Reviews tagging 'Racial slurs'

American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins

8 reviews

ngoodenb's review against another edition

challenging emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Blood, Police brutality, Grief, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Classism, and Deportation

Minor: Violence, Trafficking, Stalking, and War

jenniferbbookdragon's review against another edition

challenging emotional tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

Lydia and her son Luca are the heart of this story of love, loss, and the brutal reality of drug cartel violence in Mexico. By centering a middle class family,  Cummins makes it clear no one is safe when a community is taken over and draws the stark contrast between their previous lives and their new ones traveling to the United States border alongside other migrants. The journey is more harrowing than most of us are aware of, and we get to know other stories through the people they meet along the way. 
A heart-pounding look at the fact that the people anxious to cross the border are individuals with complex histories,  not a mob of faceless "invaders" as some political leaders have claimed. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Bullying, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Suicidal thoughts, Kidnapping, Stalking, Sexual harassment, and Deportation

beetandbaguette's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring tense fast-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? No

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Police brutality, Medical content, Trafficking, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Deportation

escaping_america's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative sad tense 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

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Child death, Death, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Deportation

lauravreads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

1.0

When I first read this book, I came into it blind. I had no idea what it was about and just seemed like an interesting cover. I read via audiobook in Spanish. The narrator was phenomenal, which made a massive difference in how I perceived the story. While listening I really enjoyed the story, it felt very thriller-esk. I was intrigued the whole time and rooting for main characters the whole time. 

My original rating was 5/5 as I was very engrossed in the novel and enjoyed it at the time. However upon reading more about the Author and the inaccuracies depicted in this book, I bumped it down to 1/5. There area a lot of harmful stereotypes within this book. The author is also a White woman (her grandmother is Puerto Rican but she was never in touch with that culture). It is so important for white authors not to appropriate others cultures. This is seen in so many novels when the MC is a person of color but written by a white person. This is super problematic as it takes away from more authentic stories written by people who are actually sharing their culture. I feel that it could have been appropriate for Cummins to write about the Puerto Rican plight and have her grandmother be a source for the novel. However, she chose to write about something’s that she is completely removed from. 

My family immigrated to the States from Colombia in 2001, I was just 5 years old. While I still hold a lot of my heritage  and culture, I am still a product of the American school system. I speak Spanish conversationally and have no difficulty understanding (aside from certain dialects having different words). Most of my knowledge of Mexican Culture comes from my high school best friend whose Parents immigrated to the States while they were pregnant with my friend. 

While listening to this book, I took it as a work of fiction and was (and still am) very uneducated regarding the cartel in Mexico. Since I listened to this book in Spanish I did not experience any of the inaccuracies that have been brought up in other reviews. 
 
I want to thank David Bowles for his review on Goodreads to educate those who are interested in this book.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual assault, Violence, Police brutality, Stalking, Abortion, Pregnancy, and Sexual harassment

twin1's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful medium-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? It's complicated

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Racism, and Murder

Moderate: Racial slurs, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, and Sexual harassment

beccadamb's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious sad tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Police brutality, Trafficking, Grief, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Cultural appropriation, and Sexual harassment

domtheknight's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

I feel that I can't rate this book because I'm extremely conflicted about many things.  I read it because someone picked it for a book club I'm in; otherwise I would not have picked it up based on description.  If I hadn't felt that I should finish it in order to participate in book club, I would have put it down almost immediately, and at many additional times throughout the story.  This book was not for me.

As for whether it's for anybody... from a technical writing standpoint, like in terms of making good sentences with words that sound and feel a certain way, Jeanne Cummins has skills.  It's bare and factual for the most part, but every paragraph is screaming in grief, underneath.  Grief, and horror and desperation.  It's creepy in that way, and sometimes that's good and what is right for the story.  But given the subject matter and the author, it honestly crossed the "violence for violence sake and not to further the story" line many times.  

The point of this story, having sat on this review overnight, seemed to be everything that can go wrong will be more awful than you can imagine.  I don't know why you tell that story.  There's no character growth.  Is the point to generate sympathy for immigrants?  Is the point to just be horror?  I think there's too much grief to be horror, but it's not really a grief book either.  It didn't feel like a horror book and it wasn't marketed as horror, but that's the ultimate end story I get from it.  I never cried, I just felt numb.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Gun violence, Infertility, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Trafficking, Grief, and Mass/school shootings

I'm not sure I got all the warnings. This book is very dark and fairly graphic about it, the plot is that a woman sees 16 members of her family shot (this is in the first couple paragraphs), manages to save her son, and then must run. They are in Mexico, they take various migrant paths, with some migrants coming from further south countries. There are gangs and violence and Lydia basically decides they need to go to the USA fairly early on and the rest of the story is whether or not they make it, plus some details about situations their fellow migrants are running from. In some cases the details left off the page felt worse than what was on the page.