Reviews with content warning for Toxic friendship - The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

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Reviews tagging 'Toxic friendship'

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

131 reviews

shannonvonpesach's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

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

4.0

Zeven keer trouwen? Ik moet er niet aan denken!

Taylor Jenkins Reid neemt je mee naar een wereld vol glamour in de 50's. We kijken vanuit de ogen van Evelyn Hugo terwijl ze aan Monique Grant haar "wilde" leven verteld voor een biografie. Uiteraard zitten hier nog wat haken en ogen aan...

Het boek leest lekker weg, de schrijfstyle van Taylor is superfijn om te lezen. Het is ook vrijwel fast paced! Een "once you start you can't stop" boek.

Toch ontdekte ik wat puntjes die voor mij niet zo lekker liepen. De magazine/krantenknipsels kwamen niet echt over voor mij. Daarnaast zit vrijwel aan het einde een twist die superonnodig was en een beetje vreemd, ik verklap het niet voor mensen die het boek nog willen lezen.
Verder is Evelyn geen likeable karakter. Ze is manipulatief en erg self centered (dit was ook het doel) dus op dit gebied heeft de schrijfster dit goed geschreven.

En de "mannen pakken toch wat ze willen dus ik liet het toe" houding vond ik vaak een "ik leg het boek zo even weg" moment. Het speelt zich af in tijden dat het ook vaak zo gebeurde, maar ik kon het niet zo goed hebben.

Het boek is lgbtq+ vriendelijk en de schrijfster heeft de struggles van toen goed geschreven.

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idontread's review against another edition

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emotional funny reflective sad medium-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? It's complicated

4.25

to anyone who saw me crying alone in the airport lounge while reading this no u didn’t

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kappafrog's review against another edition

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emotional mysterious sad tense fast-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

3.75

I zoomed through this book. I was really compelled to find out all its secrets. But now that I'm done, I'm not sure how o feel about it. The ending should have had more to it after a major revelation late in the book. The handling of race was clumsy. But I loved the fictionalization of a situation many in Hollywood found themselves in.

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mirandyli's review against another edition

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dark sad medium-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

1.5

Do you want to read about the completely unrelatable struggles of famous white lesbian/bisexual millionaires? Do you want to read about the struggles people of color face, from the POV of a white author? If so, this is the book for you.

Evelyn is so ashamed of her identities, to the point of changing her name and dying her hair blonde to hide the fact that she's Cuban, and eloping with a man to show the press she isn't in a relationship with Celia. She manipulates everyone around her and is not afraid to admit it. She does anything she can to be on top. As a result, she has millions of dollars but almost no friends, and she doesn't give a cent back to people like her until Harry and Celia decide to donate anonymously to the gay rights movement. She leaves her abusive husband and doesn't warn his next wife, despite knowing that she is being abused. Then she does a movie with him to boost his career.

You can tell this was written by a very privileged white woman. "Brilliant, Kindhearted, Tortured Harry Cameron???" Excuse me, but he isn't that kindhearted considering he drunkenly killed Monique's dad! And Evelyn covers it up - a white woman covering up the murder of a Black man to protect his white murderer. And Evelyn claims to think that giving Monique the rights to her life story is not her trying to make up for that, but because she is wrapping up all her loose ends before she dies. Evelyn barely shows any remorse for it, and Monique forgives her. Excuse me what??? In the end Monique describes Evelyn as "complicated." She is not complicated. She is self-serving and evil.

It seems like Evelyn and Monique were just characters created for diversity points. They are so unrealistically written. Monique's biracial struggles are very obviously written by a white person. She marries a white man and feels secure that he'll never consider her "Black enough." Lmao what??? Evelyn even encourages Monique to do whatever it takes to get to the top. This is not what solidarity looks like.

I relate to the struggle of being closeted. I even relate to the second-gen struggle of being ashamed of one's heritage. But if I'm gonna read a book written about these struggles, especially one written by a white woman, I would rather read about someone who doesn't feel shame about who they are. I definitely don't want to read a book about a person of color stepping on the backs of other people of color to get to the top.

