Reviews tagging 'Body shaming'

Magma by Thora Hjörleifsdóttir

11 reviews

dizzzybrook's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-paced

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

1.5

Another trauma-porny book that conveys this idea that

becoming pregnant/having a child will somehow fix everything bad in your life

I’d like my $10 and the last hour of my life back, thanks.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Blood, Physical abuse, Vomit, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, Fatphobia, Gaslighting, Rape, Self harm, and Sexual assault

hannahparadise's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Toxic relationship, Fatphobia, Pregnancy, Eating disorder, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Blood, Self harm, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Body shaming, Mental illness, Vomit, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, and Sexual assault

fourcue's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Reading this book feels like watching someone drown in slow motion, and there's nothing you can do to help. It makes this a very raw, poetic read, that cuts a bit too close to home in places.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, and Self harm

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Body shaming, Mental illness, and Infidelity

lavendar_fr0g's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

2.5

The writing is slightly off, stilled- likely due to translation. It’s an okay look at an abusive relationship, the slow degradation of boundaries and slow acceptance. The guy was bad news off the bat and Lilja is a bit of a jerk (doesn’t mean she deserves it obviously). Ending was a bit abrupt, didn’t resolve anything but it’s meant to make reader decide what happened for themselves. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Self harm, Suicide attempt, and Mental illness

Moderate: Rape, Sexual violence, Pregnancy, Blood, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Violence

Minor: Alcohol, Homophobia, Vomit, Body shaming, and Sexism

thewoodlandbookshelf's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective fast-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? It's complicated

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Self harm, Suicide attempt, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Mental illness, Rape, and Misogyny

lsmith36's review against another edition

dark sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

This book was like a freight train and felt very real to me in a way that made me uncomfortable but also seen.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Body shaming, Sexual assault, Gaslighting, Drug use, and Pregnancy

bookishcori's review against another edition

dark sad tense fast-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Suicide attempt, Gaslighting, and Self harm

Moderate: Fatphobia and Body shaming

Minor: Drug use

whatvictoriaread's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Sexual violence, Blood, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Vomit

shrutislibrary's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

3.75

'Magma', a word I searched desperately throughout this book trying to decipher its meaning: is it lava? a girl's name? a dream lost? an unbridled rage?

Just like the narrator of 'Rebecca', Mrs De Winter who is haunted by the ghost of the lingering Rebecca at Manderley, Lilja is threatened by the ever-present ghost of a girl online, the titular red-haired Magma - the object of her lover's desire, lust and undivided attention. 

'Magma' is the story of a 20-year-old college girl named Lilja and her descent into a dark void to which she is inevitably drawn and can't resist until she falls. Until she has reached the end of this dark crevice and she has broken and shattered her very being.

The novella starts with Lilja's heady, whirlwind romance with a man she meets online while travelling in Central America 
(whose age we don't get & he has crazy unimaginable fetishes) which quickly turns into a manipulative, co-dependent relationship in which she loses her identity, her dignity, her life and herself and from which she is unable to come out. 

The short chapters read like fragmented diary entries by Lilja tracking her psychotic breakdown as we bear witness to her nagging suspicions of her lover's infidelity, her growing jealousy, her resentment, her overlooking the warning signs and disregarding the gaslighting, her denial in thinking she can somehow 'fix' him. Lilja feels lust, love, jealousy, obsession, anger, humiliation, rage, disappointment, denial, erasure and in the end a glimmer of hope amidst the darkness or so we are told. The author has painted a brutally raw picture of the twisted cycle of emotional & psychological dependency on the abuser to the point where Lilja is capable of seeing & acknowledging the gaslighting, the subtle violence and who he truly is but can't will herself to come out of that abuse. For Lilja, the abuse and the manipulation is the normality that defines the dynamic of her relationship.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide attempt, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Gaslighting, Rape, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Body horror, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Pregnancy, Body shaming, and Vomit

A girl struggling with an extremely abusive and toxic relationship. She loses her identity, her dignity, her life and herself in this relationship from which she is unable to come out.

mondovertigo's review against another edition

challenging dark sad fast-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Rape, Toxic relationship, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Self harm, Physical abuse, Mental illness, Infidelity, Gaslighting, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Body shaming and Eating disorder

Minor: Pregnancy, Drug abuse, and Drug use