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ajs1906's review against another edition
challenging
dark
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
3.0
I found the book hard to get into at first, but after the first hundred pages I was fully immersed. This book is the embodiment of men being The Worst. Even the men who were not that bad were only that because the bad ones were so horrible. By the end of the book, Sasha has been stripped of all her individuality and interests (reading, studying philosophy, not wanting a child and seeming almost polyamorous in ideals) to nothing other than what she feared being the most, a house wife/stay at home mother. It’s not even that I don’t think being a wife and a mother is a bad thing, it just seems really sad to me that the only real thing she wanted to do with her life was study philosophy and make a career for herself, and almost every single person she meets does their best to squash that instinct in her.
For example, her second husband, Will. He starts of respectful and loving and helped Sasha get out of her horrible marriage to her first husband, Frank. They have a loving, fulfilling relationship, I even think he would have supported Sasha if she wanted to continue her studies at that point. Until Sasha decides to have Will’s baby (because WILL wants one, not her), and suddenly he can’t handle it. Why should he be inconvenienced with having to raise his own child, or to share his wife with someone else. By the end, he couldn’t even put up with Sasha getting a hair cut, let alone being any kind of individual. She’s just a possession to him.
Then there’s the abortion. My god, was I not prepared to read the most graphic and gruesome description of the ending of a pregnancy I’ve ever read. Honestly, the less said about that, the better.
My favourite part of the book was the friendship between Sasha and Roxanne. Neither of them exactly fit the ideals laid out for them and they bonded at University over poetry and not taking anyone’s bullshit. Even when life forced them apart, they still stayed in touch and helped each other through all of the major events in their lives. It’s refreshing to see a relationship based on mutual respect rather than sex, like a lot of the relationships in the book.
I hope that after this story, Sasha would teach her two young girls that they could be whatever they wanted to be, didn’t have to be house wives or mothers if they didn’t want to be, let them be themselves in the way that no one let her when she was young.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abortion and Miscarriage
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