Reviews tagging 'Misogyny'

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell

57 reviews

tessa_samuels's review

dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

4.5

I could not put this book down, it was an absolute page turner. The writing was riveting and beautiful. It captivated so much emotion and information. The book flowed like very few books I’ve ever read. Content warning: animal abuse, sexual violence, emotional and physical abuse. There were huge sections of this book I had to skip. Because it was too dark. There was an entire chapter about a tiger, and an animal menagerie that I had to skip. And I would definitely proceed with caution when reading this book. But I thought it was brilliant and absolutely loved it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Confinement, Animal death, Rape, Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, Infertility, Violence, Domestic abuse, Abandonment, Animal cruelty, Misogyny, and Murder

abbasaurusrex's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

This was close to five stars for me. It was definitely not an upbeat story but the writing was gorgeous (I didn’t think it was overdone as some other reviewers have suggested) and the tension was exquisite. I loved the twist at the end as a hopeful resolution to what was otherwise a very dark story. There are some difficult themes here so read the trigger warnings. Overall I really enjoyed this one.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Misogyny, Emotional abuse, Animal cruelty, Confinement, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Rape

Minor: Animal death

charisw's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad slow-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

This isn’t a bad book, but it’s not my cup of tea. The whole book felt so heavy for me. The main character’s complete and utter lack of agency and control, while an important theme in the novel, was really triggering for me. I hated reading it, honestly, because it felt so heavy.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Infertility, Misogyny, Violence, Animal cruelty, Blood, Confinement, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Torture, Classism, Sexism, Grief, Toxic relationship, Blood, Violence, Emotional abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Gore, and Sexual assault

applekettle's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny and Domestic abuse

lorenag5's review

challenging emotional mysterious reflective tense 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Death, Domestic abuse, Infertility, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Child death, Emotional abuse, Rape, Violence, Adult/minor relationship, Pregnancy, Sexism, Toxic relationship, and Infidelity

nialiversuch's review

dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Domestic abuse, Misogyny, Confinement, Vomit, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Death, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, and Infertility

Moderate: Pregnancy, Sexism, and Medical content

wellreadandhalfdead's review

emotional reflective sad slow-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny and Gaslighting

Moderate: Infertility

cadybooks's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective tense slow-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? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, Animal cruelty, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Confinement, Death, Medical content, Murder, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Infertility, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Misogyny, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Eating disorder

Minor: War, Animal death, Alcohol, Fatphobia, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Blood

bronzeageholly's review against another edition

mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This book throws the damning reality of life for women in the 16th century into the full fire flares of the sun. We follow Lucrezia, born to be married, tossed and thrown from one man’s rule to another, her body kept in a fortress but never her spirit and creativity.

With Lucrezia we understand how to navigate court, we mourn, we love, we create. The Marriage Portrait is a beautiful, intricate, and full canvas of historical fact and fiction. O’Farrell writes inner monologue and imagery that could drive a stake through your heart. 

The structure and tempo of the book are similar to Hamnet, flicking between present and past, however the prose is (in my opinion) not as intricately woven. While the vocabulary might be more “embellished”, the writing is more simplistic and reminded me  of historical fiction I read (and loved!) as a teenager.

If you are not incensed to find out everything you can about Lucrezia when you have put down this book, I’ll eat my hat!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Adult/minor relationship, Misogyny, Sexual content, Violence, Death, and Emotional abuse

newton's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional 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? No

3.0

Okay so. Generally I did enjoy this book, it kept me coming back for more every time I finished a chapter. It did a great job of building tension — especially towards the end — and I really did care about Lucrezia. However… I do have some thoughts. (spoilers below) 

This one is pretty major and has to do with the very end of the book, so be warned. Emilia. Oh my love Emilia. She was so lovely from the moment she was introduced, and her relationship with Lucrezia broke my heart. The author did a lot of good work to establish their friendship/sisterhood, and I loved Emilia so very much. 

With that said, I really do feel that she existed ONLY as Lucrezia’s loyal servant. An obvious example is her scar (gotten from playing with Lucrezia/foreshadowing that Lucrezia will be Emilia’s end), but this is MOST clear in how Emilia died. Unnamed and unmourned by anyone, not even Lucrezia! I wish I could say that she should have gone back for Emilia after her escape (or at least like, considered that Emilia looks like her and is ASLEEP IN HER BED. And there are men COMING TO KILL HER), but honestly? I never got the impression that Lucrezia gave much of a shit about Emilia outside of her loyalty and companionship. 

This could have been a place for O’Farrell to explore the self-centered nature of nobility or the ways that Lucrezia IS privileged despite her gendered oppression as Alfonso’s wife. However, this doesn’t seem to have been given much of a thought, and Emilia was reduced to a simple plot device in order to allow Lucrezia to survive where history insists she did not. 

A few more nit-picky issues I had: 

If Alfonso was going to kill Lucrezia, why would he poison her only to then smother her a day or so later? I feel like it would make much more sense for the venison and wine to have contained a deadly poison rather than a poison that weakened her, though granted, I won’t pretend to know what was going through Alfonso’s mind in that moment. 

The title, frankly, does not make sense. The marriage portrait, O’Farrell writes in the notes, is completely fictional, and it doesn’t even appear until well past the halfway mark. It had very little to do with the story as a whole, and instead tied the novel to Browning’s poem. This might just have been me, but I was reading this as historical fiction rather than a strictly intertextual work with “My Last Duchess.” 

I also thought that Lucrezia’s feelings towards Alfonso flip-flopped a bit more than was realistic. It made sense to me that she would be unsure if he truly loves her, but to have her thinking that he would never hurt her moments after she’s convinced that he is going to kill her just felt unnatural.

 

All in all, this was a book that I enjoyed reading, but I don’t think it’s one that I would highly recommend or reread. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Sexual violence, Misogyny, Sexism, and Rape

Moderate: Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, and Pregnancy