Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

When He Was Wicked by Julia Quinn

14 reviews

britwalsh16's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I enjoyed Francesca’s story. I wish we had gotten more of her & Johns relationship at the beginning. But I do love her & Michael & them being best friends, makes me really happy to read about. I liked watching their internal struggles dealing with their feelings for eachother in the wake of John’s death too, very realistic. 

The only part I didn’t really like was the whole "seduction" plot Michael started when he got to Scotland. It seemed so out of character. He spent the first half of the book fighting his feelings for Francesca & how he couldn’t be with her cause it "disrespected" John. I agree with them getting married making sense & him proposing & trying to convince her, but when the convincing became seduction, it just felt wrong, & it just surprised me coming from Michael who deeply respected Francesca, but that didn’t feel like respect at all.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Misogyny, Chronic illness, Cursing, Sexual content, and Medical content

Moderate: Blood, Pregnancy, Miscarriage, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Infertility, Violence, War, and Alcohol

etianamichele's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy, Death, Infertility, Miscarriage, and Sexual harassment

esv_'s review against another edition

emotional hopeful lighthearted reflective sad fast-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Sexual content, and Death

Moderate: Blood, Terminal illness, Pregnancy, Miscarriage, Alcohol, and Medical content

Minor: Sexual assault, Classism, Death of parent, Vomit, Rape, Sexual harassment, Panic attacks/disorders, Cursing, and Colonisation

prashiie's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

“This thing between them, this bond–it wasn't just passion, and it wasn't wicked. It was love, and it was divine.”

An interesting story and different from the other Bridgerton books. I don’t think I will read this again, mainly because of the red flags. Acknowledging the fact that everyone is flawed coud enhance the reading experience. 

The main characters are Francesca Bridgerton and Michael Stirling. 
Francesca was married to John, Earl of Kilmartin, and after only two years of marriage she was left a widow. She has always loved John a lot and griefs him deeply. She would not even think of remarrying if she didn’t have an immense desire to have a baby. So marriage is now on the table and she is determined to find someone to marry even if she has to settle for a marriage without love. Because in her opinion, a woman would not simply find love like that twice in a lifetime. 
On the other hand we have Michael, John’s cousin. He has loved Francesca since the moment he laid eyes on her. Incidentally, this was just a few days before she got married to John. Michael would never hurt or betray his cousin, so his love for Francesca remained hidden and instead a great friendship flourished between Francesca and Michael. 
This story is woven with threads of grief and guilt. They both loved John very much and dealt with his loss in their own ways. For Michael inheriting the earldom and everything that came with it felt like he was taking over John’s life. He could not possibly also have Francesca. Michael put up such a great facade, that Francesca does not believe him to be a suitable husband. Once a rake, always a rake. Little does she know that he puts on this facade to momentarily escape from his feelings for her.

I had trouble understanding Michael’s change of heart. At first he is reluctant to even consider marrying Francesca as it felt like he was dishonouring his cousin. Then he was determined to get her no matter what, almost like he flipped a switch within himself. Too abrupt for my liking. Not to mention his approach… uhmmmm… excuse me!! I don’t want to spoil it but you can find it in the list below.

Now for the red flags:

1.  
   When Francesca miscarries her baby with John and she tells Michael that the baby was to have been his in a way too. WHAT?! That’s such a weird thing to say. Granted, she does not know about his feelings for her and in the historical context of this book it makes sense since women were mostly dependent on men. But still… It felt very manipulative and off-putting when reading this in modern times.
    
2.  
   Michael’s approach to get Francesca to marry him. His intentions and love for Francesca are pure, but despair makes one do stupid things. If he can’t sway her into marriage using logic, then he would do so by using passion. He decides to compromise her and get her pregnant so that she has no other option than to marry him. In the end, the passion that they both share is what unites them and they realise that they’re perfect for each other. The final destination is great, but the journey itself had me rolling my eyes.
    
3.  
   Francesca is hurt and feels invisible and neglected when her siblings have gotten married or are getting married without her presence. Michael uses this to convince her to get married immediately.
    

The mothers in this story on the other hand were green flags! It’s no surprise that Violet is a good mother who gives Francesca great advice and support. But it’s a blessing to have a great mother-in-law! Janet understands Francesca and wishes her the very best.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Sexual content, Death, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Infertility, Pregnancy, and Miscarriage

Minor: Death of parent

caffinatedslug's review against another edition

emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Infertility, Sexual content, and Miscarriage

Minor: Sexual harassment

bookish_kori's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful lighthearted sad medium-paced

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

3.5

Loved the book! Bridgerton has become my go to “escape the world for a bit” romance series and it definitely works for that! I’ve gotten a little frustrated that all the Bridgerton sisters (and female love interests with the exception of Penelope so far… sorry Kate) seem to assume the same personality once it’s their turn to be the main character. They all have different personalities within the family dynamics and it just would’ve been cool to see a lot of those play out more in their interactions away from their family. Same with the Bridgerton men, all originally having different personalities but turning fierce and slightly aggressive when it’s their turn to be the POV character. 

