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alexauthorshay 's review for:
Taming the Beast
by Emily Maguire
I'm torn about this book very much. It's certainly an exercise in depravity, but I wouldn't go so far as to say it's without taste. Just not really my taste, which saddens me because I was very optimistic during the first part of this book.
Sarah is 14 years old when she's seduced by a teacher and begins an affair with him. It's violent, intense, almost entirely sex, but they feel a connection they can't deny. Sarah seems to be as powerless to control her feelings as Mr. Carr but they both have a degree of power over the other in the relationship. The dynamic was very interesting. Until it ends. Which is not a spoiler, because it says he leaves and returns. But during the middle half of the book where he's absent, we basically follow Sarah as she shamelessly sleeps with "anything with pants", does some drugs, and drinks a lot. Causes lots of problems for her best friend and his friends, etc. I personally felt no rising action in any of this, it was just a monotony of encounters. Which may be the point, I guess, but I don't like characters like Sarah; she basically embodies everything I don't want in a character, and I didn't expect her to turn out like that from what I knew of the book. I nearly gave up on it several times but kept telling myself once Carr showed up again it would get better.
In a way, it did. Their relationship dynamic was the same yet different, both of them different people but with the same carnal desires. Getting back together basically makes each of their lives implode, and it was kind of a nice change to read a book that actually addressed the protagonists' relationship other characters. So often, I read books where characters get together and everyone around them doesn't even react. This relationship had major consequences, of course, but still. A bittersweet ending, and honestly too brushed over on the bitter part, I felt. Sarah is so detached from herself that even in third person we get little emotional value out of the book even though she spends a good portion of it crying near the end.
I admit I read the book because I wanted to see how "depraved" it would get. And it did get pretty out there, more than I was expecting. But in terms of characters and the plot itself, I felt nothing, cared for no one, and didn't really feel like I'd spent my time well reading this book. It's not a bad book, but after the first part, it just became so boring. I don't read books for intellectual value, and I think this is the type of book that needs to be read that way to get the best value out of it. There's a lot of meaning and subtext in this book, I'm just not interested in digging into that kind of thing when I'm reading for entertainment.
Sarah is 14 years old when she's seduced by a teacher and begins an affair with him. It's violent, intense, almost entirely sex, but they feel a connection they can't deny. Sarah seems to be as powerless to control her feelings as Mr. Carr but they both have a degree of power over the other in the relationship. The dynamic was very interesting. Until it ends. Which is not a spoiler, because it says he leaves and returns. But during the middle half of the book where he's absent, we basically follow Sarah as she shamelessly sleeps with "anything with pants", does some drugs, and drinks a lot. Causes lots of problems for her best friend and his friends, etc. I personally felt no rising action in any of this, it was just a monotony of encounters. Which may be the point, I guess, but I don't like characters like Sarah; she basically embodies everything I don't want in a character, and I didn't expect her to turn out like that from what I knew of the book. I nearly gave up on it several times but kept telling myself once Carr showed up again it would get better.
In a way, it did. Their relationship dynamic was the same yet different, both of them different people but with the same carnal desires. Getting back together basically makes each of their lives implode, and it was kind of a nice change to read a book that actually addressed the protagonists' relationship other characters. So often, I read books where characters get together and everyone around them doesn't even react. This relationship had major consequences, of course, but still. A bittersweet ending, and honestly too brushed over on the bitter part, I felt. Sarah is so detached from herself that even in third person we get little emotional value out of the book even though she spends a good portion of it crying near the end.
I admit I read the book because I wanted to see how "depraved" it would get. And it did get pretty out there, more than I was expecting. But in terms of characters and the plot itself, I felt nothing, cared for no one, and didn't really feel like I'd spent my time well reading this book. It's not a bad book, but after the first part, it just became so boring. I don't read books for intellectual value, and I think this is the type of book that needs to be read that way to get the best value out of it. There's a lot of meaning and subtext in this book, I'm just not interested in digging into that kind of thing when I'm reading for entertainment.