Reviews with content warning for Sexual harassment - Girl Friends

Reviews tagging 'Sexual harassment'

Girl Friends by Holly Bourne

18 reviews

annierosebel's review against another edition

5.0

This was brutal and brilliant.

I've never read fiction that so accurately portrays the way girls are taught to objectify themselves, the ways they learn to compare themselves and prioritise desirability over pretty much everything else.

This book doesn't gloss over anything. It's so incredibly raw and emotional, and it's a testament to the writing that it's still a novel you want to read.

I really like books with messy, flawed characters. And I like books where human relationships aren't neatly resolved - there's a huge grey area between a toxic friendship and a perfectly healthy one and it's complex to navigate!

When the main character narrates a novel, you get extra insight into their thoughts but you also get the whole narrative through their perspective and that's interesting to think about with this book.

It's rare for me to be equally invested in both parts of a dual timeline novel (it alternates a chapter from the main character's current adult life and her teenage life), but with this book I was.

I would be interested in how guys experience this book. I'd thoroughly recommend it if you're in a place where you have the bandwidth to think about things that have happened to you and your friends and your peers growing up and how it's affected your lives. It's almost impossible to not experience a huge amount of compassion for so many of the characters and to start making links to your own life.

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whosfernn's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

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hajarreads_'s review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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nadiaherondale's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

I forgot to write a review so I had to do a quick reread. The best thing about this book is exactly how good it is at portraying a toxic female friendship, the competition, the need, the love it's all there. I've been there, I've been both sides. You fall apart and then you both found yourselves again and sometimes it works, sometimes you remember why you fell apart. This book portrays it so well.

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alysereadsbooks's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective 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? Yes

3.0

Listened to the audiobook and overall enjoyed it. It was hard to listen to at times because the protaganists were so flawed. There was basic surface level exploration of misogyny and rape culture.

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katenorman17's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring sad fast-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

4.0

Content Warnings

amyvl93's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

Every single one of Holly Bourne's adult novels have given me a minor existential crisis, and Girl Friends is no different.

It follows Fern, who has found some slightly accidental viral fame for sharing her experiences with mental illness, who after a ten year estrangement comes face to face with her best friend from her teenage years Jessica. The novel then takes us between the present, as Fern struggles to grapple with Jessica's arrival in her life and the years of the early 00s and Fern and Jessica's original friendship, leading to the point where the girls stop speaking.

Bourne is great at writing about the contemporary female experience and Girl Friends is no different. Fern's insecurities may feel irrational but also recognisable, as does Jessica's behaviour. Bourne's descriptions of the early 00s also felt painfully familiar, from the pop culture references to the grim way that 'lad culture' was accepted and enabled by teenage girls desperate to be recognised. This is a novel that looks at how misogyny creeps into relationships between young men and women, and how it can be a barrier to recognise how things really are.

The only thing that felt false to me is that there needed to be a 'reveal' about Jessica's motivations, given Fern's career and academic interests I would have expected her to be more able to understand the rationale behind the behaviour of those around her. However, this is a great contemporary read and I'll be first to pick up Bourne's next adult novel.

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