Not a reason at all to skip the series, in fact I’d still recommend it, just be prepared/trigger-warned for some Womanizer Lite behavior from the men and some personality shifts from all characters book-to-book. Seems to be smoothed over well in the show so far :) 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Death, Infertility, Gaslighting, Child death, and Sexual harassment

Minor: Blood and Terminal illness

Male behavior towards their partners throughout the series is aggressive bordering on coercion/non-consent at times in intimate scenes before basically yelling “DO YOU CONSENT?” to which the woman agrees. This book had some straight up coercion

(out of wedlock that could ruin the woman and not the man)

that I would NOT consider “clear and enthusiastic” consent despite Francesca agreeing/participating later on. And he is NOT admonished for it. Francesca seems to be the one criticized by the book for being hesitant. This coercion happens with

Sophia and Benedict

in their book too. I understand the timing for the books release is far earlier than the show, but still it gave me the ick. Most of the women are painfully and weirdly portrayed as innocent and uninformed with regards to steamy scenes (even in this book when she had been married before) and the men get off on that. Women are 99.9% of the time enthusiastic participants but completely uniformed (or in this book, she’s informed but “it was never like this” with her first husband so she has to relearn everything a new way). Despite their lack of knowledge, which I guess makes sense given the period it’s set (*cough cough* EVERY single male character is considered super experienced and not shamed for it in the slightest), the women ALL suddenly and randomly become “temptresses” who take control of the situation. Books praise the men as being exemplary because they care about the pleasure of their partners and not just themselves and appreciate the woman taking control. LOW BAR. Idk it’s just happened enough by now that I feel the need to comment on it all. It’s weird. So TW sexual coercion and sexual exploitation I guess. Though some of the women do it too.

bzliz's review against another edition

emotional medium-paced

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

3.75

This installment is so different from the previous five. The majority of the action takes place outside of London and the rest of the Bridgerton clan play very small parts, if they’re mentioned at all. The only one who really gets supporting role credit is Colin and his appearance is more like a fairy godmother (or fairy of common sense). 

I loved that because of her status as a widow, Francesca is afforded a pinch more freedom than the previous FMCs have been given. She also doesn’t have the same level of ignorance going into sex with Michael that creates such a power imbalance in the other books. (It also happens to be the steamiest of them, by a lot.) In addition, Francesca has bigger hurdles to clear: miscarriage, grief over her husband’s death, her own infertility, guilt over having feelings for someone else. The simultaneous timeline between Colin, Eloise & Francesca’s stories was fun. A lot less ‘okay, that’s done so now we can focus on the next child’ feeling. 

There was still some ick around some of the scenes that honestly just feels inevitable for historical romances. And these men just can’t control themselves! (The creep in the garden, the creeps at the club, and even Michael as he’s trying to coerce Francesca into marriage.) I enjoyed it but I still prefer Colin’s story to this one. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Miscarriage, Grief, Sexual content, and Infertility

Minor: Sexual harassment

beckyremillard's review against another edition

emotional hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual harassment, Infidelity, Death, Miscarriage, Infertility, and Sexual content

ashleyelizabeth's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

0.25

HATE this book. The “relationship” the book is centered around is basically manipulation, coercion, and glorified rape. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Miscarriage, Rape, Grief, and Infertility

booksbyantheia's review against another edition

emotional lighthearted medium-paced

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

4.0

Es un cuatro sólido. La historia de Michael y Francesca es espectacular: es diferente a las demás, incluso si el elemento de la viudez estuvo en el libro anterior. Su química es muy buena. La personalidad de Francesca está muy bien planteada, y se hace destacar. 

Odié profundamente un detalle particular, y es la cantidad de chistes sobre violación que hace Michael. No me sorprende considerando los antecedentes de Quinn, pero el hecho de que se hubiera tomado el tiempo de marcarlo como un hombre que sabe lo que es el consentimiento para luego hacer esas bromas (sobretodo en relación a la libertad sexual entre él y Frannie) se me hizo pesadísima. No son muchas, pero definitivamente le bajan una estrella al libro.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Infertility, Medical content, Miscarriage, Sexual content, Chronic illness, Cursing, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, and Colonisation

Minor: Rape