Reviews tagging 'Xenophobia'

All This Could Be Different by Sarah Thankam Mathews

13 reviews

alyal's review against another edition

emotional reflective tense 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Sexual content, and Lesbophobia

Moderate: Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Police brutality, Outing, Toxic friendship, and Classism

brotestantethic's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

This is an interesting one! This reads as an honest and mostly realistic look into anticapitalist 20-somethings living in the big city. Main character Sneha also struggles with the divide between her cultural and sexual identifies, as well as financial pressures. I though the deep dive into her culture was by far the best and most compelling part of this book. Matthews writes a blunt and telling narrative.

What I was surprised by here was what is not present. I truly expected Sneha to have a gender revelation. During sex scenes,

she is aroused by pretending to have a penis.

As a result, Sneha’s adventure with gender feels unfinished by the end of the novel. I do appreciate that she changes her views on trans people (originally not accepting of they/them pronouns). However, her character development is further unfinished because she does not reconcile with her fatphobia and colorism.

Furthermore, I found Project Pink House/Rion a bit hard to swallow. I believe Matthews was going for a microcosm of anticapitalist, communal living. It is a utopia of “doing what you can.” However, it ends up being and reading like college houses. A bit young, a bit unrealistic, a lot of conflict. I didn’t really like how this fit into the narrative and maybe could be chalked up to the author trying to cover a bit too much ground.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Eating disorder and Mental illness

Moderate: Fatphobia, Pedophilia, Racism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Xenophobia

fkshg8465's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad 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

So many things to be sad about. So many things to applaud. So many things to be relieved about. So many things to feel wistful about.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Bullying, Chronic illness, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Infidelity, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Police brutality, Medical content, Car accident, Death of parent, Lesbophobia, Outing, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Deportation

nialystic's review against another edition

hopeful inspiring reflective

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcoholism, Incest, Rape, Xenophobia, Lesbophobia, and Deportation

Minor: Domestic abuse

sammyofthevalley's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

2.5

This wasn’t my type of book - I don’t usually read sad endings or books which are completely focused on angst. However, I also feel justified in disliking it, as the main character never develops. My FAVORITE part of books is character development, but the only upward motion we see in S is because of a time skip when the development has happened without the reader. I would have liked a lot more payoff for suffering through her situation. But that’s how life is

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual content

Minor: Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Xenophobia, Police brutality, Classism, and Deportation

lorenag5's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective fast-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, Homophobia, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Racism, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Medical content, Medical trauma, Lesbophobia, Outing, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Colonisation, Classism, and Deportation

al3xa's review against another edition

challenging sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia

Moderate: Child abuse

rachelmichelson's review against another edition

challenging dark inspiring reflective slow-paced

4.75

This took me awhile, but I'm glad I stuck with it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, and Grief

cleo_reads's review against another edition

5.0

Wow, this is a remarkable debut and also a remarkable book. Also remarkably hopeful and generous for lit fic. 

I found parts of it heavy, both because of all of the content warnings I put below and because it's such an emotionally accurate portrayal of being in your early 20s and wow, can that be hard to read about. But it's ultimately hopeful and uplifting. 

Here's Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya's review, the review that convinced me to give it a try, even though I don't usually like lit fic - https://www.autostraddle.com/all-this-could-be-different-review/

A note for my fellow genre romance readers - this is absolutely not a genre romance - the MC does have a messy, on again, off again relationship but there's no hfn or hea and that felt like the absolutely right choice to me. This is a brilliantly written lit fic, coming of age story and that's what it should be read as.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Racism, Xenophobia, and Deportation

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Homophobia, Police brutality, and Classism

Minor: Chronic illness and Transphobia

Other warnings: internalized racism, internalized homophobia, maybe some internalized transphobia (it depends on how you interpret one character), depression / anxiety, housing insecurity

agustinayloslibros's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful reflective sad 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness and Police brutality

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Racism, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, and Classism

Minor: Child abuse, Drug abuse, Pedophilia, and Deportation