Reviews with content warning for Outing - Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

I’ll start by saying I’m in an extraordinarily biased position as a lesbian who was raised evangelical and relates deeply to many parts of this book.

This might be a new contender for my new favorite novel. I was moved a lot by Jeanette’s story and the blunt, almost terse way she narrated it. It’s compelling, bold, and often even funny. Jeanette is the type of teenage girl who is unwilling to lie for others, especially unwilling to lie to her readers. Her story is not cut and dry, and my favorite parts of the book were the ones when she was doubting, missing God as her friend, questioning who she could have been. I found many of the lines memorable and striking and you can trust my copy of the book is properly highlighted throughout. I was especially intrigued by the various fantastical fairytales inter-spliced with the main plot; it reminded me somewhat of parables in the Bible. A lot of them seem random at first glance, but, with deeper study, carry metaphorical meaning and parallels Jeanette’s life. I was a little surprised by how quickly the book moves through her life, jumping years at a time and then ending rather suddenly. I also would have liked to see more of how her relationship with

Melanie

developed as it seemed to happen rather hastily and without much explanation of what drew the two together in the first place. I feel like I got much more understanding of their relationship after being separated by the church, rather than before, although this seems to be a purposeful choice. The book is less about Jeanette’s teenage lesbian romances and more about the dangerous power of the church wielded through her mother. Most of all, it’s about choices: the choice between religion and identity, family and self, destiny and free will, past and future, and the question of if the choices you make really matter at all, or if you’re simply stuck in the cyclical nature of time, meeting yourself at the starting line over and over again.

Content Warnings

avasadored's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

mold_munchr's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

I've really struggled writing about how this book made me feel. It's a lot of things, and I dont know if I'd describe it as beautiful or nice in any way, and yet reading this book meant a lot to me. So much of the story felt as though someone had entered my mind and took all my experiences, and then set them 30 years earlier in another country - which I think speaks to just how universal a queer story of religious bigotry is. It made me cry. The fantasy passages especially just hit close to home for some reason, and Winterson's use of biblical imagery was beautiful and added so much to the story (though these elements might be hard to follow if you haven't had a lot of exposure to hardcore christianity).

Mostly, though, it's a story about a complex mother/daughter relationship. I really appreciated how female-centred it was (I kept forgetting Jeanette even had a father) - this book just isn't ABOUT men, so why should they take up a significant amount of space in the writing?

This review falls short of describing this book, I don't know how to encapsulate how it made me feel. It is the realization of an experience I've struggled to put into words so many times, and somehow she pulled it off.

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nicnevin's review against another edition

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challenging 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

4.0

A semi-autobiographical account of a life of a child brought up in an extreme religious background and the backlash she received when her lesbianism was discovered, I couldn't put it down. I found my mind wandering through on the fairy tale aspects - I was vastly less interested in those than the actual story.

Content Warnings

orlagal's review

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dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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