Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

A Amiga Genial by Elena Ferrante

176 reviews

miller8d's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

This book is brilliant in a way that makes me say “This is the story of a real life,” not “omg I love this book.” Like, I don’t really feel like I read a fictional story. (I actually have no clue if it’s autobiographical or not but I won’t google it because I don’t want to spoil it). Perhaps for that reason, this book took me an incredible long time to read. Like, months on end of picking it up and loving it, but being unable to pick it up again because it was so difficult to read. I don’t even think it was actually difficult literature for me, but instead so emotionally dense and detail-heavy that I couldn’t pay anything but 100% attention while reading, otherwise I’d have to go back dozens of pages to figure out why I was confused. Also,

this is perhaps the only book or story I’ve ever known which accurately depicts how tumultuous and confusing and painful it can be to survive childhood and grow up. I absolutely loved her depiction of how the child’s mind can equally spin fantasy and horrific terror on the same coin— not simple boogieman stuff, but much scarier, finding awful and disturbing fears in/around the mundane figures of your social world and daily life, even when there’s nothing truly wrong there.

Beautiful book.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Gun violence, Adult/minor relationship, Violence, Misogyny, Child abuse, Sexual content, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Suicide, Death, Abandonment, Body shaming, Bullying, Toxic relationship, Stalking, Sexism, Grief, Death of parent, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Murder, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Self harm, Infidelity, and Emotional abuse

readswithemily's review against another edition

emotional reflective slow-paced

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

3.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault

alyssakueppers's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional reflective slow-paced

• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault and Rape

serena_hien's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual harassment and Violence

Moderate: Toxic friendship, Child abuse, and Sexual assault

Minor: Death

flovntic's review against another edition

emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense 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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Violence, Pregnancy, Child abuse, Toxic relationship, Rape, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Miscarriage, Sexism, Classism, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, and Toxic friendship

jasmine_reid16's review against another edition

emotional reflective relaxing slow-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Sexual assault and Sexual violence

cabeswaters's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

4.75

When school started again, on the one hand I suffered because I knew I wouldn’t have time for Lila anymore, on the other I hoped to detach myself from that sum of the misdeeds and compliances and cowardly acts of the people we knew, whom we loved, whom we carried—she, Pasquale, Rino, I, all of us—in our blood.

genuinely fantastic. me when the acclaimed novel that everyone says is good turns out to be good.

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault

stavoosh's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

What can I say? This book definitely lived up to the hype. I've spent the year trying to read more classics and I feel that this story had the aura of a classic with language digestible for the modern reader. Ferrante (a pen name) has compact, tell-it-like-it-is writing that I love most. She manages to weave in colorful explanations with just the right words that have a movie unfolding in your mind as you read.

The story is told from the perspective of Elena telling about her early life in a Naples neighborhood in relation to her best friend/foil/manic pixie dream girl/rival, Lila. the two girls grow up amidst poverty and violence. Their tumultuous relationship portrays the story of every young friendship- peer pressure, competition, devotion, and love- as it changes through the years due to the violent circumstances of poverty.

I had difficulty remembering all the different characters in the beginning and tracking all the timelines but Ferrante does an excellent job in characterization AND plot. This makes each character and timeline settle comfortably in your head. The protagonist, Elena who holds the same name as the author, tells us her life story while holding Lila as some sort of unreachable person who is ultimately impossible to understand to Elena. Throughout the story, Elena navigates life and strives to outgrow the neighborhood and even best Lila.

There were lots of things about this book that left me thinking long after:
- which girl is the brilliant friend?
- the mystery of Lila in the beginning, which we later learn is very fitting of her personality
- the last sentence that showed the reader only knows as much as the narrator knows, leaving Elena still a huge mystery
- themes that permeate the book of knowledge (is it superior through education or natural talent?), violence (permeates almost every relationship), etc.

Excited to read the next one and watch the show!

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Sexual assault

isabookabel's review against another edition

dark reflective slow-paced

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

4.5

It took me a while to get into this book, but the protagonist's narrative and exploration of her thought processes and emotions are so in-depth I ended up being really absorbed and think I will probably read the rest of the series. I think the complexity of emotion she has for her friend and the way the the author explores this means this book will stay with me for a long time - I can't think of another that explores so many nuances in a female friendship, over such a time period and underpins explicitly telling the reader with suggestions of more. Likewise, the internal self reflection was really profound and not something I come across often in books to this level - especially not combined with a good plot. The relationships were all rich in detail and felt very believable. 4.5 stars currently but had a hard time rating this so may return and bump up or down - partly because of all the reasons above I feel it could easily be a 5 star - but I suppose I don't feel like I love it and have enough affection for it to rate it a 5 at this moment. Partly because I spent about a week reading the first quarter of the book and feeling it drag rather, before then reading the rest in about 2 days. This meant though my feeling towards it changed, at this moment I spent much longer feeling frustrated with it than enjoying reading it. I will probably return to this at a later date and see if 4.5 seems fair. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Domestic abuse, and Child abuse

Moderate: Gun violence, Violence, and Sexual harassment

risemini's review against another edition

emotional 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

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Pedophilia, Blood, Body shaming, Bullying, Child death, Emotional abuse, Kidnapping, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Murder, Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexual violence, Homophobia, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, War, Ableism, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Alcoholism, and Racism