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Book ramblings
Jun. 10th, 2017 03:40 pmTash Hearts Tolstoy by Kathryn Ormsbee
4.5 stars for asexual representation, 2-3 stars for the actual story.
Have I mentioned how rare it is to find a romance with an explicitly asexual character who is sex-repulsed and who does not have to compromise on their sex repulsion in order to be in a romantic relationship? It's really freakin' rare. So I heart this book for having that representation.
That said...I have mixed feelings about this book aside from the asexual rep. Contemporary fiction is generally not my thing (with the standout exceptions of Geekerella by Ashley Poston and All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher). I loved the parts about Tash and her best friend, Jack, shooting their web series (what can I say, I loved The Lizzie Bennet Diaries and Emma Approved) and handling internet fame and haters, while everything else was rather...meh.
Especially the romance.
I'm actually not a fan of Paul—he's a good person, but I never grasped his character very well. And I was disappointed that Thom turned out to be the fake love interest when he was presented as a nice golden boy at the beginning. I mean, yeah, those kinds of people exist, but I'm uncomfortable with love interests who are presented as completely nice, with no red flags, and suddenly become douchebags later. I just...don't need to be paranoid about all of humanity being deceitful terrible people, okay?
The author tried to give Thom red flags, but they utterly failed because they came off as almost totally innocuous. And I'm someone who tends to overreact and overanalyze everything people say, so...yeah.
One last comment, related to the asexual rep: There's one part where Tash says she feels uncomfortable talking about her asexuality when her friend Jay gets harassed for being gay. On the one hand, that's a very relatable feeling (especially for heteroromantic aces), but on the other hand, there was nothing in the book that challenged that thought, which is a problem because the idea of "Oppression Olympics" is extremely unproductive and leads to toxic infighting within communities—which is obvious to see right now on Tumblr, where a vocal minority of people want to kick asexuals and aromantics out of the LGBTQ community for being "not oppressed enough." So I wish someone had challenged that way of thinking.
Mature Content by Megan Erickson and Santino Hassell
Having sort-of enjoyed the previous book in this series (Hard Wired), I thought I'd give this one a shot...only to DNF at around the 75% mark.
I enjoyed seeing the complexities behind Beau's peppy façade, but Zane was a character I could never fully understand. Logically, I get the reasons that led to him developing the "TrashyZane" persona, but emotionally, it's hard for me to comprehend, based on how it was explained in the book.
The reason I DNF'ed, though, was that this book fell into one of my least favorite romantic tropes ever: lack of communication for no compelling reason leads to one character icing the other out, which of course leads to the other character being extremely hurt, cue drama, blah blah blah. I just can't take that trope anymore, especially in genre romance books.
Also, while the book acknowledged that Beau made slut-shamey comments toward Zane, it never acknowledged that Zane's response (making fun of Beau's perceived lack of sex life) was acephobic (+ ableist splash damage), and that was a massive sore spot for me.
The Wrong Woman by Cass Lennox
Okay, so...I haven't actually read this book—I sort of feel like I should, if I want to criticize it, but I don't know if I will, given that I've become leery of this author based on how she handled trauma and mental illness in her previous books (and also her writing has been overall pretty meh for me)—but I just want to say that having the seemingly only mentally ill character (drug addict) be presented as a manipulative abuser is...really not good.
Like...sadly, it's not surprising given this author's previous books, but...yeah, it's not good at all.
4.5 stars for asexual representation, 2-3 stars for the actual story.
Have I mentioned how rare it is to find a romance with an explicitly asexual character who is sex-repulsed and who does not have to compromise on their sex repulsion in order to be in a romantic relationship? It's really freakin' rare. So I heart this book for having that representation.
That said...I have mixed feelings about this book aside from the asexual rep. Contemporary fiction is generally not my thing (with the standout exceptions of Geekerella by Ashley Poston and All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher). I loved the parts about Tash and her best friend, Jack, shooting their web series (what can I say, I loved The Lizzie Bennet Diaries and Emma Approved) and handling internet fame and haters, while everything else was rather...meh.
Especially the romance.
I'm actually not a fan of Paul—he's a good person, but I never grasped his character very well. And I was disappointed that Thom turned out to be the fake love interest when he was presented as a nice golden boy at the beginning. I mean, yeah, those kinds of people exist, but I'm uncomfortable with love interests who are presented as completely nice, with no red flags, and suddenly become douchebags later. I just...don't need to be paranoid about all of humanity being deceitful terrible people, okay?
The author tried to give Thom red flags, but they utterly failed because they came off as almost totally innocuous. And I'm someone who tends to overreact and overanalyze everything people say, so...yeah.
One last comment, related to the asexual rep: There's one part where Tash says she feels uncomfortable talking about her asexuality when her friend Jay gets harassed for being gay. On the one hand, that's a very relatable feeling (especially for heteroromantic aces), but on the other hand, there was nothing in the book that challenged that thought, which is a problem because the idea of "Oppression Olympics" is extremely unproductive and leads to toxic infighting within communities—which is obvious to see right now on Tumblr, where a vocal minority of people want to kick asexuals and aromantics out of the LGBTQ community for being "not oppressed enough." So I wish someone had challenged that way of thinking.
Mature Content by Megan Erickson and Santino Hassell
Having sort-of enjoyed the previous book in this series (Hard Wired), I thought I'd give this one a shot...only to DNF at around the 75% mark.
I enjoyed seeing the complexities behind Beau's peppy façade, but Zane was a character I could never fully understand. Logically, I get the reasons that led to him developing the "TrashyZane" persona, but emotionally, it's hard for me to comprehend, based on how it was explained in the book.
The reason I DNF'ed, though, was that this book fell into one of my least favorite romantic tropes ever: lack of communication for no compelling reason leads to one character icing the other out, which of course leads to the other character being extremely hurt, cue drama, blah blah blah. I just can't take that trope anymore, especially in genre romance books.
Also, while the book acknowledged that Beau made slut-shamey comments toward Zane, it never acknowledged that Zane's response (making fun of Beau's perceived lack of sex life) was acephobic (+ ableist splash damage), and that was a massive sore spot for me.
The Wrong Woman by Cass Lennox
Okay, so...I haven't actually read this book—I sort of feel like I should, if I want to criticize it, but I don't know if I will, given that I've become leery of this author based on how she handled trauma and mental illness in her previous books (and also her writing has been overall pretty meh for me)—but I just want to say that having the seemingly only mentally ill character (drug addict) be presented as a manipulative abuser is...really not good.
Like...sadly, it's not surprising given this author's previous books, but...yeah, it's not good at all.
