Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

Yerba Buena by Nina LaCour

18 reviews

ramunepocky's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

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

2.5

“But that’s the way it goes. I lost nearly everything, and then I built something better.” 

This book was somewhat a disappointment to me. We Are Okay is one of my absolute favourite books so I had high hopes that I’d love this one too, and I just didn’t. It was okay, but only okay. It wasn’t a particularly long book, and in spite of the fact that it spans over about 12 years, I feel like absolutely nothing happened. And despite the fact that there is essentially two protagonists, Sara and Emilie, I feel like the book isn’t split well between the two; it focuses so much on Emilie and so little on Sara, which is a shame, because I absolutely couldn’t stand Emilie, whereas I really felt for Sara and would have liked to read more about her. Emilie was just so damn annoying and I really hated her. I feel like she made a victim out of herself, even though she was the one that got herself into those situations. She distanced herself entirely from her family due to her sister’s issues with drugs, which I can understand wanting distance from that, but then she complained that there was a distance between her and her family, and between her and her sister. BRO, you created it. And then the fact that she actively got involved with a married man, who had kids. She knew that he was married, she knew that he had kids, and she had an affair with him anyway, a long standing one, and only broke up with him when it actively affected her. I was genuinely so disgusted with her for that, and I could no longer feel any sympathy or warmth towards her. I feel so much of the book focused on the affair too, and I just really didn’t want that. It was so vile. And it irritated me so much that Emilie once again acts like a victim and goes on about how no-one wants to stay, and everyone leaves her, like ofc he’s gonna leave in the middle of the night, hE’S MARRIED AND YOU KNOW THAT HES GOING HOME TO HIS WIFE AND KIDS GODDAMMIT. And again, it annoyed me so much that after Sara’s father died and she practically begged Emilie to come home with her, and Emilie said no, she then went on again about how everyone leaves her and that Sara wouldn’t come back like BRO, WHAT. She literally begged you to come with her. You do this to yourself, and then act like a victim and blame it on everyone else. It just winds me up so much. 

The redeeming features for me were the chapters about Sara – I was a lot more invested in her life and the harrowing things she’d been through, and the connections she’d made and lost. She’d done whatever she could to survive, even though it meant severing all her ties to her hometown and her friends. I was glad that she got the opportunity to reunite with them ten years later and that they didn’t hold it against her. Her tumultuous relationship with her brother was interesting too since he was the one part of her family she’d tried to hold onto, but he didn’t want her to hold on as tight as she did, especially after they were older, and he understood more what was happening and wanted his own freedom to choose for himself. I often found myself desperately trying not to sob during Sara’s chapters because everything she went through and built for herself just really broke me. I really wish she had been the centre of the book instead of Emilie as maybe I would have loved it more. 

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Infidelity

Moderate: Sexual content, Sexual assault, Death, Sexual harassment, and Drug abuse

ohmygoshtosh's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Child death, Sexual content, Death, Drug abuse, Addiction, Grief, Death of parent, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Medical content, Pedophilia, Sexual harassment, Adult/minor relationship, Toxic relationship, Trafficking, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Terminal illness, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, and Mental illness

Minor: Racism, Alcoholism, Cancer, Panic attacks/disorders, and Violence

alexisgarcia's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful sad slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Murder, Drug abuse, Sexual assault, Alcohol, Child death, Adult/minor relationship, Violence, Drug use, Sexual content, Alcoholism, Grief, Sexual harassment, Death of parent, and Gaslighting

gellyreads's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

I feel like I normally adore LaCour's novels. But this one was just missing something for me. It started off great, and I really enjoyed Sara's story, but the romance felt so weak and shouldn't have been done the way it was. The way the switch between the point of views were done was also really jarring and unenjoyable. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual harassment, Abandonment, Infidelity, and Sexual content

spiides's review against another edition

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.5

I enjoyed the author’s entry into adult fiction tremendously! Her past writings that shows the young adult’s journeys through pain have always shown maturity, and it was nice to see what Lacour could do once fitting the adult sized shoes on fully. The ups and downs kept me rooting, the mistakes had me reeling, the love had me smiling. 

However, while the duel storytelling together with Lacour’s alluring prose did indeed capture me, they were not strong enough to overshadow the instantaneous love-at-first-sight / lack of connection between our two lovers. Sarah and Emilie’s stories were captivating and harrowing, but never felt quite meshed as one (and at times unfortunately better once separated.) Romance appears to be the main device used to tie our two lovers, but sadly I cannot say it succeeded. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Death of parent

mermaid36's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-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

3.0

I was enjoying the book for the first half, but the insta-love between the two characters soured the second half for me. It felt especially at odds with how slow-paced the book is in general. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Sexual harassment, Death of parent, Addiction, and Child death

caitlynva's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective 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? Yes

5.0

A wonderful book where two women’s separate stories come together as one over a shared location. Each comes with their own struggles and complex issues that leads you to never take a “side” throughout the book. Beautifully written.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Death, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Child abuse

Moderate: Abandonment, Alcohol, Blood, Child death, Addiction, Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, Drug use, Alcoholism, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Drug abuse, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, Rape, Injury/Injury detail, and Gaslighting

becdeluna's review against another edition

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual harassment

ecn's review against another edition

Too much abuse (and so many types)  way too early on

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Lesbophobia, Sexual assault, Child abuse, Outing, Homophobia, Grief, Sexual harassment, Pedophilia, and Rape

annabulkowski's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

• 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Alcohol, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Addiction, Alcoholism, Suicide, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, Death, Murder, Sexual harassment, Medical content, Homophobia, Drug use, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Blood, Toxic relationship, Child death, Abandonment, Toxic friendship, Sexual content, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence