Scan barcode
A review by briarfairchild
A Splash of Red by Antonia Fraser
1.0
Aghhh, bad, bad, bad! A very generous dollop of slut-shaming and an absolute torrent of victim-blaming: Jemima decides astonishingly quickly that because her friend Chloe has lied to her a couple of times, she's a massive liar and deserves all she gets. Apparently it was her own fault that her abusive-ex turned abuser; she drove him to drink and not only triggered his violence but actually enjoyed it. The only person who comes out of this whole situation well is the Lionnel fellow, who actually (shock!) believed Chloe when she told him how horrible it was for her in that relationship - and he is punished for this by death. Classy. And of course because Chloe apparently liked to have a lot of sex with a lot of people, she must be a bad person. Ew.
Jemima has what for anyone else would be a pretty traumatic time during this book. She loses a close friend. Then she gets badly beaten up by the close friend's abusive ex (but obviously that was the close friend's fault because she brought the violence out in him, which is presumably why Jemima is so sympathetic towards him for the rest of the book). Then another friend dies. She deals with all of this with perfect cool and calm. She is not upset. She has no nightmares and cries no tears. She appears, in fact, to have very few emotions apart from the occasional burst of panic and, of course, her indestructible self-confidence. As in the other books, she's definitely not as intelligent as she and everybody else thinks she is. In fact, she behaves remarkably stupidly on occasion.
Jemima has what for anyone else would be a pretty traumatic time during this book. She loses a close friend. Then she gets badly beaten up by the close friend's abusive ex (but obviously that was the close friend's fault because she brought the violence out in him, which is presumably why Jemima is so sympathetic towards him for the rest of the book). Then another friend dies. She deals with all of this with perfect cool and calm. She is not upset. She has no nightmares and cries no tears. She appears, in fact, to have very few emotions apart from the occasional burst of panic and, of course, her indestructible self-confidence. As in the other books, she's definitely not as intelligent as she and everybody else thinks she is. In fact, she behaves remarkably stupidly on occasion.