Review by bookwookie - The Women

bookwookie 's review for:

The Women by Kristin Hannah

2.75

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring 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: Yes

Overall, this was a pretty good book. I know that opening line might seem strange alongside my star review, but it’s true; this book tells a compelling story and has many characters who are easy to fall in love with. But, it also has many issues, namely, that the author spends a great deal of time telling instead of showing. There were many parts that I thought would have been interesting to add into the story, but which were merely described in narration. It made it hard to feel that the character was changing, I was always just told that she was. I also take a lot of issue with the politics in this book, specifically the way that it handles the complex legacy of the Vietnam war. While I can appreciate telling a story from a certain perspective, I find that it has less impact when that perspective is the dominant one in western society. The author spends a great deal of time detailing the harm that the Viet Cong does to American soldiers, (which I want to make clear I DO NOT deny happened), but does not offer the same for injustices inflicted on Vietnamese civilians by American Soldiers. She only ever discusses the massacres in her narration, and for me that lessened the impact of them. Showing the wounds of the American soldiers makes them feel much more real than simply describing how Vietnamese civilians were harmed. I think that having these events be more of a forefront of the book would have been a good opportunity to add to the story, and allow for growth in Frankie.

Content Warnings