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A review by nickoliver
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
This book was definitely a unique experience. It told the story of twelve (mostly Black) women in Britain and things they had to deal with and overcome. They were slightly interwoven with each other, be it by family ties, by being friends, or just by simply having been in each other's lives for a while. It got a bit hard for me later in the book to remember all the characters sometimes, because each chapter introduced a bunch of new characters that sometimes sporadically showed up again later, but for the most part, I loved that format.
The writing style was probably something that some people will struggle with. There were no quotation marks, almost no capitalised words, and instead of ending sentences with a period, Evaristo simply wrote the next sentence on a new line. I have to say I'm kind of a sucker for a style like this, even if it did seem a bit pretentious and hard to read at times (especially during dialogue, because it could be hard to keep track of who was saying what). But I have to say that if you struggle with writing styles à la Sally Rooney, you will probably also struggle with this one - possibly more so, even.
To be honest, the writing was almost a bit too advanced for me? I didn't always quite understand what characters were talking about and it made little sense to me. Which, obviously, was mostly a me-problem.
The topics were tough to read sometimes. Evaristo covered a big variety of issues. Some of them were omnipotent in every chapter, like the racism that Black people and Black women in general face in Britain, or the rampant misogyny and sexism. Other themes were only there in a specific chapter or specific chapters, like teenage pregnancies, drug addiction, miscarriages, or (gang) rape. I'd definitely recommend checking the trigger warnings first if you've got big triggers. Admittedly, sometimes some of the topics were too easy to overcome. For example, the drug addict got over her addiction simply by going cold turkey for a week and then never fell back into addiction anymore. There was sometime nothing specific that actually helped the women overcome their struggles and trauma; it was simply by pure will.
Some of the feminism that Evaristo wrote also felt a bit problematic and non-inclusive, especially when it came to trans rights. One of the chapters was about a non-binary person, and while I could deal with them getting misgendered and deadnamed in their own chapter - they didn't know yet at the beginning of the chapter that they were even non-binary to begin with -, I didn't understand while they kept getting misgendered in many of the later chapters, too. A lot of the transphobia just wasn't called out enough.
The character portrayal was done pretty well. The characters were mostly not very likeable and didn't differ from one another that much sometimes, but Evaristo explored their psyches a lot, which I liked. Also, I don't think a character necessarily needs to be likeable to be interesting to read about. Like I said, I did occasionally have trouble remembering characters, but it was usually not that hard to figure out who I was reading about again.
The writing style was probably something that some people will struggle with. There were no quotation marks, almost no capitalised words, and instead of ending sentences with a period, Evaristo simply wrote the next sentence on a new line. I have to say I'm kind of a sucker for a style like this, even if it did seem a bit pretentious and hard to read at times (especially during dialogue, because it could be hard to keep track of who was saying what). But I have to say that if you struggle with writing styles à la Sally Rooney, you will probably also struggle with this one - possibly more so, even.
To be honest, the writing was almost a bit too advanced for me? I didn't always quite understand what characters were talking about and it made little sense to me. Which, obviously, was mostly a me-problem.
The topics were tough to read sometimes. Evaristo covered a big variety of issues. Some of them were omnipotent in every chapter, like the racism that Black people and Black women in general face in Britain, or the rampant misogyny and sexism. Other themes were only there in a specific chapter or specific chapters, like teenage pregnancies, drug addiction, miscarriages, or (gang) rape. I'd definitely recommend checking the trigger warnings first if you've got big triggers. Admittedly, sometimes some of the topics were too easy to overcome. For example, the drug addict got over her addiction simply by going cold turkey for a week and then never fell back into addiction anymore. There was sometime nothing specific that actually helped the women overcome their struggles and trauma; it was simply by pure will.
Some of the feminism that Evaristo wrote also felt a bit problematic and non-inclusive, especially when it came to trans rights. One of the chapters was about a non-binary person, and while I could deal with them getting misgendered and deadnamed in their own chapter - they didn't know yet at the beginning of the chapter that they were even non-binary to begin with -, I didn't understand while they kept getting misgendered in many of the later chapters, too. A lot of the transphobia just wasn't called out enough.
The character portrayal was done pretty well. The characters were mostly not very likeable and didn't differ from one another that much sometimes, but Evaristo explored their psyches a lot, which I liked. Also, I don't think a character necessarily needs to be likeable to be interesting to read about. Like I said, I did occasionally have trouble remembering characters, but it was usually not that hard to figure out who I was reading about again.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia, Racism, Misogyny, Lesbophobia, Rape, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Drug abuse, Addiction, and Transphobia
Minor: Miscarriage and Biphobia