Reviews tagging 'Fatphobia'

My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

19 reviews

ellementary's review

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book wrecked me. I am still emotionally shook from reading it... completely excavated. It is not the kind of book you delightedly recommend to everyone you know but, my God, was it impossible to put down. I was mesmerized by this story. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Rape, Adult/minor relationship, Sexual assault, Sexual content, and Child abuse

Moderate: Sexual harassment, Drug use, Suicide, Fatphobia, Body shaming, Alcohol, and Stalking

Minor: Vomit, Infidelity, and Death of parent

b_barnes's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Drug use, Fatphobia, Gaslighting, Toxic relationship, Rape, Adult/minor relationship, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Sexual harassment, Body shaming, Grief, Alcohol, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Sexual content, and Suicidal thoughts

jengambale's review against another edition

dark hopeful tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

So uncomfortable, but so good

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault and Adult/minor relationship

Minor: Fatphobia

cateyeschloe's review

dark emotional sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

There’s so much to say about this book and it’s difficult to put everything it made me feel into words. 

Vanessa’s pain and conflicting emotions are so very visceral in every page, and I often found myself setting down the book for a few moments just to sit with how she felt, how I felt reading it, and how what she was going through affected her. 

This book perfectly walks the line of depicting how a relationship like Vanessa’s and Strane’s can seem from Vanessa’s perspective - romantic, beautiful, a love story, “not that bad, really” - and how brutal it actually is from the outside - heartrending, manipulative, narcissistic, and cruel. 

I think the thing that stood out the most to me was asking myself the question “if something made me feel abused - even if my mind is insistent that it ‘wasn’t that bad, really’ - isn’t that still abuse?”. And I really appreciate how the book brings this perspective to light. 

It can be really easy to bury yourself under the excuses of “others had it so much worse than me” or “what happened to me wasn’t even that bad” or “I didn’t complain; didn’t that mean I was okay with it?”. And despite all of those protests, the truth still remains true if you were hurt or used or manipulated. That is still valid and you deserve to let yourself be heard, to heal, and, ultimately, to forgive yourself for something that was beyond your control and never your fault. 

This book was painful to read and beautifully written. Vanessa is relatable and agonizing to discover. The author does a phenomenal job of weaving the abuser together both from his narcissism and his charm as he walks the line between the light of day and shadow. 

This is an essential read if you have any interest in the Me Too movement or supporting and believing victims of any abuse across the board. 

This book felt like a gut punch, but it will absolutely be added to my list of favorites from now on. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Sexual harassment, Pedophilia, Sexism, Sexual assault, Emotional abuse, Child abuse, Toxic relationship, Grief, Misogyny, Suicide, Rape, Gaslighting, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Death and Sexual content

Minor: Animal death, Death of parent, Fatphobia, Body shaming, and Stalking

reneetrinket's review

dark emotional medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Rape, Sexual content, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Death of parent, Drug use, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Grief, Animal death, Death, Misogyny, and Pedophilia

Minor: Dysphoria, Vomit, Body shaming, Fatphobia, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mental illness, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, Bullying, Classism, Cursing, Physical abuse, and Sexism

angrboda's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

wow. this book has been on my “READ THIS BOOK NOW!!!” list for over a year.. finally decided to pick it up and oh my god. i finished in the span of only two days. it was impossible to put down. it was horrifying, thought provoking, and completely messed up. the honest pain i felt when reading it; i had to take breaks everytime it got too much. i definitely see myself in the main character, vanessa, gone through a similar experience she did. i think this story did an amazing job at portraying how accurate abuse is, how it’s so easy to manipulate and control young girls who eventually spend their entire lives not understanding that what happened was bad.  this book is will stick with me for a long time.

