Reviews with content warning for Misogyny - Evil Eye

Reviews tagging 'Misogyny'

Evil Eye by Etaf Rum

50 reviews

lauren_lovestoread's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

3.75

First, I’d like to say I did like this book but I felt frustrated by the repetition. I wished there had been more backstory about Yara’s mother and grandmother, and less of the endless cycle of Yara and Fadi’s relationship. I felt that there was more potential for this story that wasn’t realized. The writing is lovely and engaging. I just wanted a bit more to the story that didn’t feel like reading the same chapter in different words so many times over. All that said, it’s still definitely worth the read.

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sophiesmallhands's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.25

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kimb2's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I didn’t enjoy this one as much as A Woman is no Man. I found this to be a long, drawn out, character study of a woman reflecting on her childhood trauma. For me, the execution falls short.

The story certainly tackles important issues such as the struggles of being a Palestinian woman, but I feel it is bogged down in the weight of the subject matter. The tension between Yara’s traditional upbringing and her desire for independence is a central theme, but at times, it seems as though the same issues are repeated without providing much growth and it left me wanting more. Then the story ended, just when a whole new storyline was appearing.

So, for me, this was just okay.

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clovetra's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful medium-paced

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

4.0

etaf rum has done it again. god she’s such an amazing storyteller.

if i was the type of reader to give half stars, this would 100% be a 4.5/5. alas i am too anal about my storygraph & goodreads ratings matching so here we are.

i’ll say the only real “downside” i found with this novel is from purely an enjoyment stance, yara becomes very repetitive in her dialogue, sometimes making this book feel like im just reading the same chapter over and over again. i understand it is likely a commentary on the generational trauma yara is experiencing, and the fact she literally points out many times how she feels like she is going in a circle and needs to break the cycle in her family. purely as a reader, it does become tiring and frustrating, but honestly im not too mad at it as i understand the reasons thematically for it. the book at times also felt slightly devoid of anything beyond yara. yes i know she’s the protag but literally i know nothing about her kids. yet again another commentary on how yara is in her head so much she literally cannot define her children’s personalities but as a reader i wanted more!

i really enjoyed rum’s depiction of mental illness in this book. it felt very realistic, and having read rum’s previous book, i was worried we would get another incredibly depressing ending, so im thankful that in some form things were looking up for yara. this book really did feel like an extension of themes introduced in ‘a woman is no man’ in the best way, where instead of just making the author feel the depths of despair with a downer ending, i like that in this story yara is beginning to break free from her traumas one step at a time. i also thoroughly adored her character development. honestly this book felt like it rectified everything “missing” within ‘a woman is no man’, and even then that book was absolute fire. and so was this.

the ending was quite cute too, and i’m very pleased this book didn’t give in to letting the protagonist suffer a tragic fate, and instead let her grow beyond what is expected of her.

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rberdan's review against another edition

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emotional reflective slow-paced

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

3.0

This is the first book I've written by Etaf Rum. I can see from many other reviews that what is consistent about this author is her ability to bring the reader into the emotional reality of the character.

This story was a pretty deep dive into the internal and external life of Yara, a young wife and mother who holds the weight of cultural expectations while longing for a different path. It follows her experience with the judgment of others as she slowly begins to look within herself to see who she can become on the other side of grief and trauma. As a whole, that unravels in a way that feels very real (and aligned with some of my own experience), even if it is hard to be in the emotional places Yara has to go through in order to heal.

I think the moments I struggled with in the book come down to forgetting how young Yara is as she navigates life. Also, I think her husband's dismissive behaviour was really difficult to sit through; though it's not an excuse for how unkind he could be to his wife, I got the impression his behaviour had a lot to do with a combination of immaturity and also wanting a different path than his family and community would see him follow. I suspect because it was a good reflection of reality, I found some of the racism Yara experienced really hard to endure, and I'm white.

I appreciated seeing Yara find her own inner strength and how she got into real talk with her daughters so they could have a different experience than she did. I loved how her supportive friendship became such a lovely touchstone for her. I appreciated how the book treated her relationship with her mother, in particular the importance of understanding the role of a child vs. the role of a parent and the journey of forgiveness that can make way for so much healing. The ending was so wonderfully hopeful.

This was a hard and beautiful read. I think I would have rated this higher when I was in a life stage that more closely aligned with Yara's as I think I would have benefited from more insight than I was able to get from this book at this point in my life.

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nishath's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.25

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campisforever's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful informative sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

This book is a really, really difficult one in which to get immersed if you're not into internal or cerebral plots (like me). It's also an honest, raw look into generational trauma, complex PTSD (C-PTSD), depression, and suicidal ideation. That said, Evil Eye is gorgeously written and well worth it. It took me quite a while to get through (a few days over six months) because I had to pick it up and put it down several times. The only thing that really worked for me was transitioning to listening to it on Spotify and tracking the reading with the pages in my physical copy. Making this change helped me, as a highly visual person, take a small step back from having to experience the raw feelings of the novel and gave me breathing room to react. Once I was able to get that room, I appreciated the story much more.

For the question about whether I found the characters loveable I said "It's complicated." Let me explain:

I love Yara deeply, I love Mira and Jude, and I love Silas and Josephine. I had strong reactions to Fadi, his family, and Yara's family in many ways, but to say they weren't "loveable" wouldn't necessarily be fair, since that's the point of the whole book. I think a fairer way to put it is that I was frustrated by how Fadi, etc., just wouldn't listen to Yara when Yara was working so hard on herself.

Also, if you're an academic, the first third might be frustrating, but it will pass, I promise. In general, I think that if you have the patience to give this book time, it will give what it needs to. In the end I was genuinely moved, but it's not something I would recommend blindly.

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