Reviews with content warning for Fire/Fire injury - Wide Sargasso Sea

Reviews tagging 'Fire/Fire injury'

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

35 reviews

pixie_d's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

3.0

The intro from someone in the 1960s saying how modern the writing was. As skilled as the author is, none of her books listed in the intro seem to have endured other than this one for its connection to Jane Eyre. And yet it doesn't have much to do with Jane Eyre until the very end. It is more a reimagining than an actual prequel.
Rhys does a marvelous job with atmosphere, but the plot is lurid and disturbing. If I weren't trying to fulfill a book challenge prompt to read a "prequel," I might have dnf'd it despite the writing skill and the short length. So many trigger warnings. You'll need a strong stomach to get through this.

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chanatova's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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david_slack110507's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad slow-paced

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

3.25

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simonmh's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-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? It's complicated

5.0

Really amazing book. It’s a prequel of sorts to Jane Eyre, showing the life of Mr. Rochester’s wife Bertha before she was locked in the attic and written off as mentally ill.

It’s a great premise, but the book lives up to the premise. It’s a short read, but the portrayal of both Antoinette and Mr. Rochester feels very thorough as you see their mental states change. The portrayal of the natural environment is also vivid and even reading it in winter, I could feel the heat and humidity of the Caribbean.

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cyberhavok's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad medium-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

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tinyjude's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes

3.75

I was eagerly waiting the moment I could read this classical rendition of a forgotten and mistreated character such as Antoinetta/Bertha from Jane Eyre, as I loved the original book back then, when I first picked it up.

In some senses, it does a great job at giving depth both to Bertha's character and background, and Mr. Rochester's feelings about her (which I did not expect to find here), as well as the racial complexities in Jamaica after the end of "legal slave ownership" (we know it was still being enacted nonetheless), colourism, women's autonomy and the treatment of (women's) madness and how these poor women are driven into these unstable mental states by their environments, and mostly their husbands.

But it was also confusing in a lot of instances and felt short when depicting more the nuance of the black characters' feelings towards their previous slave owners. I wish we had focused more on them in general, than the white Creole perspective, but I understand Rhys' background and how that shaped this re-imagining of Bertha's story. Still, I think it should be an essential read after Jane Eyre because it adds more depth to her character and a more complex post-colonial context than the original book did.

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