Reviews tagging 'Pedophilia'

The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan

23 reviews

itsbumley's review

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Kidnapping, Suicide attempt, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Alcoholism, Body horror, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual content, Medical content, Grief, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Blood, Police brutality, Car accident, Abortion, and Sexual harassment

becksreadsbooks's review against another edition

dark sad medium-paced

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

3.5

I think this was around 3.5 stars for me. I think it's worth reading, but something about it didn't resonate with me as much as I hoped it might. After talking about it with my friend, I decided that I might have emotionally connected with THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD MOTHERS a bit more if I was a mother. I was able to understand the points the book made--and they certainly were great points--but I personally just didn't connect with the emotions described because it isn't like anything I've ever felt before. 

A few random thoughts I had while reading: 

-Something interesting to me was how differently Frida was treated from Gust and Susanna. They also did plenty of things that endangered Harriet--I'm looking at you, low-carb diet--but because it was under the guise of caring, it wasn't viewed as an issue by the state. It definitely was related to race, especially given how child care systems and CPS disproportionately affect Black and brown communities. 
-The discussion of the mothers' offenses was really interesting in light of Texas's recent law about trans children and gender-affirming care. That added an eerie element that I could see fitting into the dystopian world of THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD MOTHERS very well.
-I often see a lot of discourse online about how different the standards are for mothers and fathers, and that was definitely reflected in how the "bad mothers" and "bad fathers" were treated. Definitely interesting seeing how that played out in this book, especially with Frida's ending versus Tucker's ending. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Abandonment

Moderate: Bullying, Cancer, Child death, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Self harm, and Pregnancy

Minor: Pedophilia

garlinds's review

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Based in a not-so-far-away future, Frida, a sleep-deprived single mother with post-partum depression and a poor support system, has a "bad day" and leaves her toddler home alone in an exersaucer for 2 hours. After a concerned neighbor calls and a welfare check happens, the child is taken into custody and Frida is determined unfit to be a mother and sent to a new government program called "The School for Good Mothers" so that she can learn the skills needed to be a worthy parent.

This book was hard to digest, it made me uncomfortable and I'll be gathering my thoughts for a while. The whole time I was reading all I could think about was the long-lasting emotional and physical trauma that each character was going through at the hands of the "system" and those in power. As someone who works with teens who have varying levels of CPS involvement in their home lives, it was heartbreaking to think of the impact this program would have on Harriet's future, as well as her mom's

Most prominently this book critiques the unrealistically perfect standards that we put on mothers. But it also examines both race and class disparities and the stressors that come along with them. At the end of the day, many of the mothers in the "school" would have benefitted from a stronger support system from the get-go rather than a fascist system that waits for them to make a mistake and uproots their whole entire lives.

At the end of the day, this was a great debut that could have used a little bit more development to make it more of a page-turner. The pacing of the book was slower and more repetitive than I thought it needed to be, I would have loved for it to have explored some of the relationships between the characters a bit deeper. That being said, this is an amazing book for discussions and I look forward to hearing other people's thoughts.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for sending me an ARC of The School for Good Mothers in exchange for an honest review.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Suicide attempt, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Infidelity, Miscarriage, Panic attacks/disorders, Torture, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Child death, Homophobia, Infertility, Pedophilia, Sexual content, and Lesbophobia