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misuki's review against another edition
- 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
4.25
Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Mental illness, Sexism, Sexual content, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Violence
Minor: Animal death and Xenophobia
solspringsreads's review against another edition
- 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? Yes
3.0
Cleopatra and Frankenstein is pretty much what it says on the tin (and the plot summary): a book about a couple with a large age gap who are both deeply flawed individuals, and the ways their relationship affects the people in their lives as well as how their lives are affected in turn. I didn’t expect this book to have shifting perspectives in each chapter and to focus so heavily on characters aside from the two titular protagonists, but I actually found myself preferring the chapters that gave us insight into the larger context of Cleo and Frank’s relationship. Although I wish I could get more context for certain characters and the changes in their lives, it almost felt true to life: sometimes the people you care about extremely deeply will have major life changes that you know almost nothing about, and you don’t get closure. This also felt like it was reflective of how self-absorbed Cleo and Frank were, in that their friends like Quentin and Zoe were going through some significant life changes and crises of their own, but by the end of the book we get little to no information on the outcomes of these events. From a realism standpoint, this was amazing… but from a reader’s standpoint, I definitely felt sad that the most of an ending I could get for my favorite characters was “They hopefully aren’t dead in a ditch.” On the other hand, during each characters’ respective chapter, we got a significant amount of insight into their personal lives with only limited references to the titular characters in a way that felt kind of unnecessary to the plot; sure, I get that pointing out the irony of an overweight culinary master who’s on a pretty strict diet is Fun Social Commentary™ and the fact that Cleo and Frank barely know about this characters’ struggle or reference it during their chapters is reflective of their self-involvement, but like… again, as a reader, part of me feels like these scenes are such unnecessary tangents to the protagonists’ actual character arcs. Most of the changes and “growth” that Cleo and Frank have and go through feel random and unearned, like the novel has to explicitly tell us that they’ve changed because we spent so much time focusing on Anders’s strained relationship with his son.
Relatedly, the dialogue in this book gets kinda silly. I listened to the audiobook so my impressions of certain scenes might be very different than those of a reader of a physical copy, but there were several bits of dialogue that had me rolling my eyes. Chapter 13 is one particularly example of this issue: somehow, the dialogue between Cleo and Frank felt simultaneously too realistic and too forced, like the author couldn’t decide if she wanted to capture what arguments were actually like (including the awkward pauses, the ways people cut each other off) or what arguments felt like (focusing on the inner turmoil of each character between the lines or the minute cues of body language to show how they feel). The characters constantly talked around their issues, which is again, true to life, but unfortunately the nothing-dialogue can lead to some pretty lackluster “big fight” scenes.
There are lots of stereotypes abound in a way that is almost maybe social commentary until you look up the author and see that she is a conventionally attractive cis blonde woman and suddenly you go, “Wow, this is a book that has a lot of transphobia during the narration from a character who is heavily implied if not outright stated to be a trans woman, and while it’s positioned in a way that feels like it’s supposed to be representative of internalized transphobia, this does maybe feel weird in the broader context of this being a book about the relationship between two flawed mostly-heterosexual cisgender people!” Likewise, LOTS of really random comments about race and ethnic stereotypes that feel like they should maybe be satire except that they’re completely unchallenged… or challenged in a way that the book immediately mocks. Maybe there’s an argument that the book as a whole is satirical, and while it does have moments where that feels clear, it often clumsily treads the fine line between making fun of stereotypes and perpetuating those same stereotypes.
Despite everything, though, I was totally wrapped up in this book. I binged the whole audiobook during a knitting-induced frenzy (which resulted in an all-nighter) and still felt so awed by how beautiful certain parts of the prose sounded, especially during Santiago and Eleanor’s chapters, and the philosophical ideas explored during Zoe’s chapters. I became emotionally invested in these somewhat stereotypical characters for an evening, and I truly do feel like there are moments and scenes from this book that will stay with me even now that I’ve finished it.
Overall, this was a pretty standard entry in the subcategory of litfic about beautiful yet waifish blondes who do a lot of drugs in New York and feel miserable about the older men and so-called friends with which they surround themselves. Somehow, the hype is completely understandable and yet overdone in a way that’s to be expected for this type of novel. (There’s always hype around books about sad beautiful women with addictions living in big cities, even if those books are mostly the same.) Despite my many criticisms and the fact that this book isn’t particularly unique in its plot or commentary, I still mostly enjoyed this and would (VERY VERY tentatively and with many caveats and warnings) recommend this to others, if only to discuss some of the things I might take issue with in the book.
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gore, Hate crime, Infidelity, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Xenophobia, Dementia, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Outing, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Dysphoria, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
pauliana93's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Addiction, Animal death, Homophobia, Sexism, and Suicide attempt
mariaminthebooks's review against another edition
- 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
3.5
Stating the obvious, the book flows like a river. The writing's great, descriptions' great yada yada yada...
Finished the book in 3 days. That says enough.
Now, the interesting stuff...
I found the main character insufferable, which is absolutely fine, characters do NOT have to be likeable, but Mellors tried SO hard to make her likeable by mentioning just how likeable she is (how convenient) which made me dislike her even more.
TW//
The book also features PRETTY heavy themes like alcoholism, drug abuse, animal cruelty, su!cide, self-h@rm, and the list goes on....without ever really diving into the complexity and complications of each struggle, thereby making the character's problems seem shallow (they are not!!!)
Along with having like a bazillion unnecessary characters, this, too, was unnecessary. Towards the end of the book, it felt as if Mellors was just throwing in as much trauma as she possibly can for that shocker effect. Unfortunately, that had a counter effect. It made me desensitised to much of the events in the novel.
traumatised characters ≠ unconditional sympathy
I've read books with way fewer events going on but had a much deeper attachment to the characters.
Frustratingly, this could have been such a good book....
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, and Sexual harassment
tom_om's review against another edition
- 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
5.0
Moderate: Alcoholism, Animal death, Drug abuse, Sexism, and Suicide attempt
lidia7's review against another edition
- 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
love the writing style
a lot of TWs, sorry if i forgot some
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, and Alcohol
Moderate: Animal death, Cursing, Infidelity, Blood, Dementia, Grief, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death, Homophobia, Sexism, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Vomit, and Medical content
makeno's review against another edition
- 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
4.25
Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Mental illness, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Blood, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, and Alcohol
dexlud's review against another edition
- 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
5.0
Cleopatra and Frankenstein is a book whose narrative changes as the story goes on. LIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD FOR STRUCTURE -
For people who would like to read this, be warned that there is a lot of drug use and sex throughout this book, and some topics that some people may dislike or be triggered by!
Graphic: Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicide, Terminal illness, Medical content, Dementia, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Cursing, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship
beriboo's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Chronic illness, Cursing, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, and Abandonment
mrs_gale's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.5
I kept waiting to read about the way that Cleo and Frank's relationship actually impacted their friends, but it never did!
It's just a variety of characters that somewhat link to Cleo and Frank, with a bunch of additional characters while mentioning a huge number of topics without exploring them much. The characters don't do much except drink and drugs.
The number of characters is huge, some are only mentioned briefly. I did not care for a single one, not even the main characters. They had no redeeming qualities, just really immature and self-absorbed and not developed well.
Shocked to discover it took 7 years to write! I did not enjoy this book, I cannot recommend it.
Graphic: Mental illness, Self harm, and Suicide attempt
Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, and Alcohol
Minor: Sexism, Transphobia, Grief, and Death of parent