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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
dark
funny
reflective
medium-paced
3.5/5
By all accounts I think I should have liked this less. I don't normally go for the weird, almost magical realism, motherhood/young woman books. But I actually quite liked this one and think it did a good job exploring the complications of stay-at-home motherhood. I actually found the dog bit quite amusing and I did love the way the son was written. Just weird enough maybe? Also the parts about the pyramid scheme among the mom's was a good add.
By all accounts I think I should have liked this less. I don't normally go for the weird, almost magical realism, motherhood/young woman books. But I actually quite liked this one and think it did a good job exploring the complications of stay-at-home motherhood. I actually found the dog bit quite amusing and I did love the way the son was written. Just weird enough maybe? Also the parts about the pyramid scheme among the mom's was a good add.
dark
tense
fast-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death
adventurous
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
funny
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Nightbitch is a story fueled by an anger that only women, more specifically mothers, could understand. It explores the idea and tension between what women are expected to do and what they dream of doing. I'm not a mother, but the writing is so good that the message and emotions of the main character still landed on me. I enjoyed her bitching, preaching, and raging about motherhood throughout most of the scenes. Yoder also ensured that the character was written with power, playfulness, and creativity. Overall, it was a good read. Something I’ll probably randomly remember.
Spoiler
What I didn’t like, though, was the animal brutality. I don’t think it was necessary to prove the book’s point. But then it got me thinking — the animal (the cat) probably symbolizes her husband.
What in the sad, boring, faux-feminist shit was this? This book also serves as a form of birth control!
Firstly, the main character constantly brings up the fact that she never wanted to be a mother in the first place and it basically ruined her life. Let me just say for anyone reading... NEVER let a man convince you to have children if you don't want them. NEVER EVER give up your career or your life because your husband wants a family if you don't want that for yourself. Like actually gobsmacked that any book would promote this idea that it's perfectly normal for women to give up everything in their lives to become mothers, ESPECIALLY when they don't even want too - and I know, unfortunately, this happens every day due to the societal expectations put on women but to promote that?!?!? Makes sense considering the author grew up in the Mennonite community of Appalachia(red flag).
Besides the fact that this book was utterly boring, I did not find it to be super weird as others suggest, I actually found the whole 'I'm turning into a dog' thing and the equation of being a 'nightbitch' completely fueled by internalised misogyny. Sorry, but it does not come across 'feminist' if you equate a women clearly struggling with her mental health, grappling with losing her career and her sense of self as her turning into a dog, because yunno WOMEN ARE SUCH BITCHES AM I RIGHT?!?!?! WOMEN BE CRAZY?!?
The glorification of the husband being 'a prince' was just sickening; he was a horrible husband who left all the work up to the wife, wanted nothing to do with their shared child (even though she gave up everything to give this man a child that she didn't even want) and could not seem to give a single shit about anything his wife was going through. She should have divorced him at the beginning and this story would have been so much better without him in it. Not to mention that child is a spoilt brat lol.
As a book collector, this is not staying in my collection.. off to my book library it goes.
I liked two quotes:
-'You tend the flame because if you don't you're stuck, in the cold, on your own, doomed to seasonal layer, doomed to practicality, doomed to this is just the way things are, doomed to settling and understanding and reasoning and agreeing and seeing it another way and seeing it his way and seeing it from all the other ways but your own.'
-'This and then that and then this again, until every single thought had been emptied from her head and left in its place only the physical sensation of exhaustion.'
Firstly, the main character constantly brings up the fact that she never wanted to be a mother in the first place and it basically ruined her life. Let me just say for anyone reading... NEVER let a man convince you to have children if you don't want them. NEVER EVER give up your career or your life because your husband wants a family if you don't want that for yourself. Like actually gobsmacked that any book would promote this idea that it's perfectly normal for women to give up everything in their lives to become mothers, ESPECIALLY when they don't even want too - and I know, unfortunately, this happens every day due to the societal expectations put on women but to promote that?!?!? Makes sense considering the author grew up in the Mennonite community of Appalachia(red flag).