Spoiler

as much as i loved the writing and the plot development, i wished for the downfall of stane SO badly. i despised him. i was manifesting some sort of revenge plot in the last portion, where vanessa finally exposed all he did, where stane finally admits defeat and is thrown in jail for life. the constant dismissal and disrespect vanessa had over the situations made me mad, i honestly disliked so many of her choices, but it’s so real. she’s so real. her mind is corrupted, she’s gone. she’s split off permanently and it’s so real. so real.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Rape, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Stalking, Gaslighting, Alcohol, Drug use, Grief, and Sexism

Minor: Fatphobia, Animal death, Cursing, Death of parent, Terminal illness, Body shaming, Stalking, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, and Violence

pengi's review

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Diverse cast of characters? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicide, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Rape, Sexual harassment, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Animal death, Body shaming, Cursing, Death of parent, Fatphobia, and Grief

Minor: Medical content, Vomit, and Mass/school shootings

addythebookbat's review against another edition

challenging dark sad

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Rape, Fatphobia, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Suicide, and Toxic relationship

seawarrior's review

dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

My Dark Vanessa illustrates a relentless and necessary portrait of a grooming survivor who remains tangled in the web of lies her groomer presented as love, even as she grows into an adult. This book is a bared-teeth, growling response to the lush literary canon that mythologizes young girls, asserting that they have a corruptible power over the adult men who do not see them as anything more than an imprintable sexual fantasy. It was difficult to read this book, and has been even more difficult not to continue pouring over it in my head once I finished it. 

Russell's use of language, symbols and respected literary texts is purposeful and horrifying. With each violation made by her teacher I felt genuine fear for Vanessa, yet still understood why she ignored her own worries to please this man who made her feel singled out and special. The complexities of grooming are on full display in this story. Vanessa's abuser's words are strategic and intentional, and Russell ensures that we understand the weight of them on Vanessa's life each time. I appreciated that Vanessa was not a hero. She is a woman whose development as a girl was interrupted by a predator, who is slowly learning to remove the veil of "love story" to understand her predation as it truly happened. She is also a deeply flawed person who is denying herself the growth necessary to build healthier relationships with herself and others. She is vengeful, yet turns her anger to those undeserving while repeatedly acquitting her groomer. She understands she was violated, yet tells herself she wanted this, she is being loved, she is nothing like a true victim, in order to spare herself the pain of admitting her hurt. Her story does not end with a rushed exacting of revenge that would feel insultingly unrealistic. Instead, we leave Vanessa as she is slowly learning to forgive herself and those who tried to help her, and start a life that her predator will never see, never touch and never know. 

I would recommend this book only to those prepared to read graphic depictions of underage sexual exploitation. Russell writes these passages for us to simultaneously understand how Vanessa is being taken advantage of and why she feels that she isn't, why she feels responsibility for what a much older man has primed her to tolerate. These scenes are written with a thick disgust instead of titillation, but I understand that they may still be too disturbing for people to expose themselves to. 

In conclusion, this is the only novel I've read where I felt genuine, raw grief for the protagonist to the extent that it was difficult to remind myself that her story was fiction. Yet while Vanessa is fictional, there are too many girls in this world who share her story, or who were at risk to be similarly preyed on as they formed their teenage identities around romanticized depictions of underage sexual exploitation. Russel states in her acknowledgements that she thanks "the Los I've met over the years who carry within them similar histories of abuse that looked like love, who see themselves in Dolores Haze. This book was written for nobody but you". Her story has been needed for so long, by so many people, so they may recognize the carnivorous horror of grooming for what it truly is. This is a sickening but triumphant book to experience. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Stalking and Animal death

Minor: Injury/Injury detail, Bullying, Death of parent, Fatphobia, Grief, and Medical content

martzi's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Vomit, Sexual violence, Gaslighting, Fire/Fire injury, Drug use, Child abuse, Alcohol, Violence, Pedophilia, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual content, Sexual assault, Rape, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Death of parent, Blood, Suicide, Sexual harassment, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Fatphobia, Animal death, and Adult/minor relationship