Reviews with content warning for Eating disorder - Big Swiss

Greta considered her own behaviour around red flags. Her habit was not to ignore them so much as to ingest them, a somewhat laborious mental production that involved placing them in a stockpot with butter, herbs, and mirepoix; cooking over low heat without browning; adding red meat, additional red flags, a jug of red wine; and voilà, four hours at a lazy simmer later, an extremely rich red-flag stew that she forked into her mouth every day like a fucking moron, sometimes for years on end.

Oh no... I hate to do this but I should have seen the signs when in the first few pages we were making horribly racist comments (particularly about Japanese and Chinese people), making fun of anorexics (trigger warnings would have been appreciated) and strangely glamorising suicide.

I had such high expectations for this book! It had so much potential when it came to humorously discussing some very morbid and taboo topics but instead, it turned into a very uncomfortable semi-erotic, semi-thriller novel. It failed at the thrill, it failed at the romance, it failed at the eroticism and it did not even begin the discussion of important topics like relationships, infidelity, suicide, depression, therapy and trauma.

I am not sure I have ever given a book 1 star, but there is a first time for everything and I believe it is well deserved in this case. The 1 star is being awarded solely to the beautiful US cover and its designer; it's the only thing Big Swiss has going for it. I am so incredibly thankful I decided to check this out of the library because I would have probably torn the sex-scene pages out if it were my own copy... they were so unpleasant to read. Not to mention that I am generally fine with erotic scenes! I will never be able to get the image of a slightly moist origami rose between a woman's peach-fuzz-covered legs out of my head. Thank you, Jen Beagin, for making me hate both origami and peaches now (though the latter was ruined by Call Me By Your Name a while ago).

Anyway, I somewhat regret pushing through this sorry excuse for literature, but at least I can confidently say that it sucked and I truly truly TRULY do not understand the hype here... how many trees have been sacrificed for this exactly? I would like to petition for their restoration; they didn't deserve this.

Content Warnings

kotletka_polina's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny reflective fast-paced

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

4.25

Major Saltburn vibes. Unlikeable characters, well-crafted satiric dialogues, dark themes, rich/poor kind of situation. Honestly I can compare these two pieces of art forever because to me they’re practically an adaptations of each other.
Overall, I enjoyed this book but I wish it was more disturbing in an unhinged way. The premise is cool but it’s not as big on the plot as I expected, the side events were more alarming.
Also, the ending didn’t feel like an actual ending to me because the pace didn’t changed throughout the book. I expected to feel closure of some sort but I only knew it was the end after I read “the end”.
Thought it’d be more eccentric but that’s fine too.

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glitterypiggies's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny reflective fast-paced

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

4.5

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kir1072's review against another edition

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funny sad 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

3.75

As a "big Swiss" myself, I was intrigued. I loved how they ate Fondue, but Greta shouldn't have been able to have a Ricola-ad in her hallucination (she barely knows where Switzerland is). Apart from the mandatory references to Swiss food culture, I liked listening to the audiobook. It's a bit strange to call your dog "Ruderboot" when you are from a french speaking part (still strange in german parts), but It somehow fits Big Swiss.

The plot was nice, but not unexpected. I liked listening in to all these therapy sessions, and really grew fond of the character of Big Swiss. Just as her, I strongly dislike eyecontact with strangers.
All in all a nice book that I listened to over the last three days.

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lolabecool's review against another edition

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dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.75

It was a captivating read, I wanted to keep reading it. I didn’t feel particularly connected with any of the characters, but I found their backstories interesting and I wanted to know how each of their stories would end. I didn’t want to form my own character psychoanalysis until the book revealed its own first for me to bounce off of . And now, thinking about it, I do feel compelled to form my own, so there’s that— if you’re into psychology/sociology you might enjoy this and possibly think about it after you’ve finished it. But there also isn’t enough information to go on for a long time.

The romance is sapphic, which is historically fun for me, however I didn’t think it was particularly immersive. I didn’t really care if they “worked out” or not. I would have liked to be a little more emotionally invested.

The format really helped keep the story going— the recordings are in a different font.

Overall, it helped get me out of a reading slump, so very readable, but not super filling.

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