Reviews tagging 'Medical content'

The Power by Naomi Alderman

39 reviews

maddiebusick's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• 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: Blood, Child death, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Religious bigotry, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Stalking, Torture, Trafficking, Violence, and War

keeper_of_dark_materials's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective tense 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

4.75

This is a brilliant insight as to what would happen when women had a physical advantage over men. It is a reminder that when the scales of power are taken away, we are all human and are all equally capable of violence, hate, kindness, and love. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Hate crime, Incest, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Murder, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Slavery, Trafficking, and War

supernova_reader's review

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Addiction, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Cultural appropriation, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Dysphoria, Emotional abuse, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Mass/school shootings, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Trafficking, Violence, War, and Xenophobia

epellicci's review

challenging dark sad fast-paced

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

1.5

I found The Power was horrific almost for the sake of it as the book went on, and the plot lacked confidence as the story headed towards its conclusion. The final chapters trail off into an ambiguous and stilted jumble which felt given up on when considering the particular and uncomfortable detail which Alderman went into throughout the rest of the book. The four characters leading the narration lacked dimension, and I found the way that everyone (excluding Tunde) had basically the same goal of political/religious dominance in mind lazy.  As the book progressed, the characters personalities basically all bled into one for me, and at times I forgot whether I was reading from Allie's perspective or Roxy's. A concept with a lot of potential, executed badly. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Torture, and Violence

Moderate: Addiction, Child abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Medical content, Misogyny, Slavery, and War

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Mental illness, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

scribblesbysammy's review against another edition

adventurous dark reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

An emotive tale that analyses what would happen if women became the stronger gender.
A physiological development allows women to conduct and emit electricity, weaponising it. The story is narrated from the perspectives of multiple people, ranging from a young man who captures the first film of a shock, to a female American politician, to a foster girl who hears a voice and begins a religious movement. They move through independent yet intersecting stories that chart the emergence of this gift and the freedom it provides. This then

devolves as woman make the same grabs for power that men do in the present day, ranging from sexual assault to organ harvesting to dictatorship <spoiler/>.
An intriguing and evocative piece of feminist speculative fiction.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Hate crime, Medical trauma, Medical content, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Child abuse, Bullying, and Body shaming

The deeper you go, the darker it gets.

brigiddolan's review

adventurous dark reflective tense fast-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Gun violence, Medical content, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicide, and Violence

miadevito's review

emotional reflective tense medium-paced

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

2.5

The premise of the book is interesting and it seems like it will turn into a "good for her" style narrative, but the author makes a clear choice to not take that route. Which I think could have been interesting but ultimately misses the mark.

Having women become abusers, rapists, misandrists, etc. because they can "finally" subjugate men is unrealistic and kind of stupid. There are multiple times in the book where the new women in charge say "we know what the men did to women in the past" and then turn around and do the same to men is ridiculous. Yes, some people who have been abused turn into abusers themselves, but the majority don't. This book clearly is trying to say that without equality nothing changes, but none of the characters seemingly are even attempting to make things equal.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Trafficking, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Death of parent, Hate crime, Medical content, Sexual violence, and Slavery

christycorr's review against another edition

dark reflective medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape and Sexual violence

Moderate: Transphobia, Child abuse, Body horror, Medical content, and Death of parent

Minor: Trafficking and Antisemitism

alexbobalex's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

Everyone should read this book at least once. It’s a story everyone can relate to, as we all are affected by gender and it’s power dynamics. This book made me relook at human history itself, and wonder. All that being said, strongly recomend.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Trafficking, Torture, Violence, Stalking, Sexual violence, Slavery, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Sexism, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Religious bigotry, Racism, Police brutality, Physical abuse, Murder, Misogyny, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Medical content, Mass/school shootings, Kidnapping, Infidelity, Hate crime, Gun violence, Gore, Grief, Genocide, Forced institutionalization, Excrement, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, Drug use, Drug abuse, Domestic abuse, Death, Cursing, Confinement, Cannibalism, Bullying, Body shaming, Body horror, Blood, Biphobia, Antisemitism, and Acephobia/Arophobia

LOOK AT THE TRIGGER WARNINGS. This book it for a mature audience and contains many, many triggers.

fruitea's review

hate it. absolutely hate it. this is not a good book for many reasons but i will only briefly discuss them because i could go on about how much i loathe this book for hours.

firstly, the prose is so straightforward and simple. this made it very quick to read, but i didn't get anything out of it. like, when i read a book there's usually a couple of lines or passages that i'll underline because they left an impression on me. this didn't happen at all for the power.

secondly, the message of this book is not good. at all. whether this is an inadvertent result or not, the very obvious interpretation of the whole premise of the power is that women will never achieve equality without having superpowers. which, you know, is a pretty shitty message. not to mention the subsequent actions of the majority of women. this is not a feminist book. this book describes radical feminism. dangerous radical feminism.

and, i'm not saying this is completely factual, but i think if women were to get this power... our reaction wouldn't be so extreme? i mean, i get that power often leads to corruption but idk. feminists just want equal rights? feminism isn't about women being superior to men. in fact, feminism benefits men because the patriarchy targets all of us. that's just how i see it though.

also - alderman failed to mention other genders? it was just 'women' vs 'men.' and i'm pretty sure she was only talking about cisgender people. so. idk, the fixation on only those genders was kinda weird to me. like bro i'm just trying 2 vibe i don't have a gender i wanna be like a walking moss covered rock.

thirdly, what's with all the gratuitous graphic scenes? this links back to my first point, in the way that having all of these nasty descriptions of triggering & disturbing things felt like it was solely for 'shock' factor, if that makes sense. like there were so many of them that it became gratuitous in a way. i ended up skipping them because i didn't want to be, you know, triggered by them. it just made the reading experience very unpleasant.

0 stars for bad writing, bad message and giving me more trauma.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Child abuse, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Drug use, Drug abuse, Gore, Grief, Medical content, Murder, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Torture