Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

Summer Fun by Jeanne Thornton

2 reviews

amissabellator's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective relaxing sad tense slow-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? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Drug use, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Adult/minor relationship, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Sexual violence, Suicide attempt, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual harassment, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Violence, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Animal cruelty, Blood, Cursing, Outing, Addiction, Emotional abuse, Lesbophobia, Dysphoria, Grief, Child abuse, Gaslighting, and Hate crime

Moderate: Alcohol, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Death of parent, Biphobia, Infidelity, Misogyny, Classism, Fatphobia, Sexual content, Vomit, Death, and Kidnapping

Minor: Ableism, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Racism, and War

ninjamuse's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional slow-paced

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

4.5

Summer Fun by Jeanne Thornton is a great book and very powerful. It’s finely crafted, expansive yet taut, and, well, the sheer amount of character, theme, and history that Thornton managed to hold in her head while writing and then convey on the page is incredible. A lesser author couldn’t have done it. And the emotions she makes the reader feel? The way she writes hope and pain and loneliness? The things she forces the reader to consider, and the ways she does that? Equally impressive!

It’s not a book for everyone, though, and if I’d known how affecting it would be, I’d have picked a different time to read it because there’s definitely a certain headspace required and I didn’t quite have it. Basically, Thornton does not sugarcoat the lives of trans women, either in the past or the present, and she presses those realities on her readers. There’s abuse and trans-misogyny and substance abuse, for instance, and several trans characters are working through (what I read as) internalized trans-misogyny as well. The prose is also dense and dark, and Thornton doesn’t hold readers’ hands through it or her messages. You have to pay attention to this book and you can’t expect easy answers.

The plot, you ask? An elevator pitch might be, “A trans woman in New Mexico writes letters to her favourite musician”, but that compresses so much. For one thing, the lines blur quickly. How much of the detail of the musician’s life is true, and how much is fannish re-creation? How much does the writer’s outlook colour everything? What is the goal of the letters? Really, Summer Fun is about hope and loss and longing, about finding yourself and learning to be comfortable in your skin, and about connection and the power of music and the many ways trans women live in the world.

It’s a great book, as I said. It stirs emotions and asks hard questions. Thornton’s won Lambdas and it’s easy to see why. It’s powerful and vivid and affecting, a worthy book for any queer-positive TBR. It is not the breezy summer read I expected (my bad there), but I’m very glad to have read it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Transphobia, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Alcoholism, Car accident, Drug abuse, Gaslighting, Infidelity, Lesbophobia, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual harassment, Misogyny, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, and Dysphoria

Minor: Car accident