TagSocial Commentary

Book Review: The Women by Kristin Hannah

B

The Gist: The Women is a powerful novel about the erasure and resilience of women during the Vietnam War through the lens of friendship, societal challenges, and the lasting impacts of conflict.

Series: Standalone

Release Date: February 6, 2024

Synopsis
An intimate portrait of coming of age in a dangerous time and an epic tale of a nation divided.

Women can be heroes. When twenty-year-old nursing student Frances “Frankie” McGrath hears these words, it is a revelation. Raised in the sun-drenched, idyllic world of Southern California and sheltered by her conservative parents, she has always prided herself on doing the right thing. But in 1965, the world is changing, and she suddenly dares to imagine a different future for herself. When her brother ships out to serve in Vietnam, she joins the Army Nurse Corps and follows his path.

As green and inexperienced as the men sent to Vietnam to fight, Frankie is over- whelmed by the chaos and destruction of war. Each day is a gamble of life and death, hope and betrayal; friendships run deep and can be shattered in an instant. In war, she meets—and becomes one of—the lucky, the brave, the broken, and the lost.

But war is just the beginning for Frankie and her veteran friends. The real battle lies in coming home to a changed and divided America, to angry protesters, and to a country that wants to forget Vietnam.

The Women is the story of one woman gone to war, but it shines a light on all women who put themselves in harm’s way and whose sacrifice and commitment to their country has too often been forgotten. A novel about deep friendships and bold patriotism, The Women is a richly drawn story with a memorable heroine whose idealism and courage under fire will come to define an era.

Ending
HFN. Frankie has found peace with her past and has opened up a centre to help women who served. She’s on the road to healing her relationship with her parents. And… there’s an open-ended ending for the romantic subplot. I’ll just say… OMGGGG I KNEW HE WAS ALIVE.
Representation
• Black supporting characters
• Black side characters
Possible Triggers: Yes
• Death of protagonist’s brother in the war
• Medical trauma (e.g., amputation, surgery, gunshot wounds)
• Children and pregnant women are described as victims of the war in Vietnam
• Gore
• Miscarriage
• Alcoholism
• Drug addiction
• Depression
• Suicidal ideation
• Suicide attempt
• PTSD
• War themes
• Death of supporting characters
• Grief
• Racism
• Police brutality discussed
• Sexism
• Infidelity
Mature Themes
• Non-descriptive sex scenes
• Swearing
• Alcohol and drug consumption and abuse
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.

Format: Hardcover

Rating: 5-stars

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Book Review: Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter

B

The Gist: Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter is a poignant and darkly satirical exploration of classism, mental health, and the dystopian nature of modern work culture.

Series: Standalone

Release Date: July 11, 2023

Synopsis
A year into her dream job at a cutthroat Silicon Valley startup, Cassie finds herself trapped in a corporate nightmare. In addition to the long hours, toxic bosses, and unethical projects, she struggles to reconcile the glittering promise of a city where obscene wealth lives alongside abject poverty. Ivy League grads complain about the snack selection from a conference room with a view of unhoused people bathing in the bay. Startup burnouts leap into the paths of commuter trains, and men set themselves on fire in the streets.

Though isolated, Cassie is never alone. From her earliest memory, a miniature black hole has been her constant companion. It feeds on her depression and anxiety, its size changing in relation to her distress. The black hole watches, but it also waits. Its relentless pull draws Cassie ever-closer as the world around her unravels.

When her CEO’s demands cross an illegal threshold and she ends up unexpectedly pregnant, Cassie must decide whether the tempting fruits of Silicon Valley are really worth it. Sharp but vulnerable, funny yet unsettling, Ripe portrays one millennial woman’s journey through a late-capitalist hellscape and offers an incisive look at the absurdities of modern life.

Ending
Reflective. Open-ended. It could be construed as suicide or that she finally confronted her depression and was ready to find a fulfilling life by treating her depression.
Representation
• Main character with depression
Possible Triggers: Yes
• Classism
• Depression
• Recounting of child abuse (including flashbacks)
• Intrusive thoughts
• Suicidal ideation
• Surgical abortion
• Drug and alcohol abuse
• Drug and alcohol consumption after pregnancy is confirmed
• Toxic parental relationships
• Toxic and abusive workplace
• Panic attacks
• Sexism
Mature Themes
• Drug consumption and abuse
• Alcohol consumption and abuse
• Explicit sexual content
• Swearing
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.

Format: Hardcover

Rating: 5-stars

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Book Review: Starling House by Alix E. Harrow

B

The Gist: Starling House artfully employs dark academia and an enigmatic haunted house to delve into the racism, sexism and classism that plague a small town.

Series: Standalone

Release Date: October 3, 2023

Synopsis
A grim and gothic new tale from author Alix E. Harrow about a small town haunted by secrets that can’t stay buried and the sinister house that sits at the crossroads of it all.