Besides the fact that this book was utterly boring, I did not find it to be super weird as others suggest, I actually found the whole 'I'm turning into a dog' thing and the equation of being a 'nightbitch' completely fueled by internalised misogyny. Sorry, but it does not come across 'feminist' if you equate a women clearly struggling with her mental health, grappling with losing her career and her sense of self as her turning into a dog, because yunno WOMEN ARE SUCH BITCHES AM I RIGHT?!?!?! WOMEN BE CRAZY?!?
The glorification of the husband being 'a prince' was just sickening; he was a horrible husband who left all the work up to the wife, wanted nothing to do with their shared child (even though she gave up everything to give this man a child that she didn't even want) and could not seem to give a single shit about anything his wife was going through. She should have divorced him at the beginning and this story would have been so much better without him in it. Not to mention that child is a spoilt brat lol.
As a book collector, this is not staying in my collection.. off to my book library it goes.
I liked two quotes:
-'You tend the flame because if you don't you're stuck, in the cold, on your own, doomed to seasonal layer, doomed to practicality, doomed to this is just the way things are, doomed to settling and understanding and reasoning and agreeing and seeing it another way and seeing it his way and seeing it from all the other ways but your own.'
-'This and then that and then this again, until every single thought had been emptied from her head and left in its place only the physical sensation of exhaustion.'
dark
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I feel like part 1 scared me out of motherhood. This book is strange, but it definitely covers motherhood/post-partum rage media I'm a way that I've never seen (in a good way). Part 2, I was mostly lost ngl but I was often shocked at how her husband went from seeming distant and shrugging off her problems to extremely supportive and understanding, which was cool just unexpected. Part 3 was even more weird. Her art show was very strange but it mostly just showed a feral mother taking care of her feral kid, which is what parenting is, isn't it?
I thought it was a good touch that we never got her real name, just "mother" or "nightbitch" to show, especially at the beginning, that aspect of her life took over her entire identity and she no longer was anything other than "mother", it helped portray her struggle of staying at home instead of working, because you know that she hated it. I also really liked that it was following her inner dialogue but it was still in 3rd person.
Half the time I couldn't tell if her dog happenings where just a manic episode or real. Also the other mother dog figures, was that to show that mother's are all in this together and 1 in the same? Or was it simply her trying to create friends that understood her because she was lonely?
Anyways, it was pretty good. Strange, I have lots of questions, but I think it was mostly interesting and enjoyable, although I did not like her killing the cat, I HATED the animal death parts
I LOVED the audio reader! She made the book experience more enjoyable, especially since the book has no quotation marks and I really struggle with that
I thought it was a good touch that we never got her real name, just "mother" or "nightbitch" to show, especially at the beginning, that aspect of her life took over her entire identity and she no longer was anything other than "mother", it helped portray her struggle of staying at home instead of working, because you know that she hated it. I also really liked that it was following her inner dialogue but it was still in 3rd person.
Half the time I couldn't tell if her dog happenings where just a manic episode or real. Also the other mother dog figures, was that to show that mother's are all in this together and 1 in the same? Or was it simply her trying to create friends that understood her because she was lonely?
Anyways, it was pretty good. Strange, I have lots of questions, but I think it was mostly interesting and enjoyable, although I did not like her killing the cat, I HATED the animal death parts
I LOVED the audio reader! She made the book experience more enjoyable, especially since the book has no quotation marks and I really struggle with that
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death
Moderate: Blood
dark
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
DNF @ page 167(69%)
I was already not enjoying the writing the style, and I hate when quotation marks aren’t used during dialogue. The premise was interesting enough to keep me somewhat invested, but there is one specific event that just took place that I hated and now I couldn’t care less about what happens. I’ll probably watch the movie to see how it ends, but I can’t suffer through the writing any longer.
I was already not enjoying the writing the style, and I hate when quotation marks aren’t used during dialogue. The premise was interesting enough to keep me somewhat invested, but there is one specific event that just took place that I hated and now I couldn’t care less about what happens. I’ll probably watch the movie to see how it ends, but I can’t suffer through the writing any longer.