Reviews tagging 'Death'

Any Man by Amber Tamblyn

20 reviews

gerardine's review against another edition

dark emotional sad fast-paced

• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

This one was brutal. Wow. 
Any man describes the aftermath of 5 men victims of sexual assault by a woman called Mae. The book shows how rape culture and society treat its survivors. 
The story switches between internet searches, poetry, radio dialogues, and journal entries, making the book a very fast-paced read.
Highly recommend the audiobook for this one. 
4.5 🌟 
TW: rape, animal cruelty, death, suicide, suicide thoughts 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Animal cruelty and Suicide

Minor: Death

petit_lecteur's review

challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Violence, Blood, and Suicide attempt

chloseencounter's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad 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

5.0

Any Man was a stunning and unique experience. I’d 100% recommend the audio book because it’s extremely immersive. 

I really enjoyed hearing all the different POVs of the antagonist’s victims, this was a very raw look into all the various outcomes that can come from surviving sexual assault, weather it’s dealing by humor, family, control, emptiness, self destructive behavior, or even suicide. While the characters were interesting and their storylines were heartbreaking, the most special thing to me about this novel is the look at what women so often deal with when faced with sexual violence but through the eyes of a man. Unfortunately female victims of sexual assault are all too common, we hear about it so much in fact, our society has become desensitized to the sexual abuse women face and how it’s handled by the public. Flipping the narrative and using men as the victims not only opens up an important conversation about men who have experienced sexual violence and how they are treated but also made the subject feel much more shocking. Then I suppose we can ask ourselves…why is that? Why is being sexually assaulted as a women so commonplace that it doesn’t feel nearly as gut wrenching to read?

The most eye opening part in my opinion was the very last bit, when our serial rapist responds to the journalist, in which she replies with a lot of grotesque language about how a women might think about men as essentially prey or even nonhuman. Then she sends the same exact paragraph replacing the pronouns with she/her, it was sort of appalling to see how different those paragraphs felt right next to one another. Why one was shocking and the other…felt sort of normal. As a women it was easy for me to read the paragraph and think “yea that’s just how men often think of us”, and yet the same exact paragraph but with men as the group being preyed upon felt much more abhorrent. 

At the end of the day, I think that ultimately there wasn’t one predator but multiple women predators. The story seemed to lump these people into one frightening amalgamation of a women because how could society believe that there may be multiple women out there preying upon men, it must be a repeat offender. However, when a women is attacked it could literally be “any man”, which is a very smart way to make a statement about how both male and female victims of sexual violence are seen unfairly by the general public.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal death, Cancer, Child abuse, Death, Eating disorder, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

hapikohw's review against another edition

dark emotional inspiring sad fast-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? It's complicated

4.0

It started on such a high for me. I really thought it would be a 5-star easy. As we went from the survivor-hood of each of Maude's victims to the general spectacle of the case it dipped for me. It is at its best when the internalization of each man is explored and how they maneuver through relationships of those closest to them. When they are centered. Some of the survivors are given this, and others are not - the last two men. It was bold to use real celebrities and what they would say in an event like this. The sixth man, who was technically the first, and then Maude herself were extremely rushed and that lack of exploration in those chapters really dropped it for me to 4 stars. Maude's logic that she gave the press versus what she actually believes in and why she actually done it is fine, but there should have been more if she was to actually have a moment in the book instead of being the person who got away and exists as a phantom in the public consciousness and the minds of her victims. Still, the experimental approach to the physical and audio book was enough to still be great to me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Cancer, Child abuse, Deadnaming, Death, Eating disorder, Misogyny, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Injury/Injury detail

corpseparty's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Eating disorder, Pedophilia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Blood, Murder, and Sexual harassment

autumnwhite's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Cancer, Chronic illness, Cursing, Death, Eating disorder, Gore, Hate crime, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Lesbophobia, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

cursivewolf's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

This book is so powerful. The writing style is so unique, but I loved it. I am not a man, so I cannot attest if this is accurate to male victims of assault. But to me, it brings a voice to something most don’t consider or take seriously. Sexual assault itself is a topic explored so much, but sexual assault on men and the aftermath of such is rarely, if ever, explored. Tamblyn did it diversely, respectfully, and accurately. This book is personal to me. It shows so accurately how sexual assault can take over and affect you afterwards. I wept reading this. Part of me wishes Maude was explored more, just a tiny bit more. But I loved this book, in a weird way. In a therapeutic way. I don’t know if it’s one I could read again, it’s a hard read. But it’s so beautifully and delicately done, but rips the bandaid off all the same.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Cancer, Death, Mental illness, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

mermaidsherbet's review

dark emotional sad tense fast-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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Eating disorder, Mental illness, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual violence, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Drug use, Gore, Pedophilia, Torture, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Kidnapping, Gaslighting, and Alcohol

Minor: Alcoholism, Cancer, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Drug abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Transphobia, Excrement, Vomit, Stalking, Murder, and Pregnancy

literaryliaisons's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Eating disorder, Gore, Homophobia, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, and Injury/Injury detail

gymbeannz's review against another edition

dark sad fast-paced

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

2.0

 This book, including the author, is everything wrong with the world.

The most disconcerting thing about Any Man is that it is written by a female.
To think that a female would have any clue what it feels like to be a sexually assaulted male is beyond me. And to think, she attempts to do it... what... seven times? Sevenish different men? I can't even remember. And all in first person, or from emotion-based poetry.
Based on this alone, I realised I couldn't take the novel seriously.
And I was correct. It's not made to shed light on the male's point of view.

Uncomfortable as it is to say, while the novel's purpose is to somehow promote feminism, I suspect it also acts as therapeutic revenge porn for the author. That's... concerning to say the least.

Maude is never caught. Her single communication with the press is a four page list of rhetorical questions that would make anyone feel like a guilty slime, even the reader! We learn she's never been abused, she does these things... for fun. My assumption then? She hates men.

I don't mind a character hating men. We get all sorts in this world and their point of view is a rare and interesting one. But I just can't shake the feeling that the author approves of Maude.

Amber Tamblyn turns a book about male rape victims into a "lesson" about female sexual assault. To be honest, the attempt to connect the two is very impressive. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Eating disorder, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Body horror, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Suicide attempt, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Vomit, and Fire/Fire injury