Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson

10 reviews

blackberryjambaby's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Lesbophobia, Toxic relationship, Religious bigotry, Grief, and Homophobia

Moderate: Medical content, Racism, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Child abuse, Colonisation, Sexism, Misogyny, Confinement, Abandonment, and Bullying

Minor: Alcoholism, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Classism, Death, Fatphobia, Pregnancy, and Adult/minor relationship

balth_the_chaotic_good's review

challenging emotional funny inspiring reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Lesbophobia, Religious bigotry, and Homophobia

Moderate: Death, Outing, Xenophobia, Emotional abuse, Racism, and Adult/minor relationship

penofpossibilities's review against another edition

reflective sad fast-paced

3.0

I dont know how I feel

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Colonisation, Racism, Hate crime, Child abuse, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Lesbophobia, Confinement, Domestic abuse, and Misogyny

Moderate: Infidelity, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Medical content, Grief, Death, Racial slurs, and Ableism

Minor: Chronic illness, Bullying, Vomit, Outing, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Slavery, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, and Animal death

Hallucinations, psychiatric institution, ableist slurs

bisexualwentworth's review against another edition

• 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

I really don't know how to feel about this one. It was very interesting. Very surreal. Very emotional. I don't think I understood all of it. Definitely the sort of odd coming-of-age story that I don't tend to encounter often and usually find interesting when I do, and this was no exception. I'm just not sure I liked it.

If you have more religious trauma than me you might connect to it more than I did.

The chunk from just after the opening until about halfway through was probably my favorite. Ironically the gay parts were not super interesting to me. Poor Melanie though.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Homophobia, Racism, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship

nannahnannah's review against another edition

3.0

I realize this is pretty much a classic, and I recognize that it's very well written and everything, but I never, ever want to read it again. In fact, I hated reading this.

I know the importance of autobiographical works by LGBT people, I do! But sometimes, as a wlw myself, reading accounts of so much nastiness happening to people like me is ... beyond depressing. Yeah, I get how meaningful and powerful these accounts are, especial for historical reasons, but I could barely get through this.

Maybe it's just me. Maybe I just couldn't handle more homophobia, or maybe I just couldn't handle reading about an abusive household like the one I grew up in, even if the circumstances are/were completely different. I don't know. I appreciate the book and the author's experiences (and how damn strong she was and still is), but I couldn't enjoy the book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia

Moderate: Racism and Child abuse

Minor: Adult/minor relationship

nicnevin's review

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.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Grief, Hate crime, Homophobia, Medical content, Racism, Adult/minor relationship, Outing, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Bullying, Child abuse, Classism, Colonisation, Emotional abuse, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Death, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Torture, and Toxic friendship

ilona's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective slow-paced

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

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Racism, Lesbophobia, and Religious bigotry

ha1yan's review against another edition

challenging emotional fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship and Medical content

Minor: Racism

jamierose's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective slow-paced

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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Homophobia

Minor: Racism

sinmin667's review against another edition

challenging emotional tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I first read this book five years ago and absolutely inhaled it. I think I loved the themes about Pentecostal religion and sexuality and wanted more books like it. I just finished rereading it a second time and I honestly didn't like it nearly as much-- I found her writing style to be very inaccessible if you were not very familiar with conversational British slang. Personally I'm not a huge fan of fantasy writing, so for the half of the book that is her fantastical internal monologue, I was very bored. I could tell it was her trying to develop the character, but it was exhausting to parse through. I think this is because the second time, I came wanting the story about a young girl coming to terms with her sexuality-- which honestly doesn't get that many scenes, and not much resolution. It wasn't as center stage as I remembered it to be.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Homophobia, Religious bigotry, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Racism, and Xenophobia