinsellas, and how, against such opposition, they would necessarily feel the need for solidarity. So not only might Keelin feel like she can’t run—she also doesn’t really have anywhere to run to.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll turn these pages while your skin crawls, and you’ll want to yell at the book, as if it could transmit your words to Keelin: leave him, run, wake up and realize what he’s doing. Every moment of reading After the Silence is a visceral moment of feeling Keelin’s sense of swimming through lead.

If that were it, if this book were just a portrayal of a woman being gaslit and manipulated by her husband in the decade following a murder, then the book would be good. But what makes this book sublime is how O’Neill connects the dots for us between Henry’s behaviour and our patriarchal society.

I think there is room to read Henry’s behaviour in two ways. On the one hand, he knows exactly what he is doing: he is the mastermind, the manipulator, cunningly controlling his wife for his own ends. On the other hand, I prefer the idea that Henry is somewhat oblivious to the harm in his behaviour—that is to say, he is not naive and he knows that he is good at manipulating people, but he genuinely believes that this is what love is. We see this throughout the book. He uses all the right phrases, condemns obvious incidents of sexism, tells Keelin she needs to listen to him “express his feelings” because isn’t communication important in a relationship? Henry is the epitome of the woke misogynist.

This is the true danger lurking at the heart of After the Silence. The problem is not the women who are abused. And without trying to excuse individual responsibility, the men who are the abusers are a symptom of the ultimate problem: our society enables abuse, particularly the abuse of women at the hands of male partners. It does this in multiple ways. Some are pretty obvious when you think about it—the way abused people can so easily be isolated in an age where we all seem connected at the hip through our phones, the victim-blaming and lack of supports to people who actually leave their situation of abuse. But most of th ways our society enables abuse are far more pernicious, and Henry is a textbook case. This is particularly evident towards the end, when we hear more about his backstory. No one taught Henry how to have a healthy relationship. He learned bad lessons, built atop a tower of white and male privilege. In Henry’s mind, his love for Keelin justifies how he behaves towards her, because our society teaches men that to love a woman is to want to control her, to put her on a pedestal, to bind her to you so that you can admire her and praise her—but on your terms and in a way that can never threaten your own success. Just think back to the vast majority of romances and romantic comedies with these kinds of messages.

Echoes of this theme abound throughout the book. Consider how Nessa and her two sisters were mythologized as the beautiful, slightly alien Crowley Girls. From an early age, we teach girls—intentionally and unintentionally—that their beauty is tied to their self worth. Nessa, even at 20, was still a very young, very inexperienced woman. She gets taken advantage of, not because she lacks agency, but because the messaging she received for the first two decades of her life have twisted that sense of agency. What we view as unacceptable she views as acceptable because it validates the messages we have told her for 20 years.

Did Henry Kinsella kill Nessa Crowley? Does she ever get justice? You’ll have to read the book to find out! I won’t lie: it will be a difficult read, but it is so worthwhile. O’Neill engages me, gets me thinking about these issues, all while telling a deep, rich, dark story. This is the power of fiction at full strength; what would be dry or too stark when laid out in non-fiction becomes moving, terrifying, paramount when told through fiction’s lens. After the Silence is an abiding story of abuse, patriarchy, toxic masculinity, and the tolls that these take on women—up to and including their very lives.

Originally posted at Kara.Reviews.

Content Warnings

More...