Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Femlandia by Christina Dalcher

9 reviews

laurenbaggy's review against another edition

dark reflective medium-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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Animal death, Confinement, Abortion, Physical abuse, Blood, Death, Sexual harassment, Domestic abuse, Gore, Murder, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Sexism, Gun violence, Pregnancy, Rape, Suicide, and Violence

Moderate: Cursing, Infidelity, Abandonment, Gaslighting, Medical content, Miscarriage, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

thebelljoy's review

adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Child abuse, Gun violence, Death, Emotional abuse, Grief, Self harm, Sexual assault, Confinement, Violence, Abandonment, Sexual violence, Suicide, Misogyny, Mental illness, and Rape

beccajdb's review

challenging dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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

A page-turner with some thought-provoking ideas about feminism, gender ‘characteristics’ and how we might all behave post-apocalypse. This particular apocalypse is one we can all easily imagine and all the scarier for that. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault, Bullying, Violence, Sexual content, Rape, Confinement, Child death, Blood, Suicide, Domestic abuse, Child abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, Abortion, Pregnancy, Slavery, Sexual violence, Sexism, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, and Death

siriface's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Violence, Death, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Misogyny, Transphobia, Pregnancy, Suicide, Child abuse, and Toxic relationship

ambb's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

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

3.75

I might change this rating 20 more times. I don’t know how to rate this. I don’t know what I just read. What the fuck

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, Gaslighting, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Death, Toxic relationship, Domestic abuse, Gun violence, Sexual violence, Violence, Slavery, Misogyny, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Blood, Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Medical content, Kidnapping, Murder, and Transphobia

Minor: Miscarriage, Death of parent, Abortion, Fatphobia, and Grief

lsbonnie's review

challenging dark reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

I'm putting 5 stars because that's what I put for books I have truly enjoyed reading and would read again. 
I'm not saying that this book is perfect, but I like that it got me questioning, sometimes agreeing with one side, sometimes with the other, sometimes leaving me not knowing what to think. 
I couldn't put the book down. The story was gripping, and sometimes very intense, a real page turner. I don't know if I'm really into the dystopian genre, but as a feminist I was excited to read this. 

I like that the characters are deeply flawed therefore deeply human. Let's take Miranda, the main character. At times, yes, she is frustrating because she doesn't get the need for feminism, was a kept woman and because she understands why Nick did what he did. But at times she is also angry at him and at men, she is not completely blind. She has a very moderate point of view when it comes to feminism, it's true, but surprise surprise, it's still the case of many women nowadays. A lot of them don't really have problems with men, or they roll their eyes playfully at them and their antics, without thinking much about it. They know there is violence against women, including sexual, but they don't see it as being spread in the whole world. They don't get it, as Win would say. Maybe they're blind or society (men?) made them blind, maybe they're not educated enough, maybe they think it's normal ("hardwired"), maybe they accept their situation and are happy with it (what's wrong with being a kept woman if you enjoy it?). But these women exist, and there are many of them. 
Also, can you really blame Miranda for her difficult relationship with feminism/her mother, when

her mother killed her father who yes was a shitty husband but a good father? When she has seen her mother's view distort the world and causing pain, like the innocent employee tying Miranda's shoe turned into a pedophile for her profit?

 
Win too is a complicated character. Yes her view of the world is extreme and raises issues. But I also understand why she

murdered her husband. You sometimes hear that kind of stories, of women who were abused over and over and ended up snapping and killing their husbands. Who can blame them?

When you start really going into feminism, truly look at the numbers, at all the violence men cause women... Yes, I believe a part of you end up hating men a little. It's overwhelming, it's scary. And it can be difficult to find good men. You may start to think that a society without them would be better. I am not saying that's what I think, but that I understand how Win may have gone there. And why some (non fictional) women would think this way, too. 

Contrary to what some people wrote in the reviews, I don't think that the author's point was to say "boo extreme feminism is bad!" or that "men are good, poor men, mean women". I honestly think Christina Dalcher wanted to question what kind of world is possible, what we want, how far we would go in our thinking. 
I do agree with people saying that the "big" twist was a bit predictable, but I still think that it is worth a read. Be mindful of the content warnings, though.

About the epilogue:

I've read some reviews and I guess we see it differently. I do agree with the fact that it felt rushed. But I don't think the idea was to say "we are bound to act like this according to our gender", to me it felt more like a question: was re-integrating men the solution? Did they ruin Femlandia, turning it into Landia? Even if treating boys like this was awful, wasn't it better for women? 
As we got closer to the ending, I imagined something like just a few years later. With boys reintroduced in the society, turning into teenagers then men, would violence and sexual assault against women happen again? And how would that be handled by the society? 
Alternatively I imagined the boys/teenagers/men living within Femlandia, but being second-class citizens, at least for the next generations as they would still be wary of men. But this could have carried on, just like in our world women have been treated as second-class citizens for generations/centuries.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Transphobia

Moderate: Pregnancy and Domestic abuse

Minor: Sexual assault, Suicide, and Miscarriage

About transphobia in the book:

it does not come from the main character, and trans people are only discussed once for about a page I think. The women living in Femlandia have a very binary view (women good, men bad) as in the biological sense. If you have a penis or used to have one, you're bad, you cannot enter Femlandia. I do not recall mentions of trans men or non binary people. Also please note that several times, chromosomes are used as genders, for example when discussing babies.

About sexual assault:

The author thankfully never goes into details, but the mention of sexual assaults kind of slams into you from nowhere. I recall three or four mentions of SA. But it is always a sentence or two, not whole paragraphs.

sophieeleri's review

dark emotional 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

4.0

Really enjoyed, as per. The linguistic aspect isn't as prominent in this as it is in Vox, but was still enjoyable to have in the book! Raises a lot of questions and makes you think about what kind of world you want to live in, and how it could/should be run.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence

audra_spiven's review against another edition

dark reflective slow-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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Abandonment, Abortion, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Murder, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and Violence

deirdre_reads's review

challenging dark tense medium-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Transphobia, Trafficking, Violence, Suicide, Rape, and Pregnancy