Reviews

The Furies by Mandy Beaumont

gingie's review

dark sad tense fast-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? No

1.5

This book was riddled with one-dimensional, stereotypical and often offensive representations of POC. Men of Colour in this book are always predatory, Women of Colour in this book are always depicted as helpless and rude, and at one point the main character even compares her arse to Uluru (a sacred site). 

Not only this, but the Furies was essentially just trauma porn. It was riddled with gratuitous violence against women, to the point where it seemingly served no purpose but to disturb. Massive trigger warning for rape and assault -  there is almost no reprieve the entire length of the novel. 

The section from Cynthia’s mother’s point of view was the best part of the book, and was genuinely really well-written. However, the rest was trying to do much and I just wanted to get it over with.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fatphobia, Gore, Misogyny, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Animal cruelty, Child abuse, Child death, Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Grief

mcf27's review

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

3.0

sparker190's review

challenging dark emotional 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? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Child death, Sexual harassment, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Animal death, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

Moderate: Alcoholism, Car accident, Miscarriage, and Domestic abuse

taejai's review

dark emotional reflective medium-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

jouljet's review

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Rape, Sexual content, Mental illness, Murder, Abandonment, Child death, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, and Sexual assault

livbeveridge's review

The book was not what I was expecting at all, I wasn’t prepared for the graphic scenes or contents of the book and frankly it was not what I was wanting to read

hogsandwich's review

challenging dark medium-paced

1.5

I'm really, intensely sick of the I-am-Nihilism-I-will-sleep-with-random-dudes trope. It's so overdone. 
That aside, this is pretty stomach-churning, hardgoing stuff. No one is likeable, no one is redeemable, the misfortunes are piled up so high that it's hard to think of this as anything but torture porn, and the whole central idea of the Furies appear to operate only as a deus ex machina to power up our central character in a mysterious way towards the end?

It's been a long time since I've read something this unpleasant. 

geekberry's review

challenging dark inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Sexism, Murder, and Violence

wtb_michael's review

dark tense medium-paced

3.0

A grim, often brutal, call to arms. The Furies is all rage and redemption, injustice, trauma and transcendence. All the trigger warnings required 

tackling_my_tbr's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

I’ll admit, I completely judged this book by its cover. Here I was thinking it would be your typical crime/thriller — a genre I usually have to be in the right headspace for — which is primarily why I hadn’t picked this one up until now.

I was pretty much completely off the mark. And I’m so glad I was.

It’s probably best to class this as literary fiction; the desperate, raw, unyielding kind. Exactly my type of book. A story intended to highlight female oppression and the trauma women are subjected to on a regular basis. A system of misogyny and the powerlessness of women in a place where only men can belong. A culture that insidiously dehumanises women and violates their rights, continually eroding their sense of self until almost nothing remains. 

Heavy stuff right?

The frightening thing is that it’s set close to home, right in the heart of the outback. Cynthia is a young woman who has lost her family in the most tragic of ways, an ending brought about by dysfunction, neglect and abuse. Her story is one of pure survival when all love and hope has been lost.

The grating feelings I had while reading this reminded me a lot of how I felt when I read A Little Life. There is that omnipresent sense of spiralling despair. And the poetic prose was sparse but strong, vividly evoking the dry, desperate heat of rural Queensland. It was such a sticky, uncomfortable read — and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

This is one fierce, devastating debut, but handle with care because there is a lot of graphic and disturbing scenes of violence. Beaumont is definitely one to watch out for in the future though, and I would not hesitate to pick up more of her work.

Thanks to Hachette Australia for my review copy.