Reviews with content warning for Injury/Injury detail - Penance

I haven't read Boy Parts so this was my first taste of Eliza Clark's writing and I found it outstanding. The whole thing messes with your head as the vast majority of Penance is a fictional book written by a fictional author, but you're also aware from the beginning that this fictional book in this fictional world might not be entirely true. In all this, Eliza Clark manages to make adolescents' speech and writing styles not just understandable but compelling. I think the unreliable narrator is made a little too much of and is there to add an extra dimension to the book's criticism of True Crime, but it would have been less of a book without it. I'm off out to buy Boy Parts now.

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iheartm4m's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

As a tumblr trawler of 2013-2016, this book hit home so hard. I knew girls like this, and now i dont have to imagine what would have happened to them if they took it too far. Great use of media from this decade, im obsessed with clarks use of the darkest parts of the internet that are teenage girls blog posts. Fantastic and fascinating and chilling. Could not put it down. As a person the same age as the characters, f*** me is this accurate!

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danidamico's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.0

Me gustó, empecemos por eso. Pero tengo que admitir que Penance, mi lanzamiento literario más anticipado de 2023, no cumplió con mis expectativas. Boy Parts, la primera novela de la autora británica Eliza Clark, es una de mis lecturas favoritas de los últimos años, me encantó, por eso esperaba con mucho entusiasmo esta segunda novela. Penance es la crónica de un crimen ficcional, el asesinato de la adolescente Joan Wilson en manos de tres compañeras del colegio en un pueblo costero de Inglaterra. Clark construye un narrador que juega el rol de escritor de la crónica, con guiños a A sangre fría de Truman Capote y a la cultura del true crime. Sé que no debería comparar, pero es inevitable; este libro difiere muchísimo del debut de la autora, que era una narración en primera persona super visceral, vertiginosa y llena de personalidad. Era una bomba. Penance es un texto mucho más distante y fríamente calculado, extrañé todas las cualidades explosivas que había encontrado en Boy Parts, cuya dedicatoria decía algo así como "papá y mamá, no lean este libro". En cambio, en la sección de agradecimientos de Penance, Clark dice "este sí lo pueden leer". Creo que eso resume bastante bien las diferencias entre las dos obras.

La novela me pareció interesante, en su mayor parte me atrapó bastante y llegué hasta el final sin problema, pero sí creo que hay instancias en las que la escritura cae en un detallismo excesivo que ralentiza demasiado el relato. Tengo que decirlo, hubo varios pasajes que me salteé porque sinceramente no aportaban mucho a la historia más que un efecto de realismo. Es cierto que todo está muy bien construido y el verosímil funciona a la perfección, el pueblo aparece como un personaje más, pero no sentí necesaria la descripción tan detallada de la vida de personajes irrelevantes o del pasado del lugar. En ese sentido, hubo momentos de la lectura en los que me aburrí un poco y el ritmo no se mantuvo. También pasó que el libro me recordó a textos de otros autores (por ejemplo, Matt Wesolowski) y no lo percibí tan original como algunas personas señalaron en redes. No sé, creo que puse a Clark en un pedestal y eso hizo que fuese muy difícil cumplir con lo que esperaba en mi cabeza. Claramente la novela no me disgustó, por algo la estoy puntuando con 4 estrellas, pero bueno, me gusta documentar mis reacciones y sentimientos, que en este caso tuvieron algo de decepción.

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rebeccafarren's review against another edition

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challenging dark funny mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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baielleebooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

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

4.25

Penance is dynamic in its structure and blooms royally in relation to how of contemporary prominence it feels. A great novel exploring the egregiousness of creators and writers mining into real human suffering for the sake of intellectual propriety and fame.
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There is a real sense of embeddedess in the way Clark writes; in passages of representing darker internet subcultures to the humourous and complicated renderings of English village living to Carelli's enraging fallacies conjured around terms like 'plasticity' and 'emotional truth' that strike a chord with the current political moment.
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My only minor gripe is Angelica as a significant feature of the novel doesn't necessarily feel as flesh and blood as other characters. Penance's literary vision makes us aware that these characters come into being through Carelli's warped presentations of them, yet I still feel that Angelica doesn't necessarily harmonise as well in the book's broader framing.
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Overall, Penance dazzles and is definitely a book I am chomping at the bit to reccomend to friends. Tackling with embodiedness and deftness the muddy relationships people can share with truth and the gritty morbidity of human fascination.

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