I probably would have stopped reading this but I forced myself to finish it because it was on hold at the library. I honestly don't get the hype. This book was unrealistic at best and repugnantly offensive at worst.

Content Warnings

victaphone's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense

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? It's complicated

3.0

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msradiosilence's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

0.5

TLDR; 1.5 rating, I hate this book and everything it stands for. I get a little rant-y. Sue me.
Content warnings at the bottom. :)

I gave this 1 star on GR because it’s a hellsite, but it gets .5 stars because I did in fact read this in only a few days. I’ll say this about TJR, her books aren’t badly written. She just sucks as a person.

First off, TJR is a white woman. I have very strong opinions about staying in your lane as a white woman, and TJR swerved all over the goddamn highway. Not only is the main character a Black woman, but the other main character is a Latina woman. Does TJR belong to either of those communities? No. And to yadda yadda their communities, TJR

kills Monique’s father in a horrific way so she doesn’t have that connection to her heritage

and has Evelyn repress everything about her Latina roots. When this book came out, there was huge backlash from the Latine community about a white woman taking up space in the publishing industry that could have been made for a Latine author to write in (do not get me started on racism in publishing, we’d be here all day) and she apologized and said she wouldn’t do it again, she’d lift up own-voices authors, etc. And then she didn’t do that and instead wrote Carrie Soto is Back, which had a whole thing about the title in Spanish that — shocking! — once again TJR didn’t understand the complexity and nuance of and insulted an entire community of people. The Black and Latine perspectives are just some that white authors cannot ever have, considering their whiteness, and therefore should not be writing in the perspective of Black and Latine characters. No one is saying white authors CAN’T have diverse casts, because white authors should, but rather that they shouldn’t try to write from a perspective they can’t conceivably share. I don’t care how much research they do, it is not enough when compared to lived experience.

(sources: google is free, but https://www.feministbookclub.com/taylor-jenkins-reid-is-back-with-her-bs/, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8dJ54Fp/, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8dJPbaD/, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8dekrA8/, and https://shelit.com/2022/10/04/carrie-soto-is-back-and-the-problem-of-white-authors-creating-main-characters-of-color/#:~:text=Book%20influencers%20expressed%20concern%20about,character%20against%20an%20Asian%20character.)

Secondly, I’m bi. To this day, there are still biphobic members of the LGBTQ+ community that say we’re either not gay enough, or that we need to pick a side, or that we’re lying, etc (few and far between, but always a take I see in online spaces around Pride Month). And to have that thrown back in my face while I’m reading a book by a straight author? What the fuck? Celia is constantly being biphobic, and it doesn’t help that Evelyn is lesbophobic in the beginning. TJR wouldn’t know this, being that (again) she’s not a part of the community, but a lot of people use the term ‘gay’ as an umbrella term. Just like the pride flag encompasses the whole community, gay can be a term to mean any sexuality within the LGBTQ+ spectrum. But Evelyn reacts with such immediate vitriol to being called gay, it just leaves such a horrible taste in my mouth, especially when there is such animosity between certain corners of the LGBTQ+ community. It’s just not something a straight author gets to comment on, especially when they don’t understand the nuance surrounding that conversation.

Also the ending?

Not only are you writing perspectives that aren’t yours, you had Monique forgive the woman that killer her father???

What the FUCK. Eat the rich, even the fictional ones.

Anyway. Considering both of my major points cover basically the entire book, fuck TJR and no, I don’t care if Daisy Jones is a good show, or if Malibu Rising is a good book. I will not read anything else by this woman, and I’ll be getting rid of Evelyn Hugo as soon as I’m able.

Rating: 0.5
Would I recommend? Abso-fucking-lutely not.

Content warnings: Blood, Cancer, Death of parent, Infidelity, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Ableism, Abortion, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Biphobia, Body shaming, Car accident, Classism, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Grief, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Outing, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Racism, Sexual content, Death, Gaslighting, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Sexism, Toxic friendship, and Pregnancy

Content Warnings