Reviews

Silenced by Ann Claycomb

amybouwer's review

emotional hopeful lighthearted fast-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

3.5

bertasbookshelf's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

4.0

emily_davies's review

dark reflective fast-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

4.75

naro173's review against another edition

adventurous dark funny inspiring reflective fast-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? No

3.5

_seabs_'s review

fast-paced

4.5

123zoeg's review

emotional funny hopeful inspiring medium-paced

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

4.0

pbandjane_library's review

adventurous 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual assault and Sexual harassment

book_ish_bitch's review

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.5

hcuevas's review

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

oddmara's review

2.0

Silenced for me falls in the category of books that have really cool premises that are sadly poorly executed. Silenced follows the story of four women who have been sexually assaulted by their CEO. After doing so, the man curses them to not be able to talk to anyone about what has happened to them, curses which are inspired by various fairy-tales. Jo, for instance, will spit out bugs every single time she tries to speak out about the CEO. Together, they try to figure out a way to lift the curses. Whilst I thought the premise was incredibly cool, the story itself felt like a pretty heavy-handed metaphor of women afraid to speak up because of various reasons (a metaphor that wasn't really a metaphor, because the girls actively speak about how ironic and cruel their curses are in this respect). The CEO was written in such a cartoon villain way that it was hard to take the actual story seriously, and especially him as a dangerous man that has violated more than seven women. The ending again felt quite cartoonish, with the power of friendship saving the day (with the exception of Maia's character, which actually felt a little more fleshed out). I could however appreciate the individual epilogues for each girl's story, which wrapped up everyone's narratives quite nicely. Honestly, I think the issue with this book is that it tried to focus on too many things at the same time. There's 4 persepctives, 4 main characters, all with different issues that we had to get through in only 350 pages. If the focus was only on one character, or maybe if the book was longer we would have been able to appreciate and immerse ourselves more in the story, and eventually also empathise more.