Reviews tagging 'Dysphoria'

Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters

130 reviews

anthsoprano's review

emotional reflective medium-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

5.0

honestly torrey peters' writing is so funny and captivating and brutally real. written by a trans woman for trans women, but also as someone under the trans umbrella, if i had tried to read this a year ago i'd throw it down the stairs with how real it hits.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Stalking, Domestic abuse, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Miscarriage and Outing

lanid's review

emotional reflective

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Outing, Infidelity, Sexual content, and Transphobia

Moderate: Body shaming, Domestic abuse, Dysphoria, Adult/minor relationship, Deadnaming, and Abortion

Minor: Pregnancy, Miscarriage, Sexual violence, Misogyny, and Suicide attempt

mmikenaite's review

emotional informative reflective slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Dysphoria, Outing, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, and Abortion

Moderate: Body shaming, Miscarriage, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, and Transphobia

caseylovett's review

emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Dysphoria, Abortion, Suicide, and Transphobia

aliciae08's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative reflective medium-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? It's complicated

3.75

I just finished Detransition, Baby, and I’m still sussing out my thoughts.

The conclusion I’ve come up with is complicated—as it should be, as the characters are complicated. 

What I loved:

• the exploration of womanhood, motherhood, gender expression and queerness;
• The imperfectness of the characters so that the reader knew that no one person’s identity is monolithic. It is entirely one’s own;
• The idea that we can create our own family
• The exploration of why the characters are the way that they are (especially Ames).  

What I didn’t like:

• Others have mentioned the clumsiness of race within this, and how the inclusion of Katrina being the one major character of color might be a metaphor for how the white trans experience isn’t the only one.  It doesn’t work for me fir so many reasons, but the first one being that whenever she brings race up it feels like someone who hasn’t actually experienced being a minority, and because any attempts at relating with Katrina by Reese/Ames are shut down.  
• Some of the writing, as beautiful as it is, was over the top for me.  I was sometimes waiting to get to the end of a chapter and I hate feeling like that. 

What I found challenging:

• Reese said things about womanhood and the need to feel delicate (particularly when she was with Stanley and the Cowboy) that I wholeheartedly couldn’t relate to, but have to admit that at some point in my own life defined my own perception of what it means to be woman and the need for men to view me as someone worthy of being taken care of/defended etc. I think it’s easy for people (especially those looking for an excuse to hate this book) to use it as a way to accuse people like Reese, at worse, of cosplaying womanhood, when that’s not what’s happening. 
• Ames’, before their transition to Amy, misogyny and further internalized misogyny was hard to read, mostly because I grieved for that character. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Outing, Misogyny, Transphobia, Suicide attempt, Infidelity, Dysphoria, Miscarriage, Suicide, and Pregnancy

sorcha's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful reflective sad

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Infidelity, Sexual content, and Outing

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Dysphoria, Blood, Pregnancy, Miscarriage, Suicide, Abortion, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Infertility, and Transphobia

cmcrockford's review

adventurous dark emotional funny sad medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Sexism, Pregnancy, Transphobia, Deadnaming, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Outing, Homophobia, Suicide, Miscarriage, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Death, Car accident, and Racial slurs

sofipitch's review

emotional reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated

4.5

The book was really good, I adored the writing style. Any writing style that sounds like a person talking to me is deeply addictive, even more if the narrator is funny. The characters also felt like real people, and the decisions they made were not always the best, but that is what I enjoyed. I think they only thing I didn't quite believe is their relationship to each other, especially Katrina. I didn't see what Ames or Reese saw in her beyond her obvious role in the story. I liked a lot of the flashbacks and other musings more than I did the plot the book was named after (but this is also likely personal bc pregnancy is a bit squicky to me). I feel like I could read a book of Reese ordering take out and doing her laundry though 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Outing, Dysphoria, Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Miscarriage and Pregnancy

Minor: Suicide

readingthroughinfinity's review against another edition

adventurous challenging funny hopeful reflective 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

4.5

This was absolutely fantastic, a real tour-de-force and unapologetically full of trans joy and heartache. The characters felt so raw and real in a way that I haven't found in a book for a long time. I liked how messy and complex they were and how unconventional their decision to co-parent was. I know I'll be thinking about this one for a long time to come. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia

Moderate: Mental illness, Outing, Suicide, Homophobia, Dysphoria, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, Sexual content, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Injury/Injury detail and Violence

leadpal's review against another edition

emotional funny reflective sad 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Sexual content, Misogyny, Miscarriage, Toxic relationship, Infidelity, Infertility, Toxic friendship, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Violence, Pregnancy, Stalking, Self harm, Hate crime, and Abortion

Minor: Cultural appropriation, Racism, Rape, Medical content, Homophobia, Mental illness, Alcoholism, and Eating disorder