Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

Build Your House Around My Body by Violet Kupersmith

34 reviews

etherealsuju's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Body horror, and Drug use

Moderate: Sexual assault and Sexual harassment

ericageorge91's review against another edition

dark mysterious medium-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

4.25

This book was a slow burn love. I was invested from the beginning because I needed to know what happened to the missing girls/women but it also felt like a puzzle?? There are multiple POV and time jumps but each character’s perspective would reference previous characters provide further insight to their  background. I found myself looking forward to discovering these little nuggets and callbacks. 

The horror in this story would slowly creep in the best way possible. Several scenes had me shivering. Please read this book!! 🤗

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Colonisation, Fire/Fire injury, and Body horror

Moderate: Sexism, Animal death, and Animal cruelty

Minor: Child abuse, Sexual assault, War, Incest, Sexual violence, Trafficking, and Vomit

hannakutlu's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Minor: War, Sexual assault, Grief, Animal cruelty, Death, Eating disorder, Incest, and Murder

lydia_kbm's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Sexual assault

mateoj's review

challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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

4.75

oh this was so good. this was so good! just the right side of scary without being over-the-top, the storylines integrated (near) seamlessly... I'm kind of in awe. not that it was perfect, because it wasn't, but that's a damn good book. 
(and once again we have a book that taps into one of my very specific fears/fascinations: two-headed snakes!) 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Drug use, Murder, Violence, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Alcohol

Moderate: Excrement, Animal cruelty, Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, and Fire/Fire injury

rluo2294's review

challenging sad medium-paced

5.0

I truly feel haunted by this novel. As much as I enjoy the intricate network of characters and interconnected stories and supernatural/mystery elements, I realllly appreciate the understated emotional themes; Kupersmith conveys a lot below the surface of her words--history (esp colonialism), trauma, rage, violence, culture, grief.
Also Winnie's relationship with her body... oof

---

Content Warnings

Minor: Eating disorder, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Body horror

jmcampbell57's review

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Vomit, Mental illness, Drug use, Body horror, Suicide, and Death

Moderate: Sexual assault, Alcohol, and Sexual content

Minor: Blood and Alcoholism

jussery's review

dark mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.5

I really enjoyed reading it, it was depressing but also extremely intriguing! I always wanted to keep reading to see what would be revealed to the reader next, and it was also just very well written.

The only reason I didn't give it a full 5 stars is because I like happy endings too much.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Sexual content, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, and Sexual assault

foreverinastory's review against another edition

mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

This was something else. If you really do not like snakes, don't read this one. There's lots of snakes especially cobras and other venomous ones. And a snake nose man--inserts a snake in his nose. It was very gross.

Rep: Biracial Vietnamese-American cishet female MC, cishet Vietnamese cast. 

CWs: Blood, body horror (including swapping bodies and possession), drug use/abuse, death, murder, animal cruelty (capturing snakes to take venom, attempted dog kidnapping to take to a restaurant), gore, injury/injury detail, sexual assault, sexual content, sexual violence, snakes, suicide, toxic friendship, violence, xenophobia. Moderate: Misogyny, incest, rape, attempted necrophilia, colonisation, sexism. Minor: eating disorder, cursing, racism, war. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Gore, Drug use, Alcohol, Blood, Xenophobia, Body horror, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Drug abuse, Sexual content, Suicide, Toxic friendship, and Violence

Moderate: Incest, Sexism, Misogyny, Rape, and Colonisation

Minor: Cursing, Eating disorder, Racism, and War

whatellisreadnext's review against another edition

challenging dark funny mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

𝘚𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘥 𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘶𝘮𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘢𝘺 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘧𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘴𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘦. 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘷𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘩 𝘬𝘦𝘦𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘨. 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘩𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘣𝘦𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘬𝘦𝘱𝘵.

In 1986, a teenage girl gets lost in an abandoned rubber plantation, and is forever changed. 25 years later, an unhappy Vietnamese-American woman vanishes without a trace. 

This book was fantastic. I read it a few months back, and have just been sitting with my feelings on it. Not quite being sure how to articulate them, but it's well deserved Women's Prize nomination felt like the perfect time to try. Build Your House Around My Body does so much. It is vast and winding and absolutely brilliant. 

Part of the fun is going on this journey not knowing how it's all connected, just going with the flow of it, and getting that giddy feeling when a character from a past chapter pops into one of the other story lines. I loved how these characters were hidden throughout the narrative, how in one they'd be named and others just referred to as 'the medium' or 'the policeman', it made putting two and two together even more rewarding. 

The only reason this wasn't a 4 star read, is because it took me a lot of time and brain power. Don't get me wrong I loved this, but it didn't have that effortless reading sparkle that makes me give a book 5 stars, but it came pretty damn close. It was empowering, and dark and chock-full of dry humour. Plus the ending, and how it all came together was brilliant. If you've been thinking about reading this, here's your push to do it, I very much doubt you'll regret it.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Suicide, Gore, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Violence