Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - Being Lolita: A Memoir

Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

Being Lolita: A Memoir by Alisson Wood

64 reviews

lostinpaperbacks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense

4.0

I came across this book after reading My Dark Vanessa a few months ago, I was intrigued and heard good things about this one. There were so many similarities it was uncanny, but this is an actual memoir. Ironically enough, I enjoyed the fictionalized My Dark Vanessa a tad more. This memoir is completely consuming---I finished it in a matter of hours! About an hour and a half to be exact. Ms. Wood manages to handle such delicate topics and complicated emotions with effortless ability. Not once does she idealize her abuser, even in her reflections of her past, but she still manages to give the reader a sense of how easily a situation can spiral and how quickly innocence can be stolen with the right words and actions. This was a good read, but it harped just a little too much on Lolita's book. I've never read it, so these passages did not speak to me and became a bit monotonous. So, I've read two eerily similar books in a short amount of time, and apparently, there is a sickening formula to this kind of inappropriate seduction of a minor student. Definitely read the TWS before reading this but overall thank you to Allison Wood for putting her story out into this world.

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vkitoria's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective medium-paced

4.5

very well written and extremely eerie. especially in its similarities to my dark vanessa (a fiction book).

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lexi_paws_and_pages's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

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hannakutlu's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

3.25

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marcia__amelie's review against another edition

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challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

4.25

a raw, agonising & vulnerable exploration of abuse, consent & exploitation. this book was an emotional journey, knowing that this was a real story. that this was somebody’s life. the writing was haunting & lyrical most of the time but there were some aspects that i found a bit too vague. it was deeply uncomfortable reading how the teacher misinterprets the twisted classic “lolita,” to justify his abuse. the last third of the book genuinely made me cry. her adult voice taking over as she realised what she experienced & had to endure was not love was devastating. the scene where she was looking at the old photographs and it dawned on her that she was just a child??? crying. the way wood breaks from nabokov’s narrative structure to rewrite her own story was uplifting & memorable. the strength and courage it must have took to lay your heart bare and tell this story is remarkable. it’s a memoir i believe people should read but please look at the trigger warnings!! this is not an easy read!!

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