Eden, Kentucky, is just another dying, bad-luck town, known only for the legend of E. Starling, the reclusive nineteenth-century author and illustrator who wrote The Underland–and disappeared. Before she vanished, Starling House appeared. But everyone agrees that it’s best to let the uncanny house―and its last lonely heir, Arthur Starling―go to rot.

Opal knows better than to mess with haunted houses or brooding men, but an unexpected job offer might be a chance to get her brother out of Eden. Too quickly, though, Starling House starts to feel dangerously like something she’s never had: a home.

As sinister forces converge on Starling House, Opal and Arthur are going to have to make a dire choice to dig up the buried secrets of the past and confront their own fears, or let Eden be taken over by literal nightmares.

If Opal wants a home, she’ll have to fight for it.

Ending
HFN
Representation
• Bisexual main character
• Mexican Biracial Supporting Character
• Lesbian supporting characters
• Sapphic side relationship
Possible Triggers: Yes
• Grief (Heroine’s and the Hero’s parents died before the book starts)
• PTSD from near-death experience
• Sword violence
• Homelessness
• Incest recounted (by a side character)
• Racism
• Homophobia
Safety Rating: Safe
No cheating
No OM/OW drama
Does have the Hero pushing the Heroine away
Does have a brief separation between the Hero and Heroine
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.

Format: Hardcover

Rating: 4.25-stars

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Book Review: Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou

B
Cover of Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou

The Gist: Disorientation is a gripping campus novel that uses satire to confront bias and complicity in academic spaces.

Series: Standalone

Release Date: March 22, 2022

Synopsis
A Taiwanese American woman’s coming-of-consciousness ignites eye-opening revelations and chaos on a college campus in this outrageously hilarious and startlingly tender debut novel.

Twenty-nine-year-old PhD student Ingrid Yang is desperate to finish her dissertation on the late canonical poet Xiao-Wen Chou and never read about “Chinese-y” things again. But after years of grueling research, all she has to show for her efforts are junk food addiction and stomach pain. When she accidentally stumbles upon a curious note in the Chou archives one afternoon, she convinces herself it’s her ticket out of academic hell.

But Ingrid’s in much deeper than she thinks. Her clumsy exploits to unravel the note’s message lead to an explosive discovery, upending not only her sheltered life within academia but her entire world beyond it. With her trusty friend Eunice Kim by her side and her rival Vivian Vo hot on her tail, together they set off a roller coaster of mishaps and misadventures, from book burnings and OTC drug hallucinations, to hot-button protests and Yellow Peril 2.0 propaganda.

In the aftermath, nothing looks the same to Ingrid—including her gentle and doting fiancé, Stephen Greene. When he embarks on a book tour with the super kawaii Japanese author he’s translated, doubts and insecurities creep in for the first time… As the events Ingrid instigated keep spiraling, she’ll have to confront her sticky relationship to white men and white institutions—and, most of all, herself.

For readers of Paul Beatty’s The Sellout and Charles Yu’s Interior Chinatown, this uproarious and bighearted satire is a blistering send-up of privilege and power in America, and a profound reckoning of individual complicity and unspoken rage. In this electrifying debut novel from a provocative new voice, Elaine Hsieh Chou asks who gets to tell our stories—and how the story changes when we finally tell it ourselves.

Ending
The ending is very OTT because the book is satire, but I think it reflects what happens in real life: those who perpetuate oppression through a “free speech” narrative are rewarded, whereas those who call out oppression – white supremacy – are punished by institutions (and the people who want to uphold it). Disorientation ends with Ingrid having dropped out of her Ph.D. and working a minimum wage job at a hot dog fast food joint. But the author emphasizes that while society might consider this “failure,” Ingrid is all the better for it. This is a brief pause as she considers what she wants to do now that she’s left academia. She finally has time to rest and heal from the trauma of academia, and she’s rebuilding her relationship with her parent and learning their native language. Essentially, Ingrid is on the road to reclaiming herself and her identity outside of the white space of academia.
Representation
• Taiwanese-American main character
• Korean-American supporting character
• lesbian Vietnamese-American supporting character
• Chinese side character
• lesbian Black side character
• Taiwanese-American side character
Possible Triggers: Yes
• Racism
• Gaslighting
• Emotional abuse
• Homophobia
• Xenophobia
• Misogyny
• Cultural appropriation
• Racial slurs
• Discussion of a side character’s attempted suicide
• Cultural appropriation
• Yellowface
• Fetishization of East Asian women becomes a main plot point
• Brief allusion to an adult/minor relationship between a supporting character and his wife (he met his wife in China when he was 27, and earlier, it was mentioned that there’s a 15-year age gap between them)
Mature Themes
• Sex
• Cursing
• Drug abuse
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.

Format: Hardcover

Rating: 5-stars

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