Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

Eight Kinky Nights: An f/f Chanukah romance by Xan West

7 reviews

dominic_t's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative reflective relaxing sad 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

4.75

I really loved this book. The central romance between Leah and Jordan was wonderful, but I also loved seeing both of them develop other close friendships and become part of a chosen family. I loved how central Judaism was in the characters' lives. Jordan singing a blessing after

putting a leash on Leah for the first time

absolutely killed me! Both of the main characters are Autistic, and the author did a great job of portraying the intricacies of their neurodiversity. They wrote a lot about stimming, meltdowns, and masking, and I think they did a really great job of portraying the characters' inner lives.

Sorry to get horny on main, but the sex scenes and kink scenes were super hot. It made for a strange reading experience at the doctor's office. I guess I'm telling on myself here, but I found the portrayal of all the kink stuff to be pretty spot on.

I loved, loved, LOVED Leah exploring her gray ace identity and navigating how she wanted her sex life to change in the wake of her learning about that aspect of herself. The author handled that really beautifully, and it was cool to watch her discover new aspects of her gray ace-ness. 

Trauma comes up a lot in this book, and it was a really nuanced portrayal of how trauma can show up in our lives years after the traumatic event. I thought it was handled really well, and I loved this beautiful quote from Leah: "The wounds I have are deep, and I patched over them as best I could at the time, but the patches I used cut me off from so much possibility. I’ve come to realize that I want to be brave. That I want to try to live into the fullness of myself even though it scares the shit out of me." I really relate to that, and it's a good reminder.

Xan West subverted one convention in romance that I often find annoying:

the third act misunderstanding

. Instead of that trope, the author

centers the third act conflict around Leah healing from her trauma.

I feel like this worked pretty well.

I think my one big criticism is that there are definite GOOD GUYS and BAD GUYS. The bad guys have no redeeming qualities, and the protagonists have no positive memories about them. The good guys (including the protagonists) never do anything really wrong. They inadvertently hurt each other sometimes, but they don't do anything bad. I would have liked to see more nuance, including characters who don't fit neatly within a good character/bad character dichotomy. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Death of parent, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Suicide and Fatphobia

Lots of kink, particularly impact play and a dominant/submissive relationship

kawthar114's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative lighthearted tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual content, Emotional abuse, and Acephobia/Arophobia

Moderate: Grief, Body shaming, Death of parent, Fatphobia, and Ableism

Minor: Sexual violence and Toxic relationship

decie's review against another edition

4.25

as soon as i saw reviewers saying the "excessive explanations" ruined it for them i knew i was going to have a good time. this entire book is autistic as hell. (/pos)
I also really enjoyed learning about kink/bdsm in such a safe and inclusive environment alongside the characters. so many important conversations !!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Emotional abuse, Child abuse, and Self harm

Moderate: Fatphobia, Grief, and Body shaming

Minor: Death of parent

lennie_reads's review against another edition

I'm just not in the headspace for this atm. It's very introspective and has a lot of explanation about a lot of things. It's interesting but the plot is getting lost in all the explanations. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death of parent, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, Chronic illness, and Grief

kaetheluise_nckl's review

emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

• 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

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Body shaming, Eating disorder, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual content, Dysphoria, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Alcohol

jais_pak's review

emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Death of parent, Chronic illness, and Grief

Minor: Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, and Toxic relationship

moatzilla's review

emotional hopeful informative slow-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Death of parent, Fatphobia, Grief, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Ableism, Acephobia/Arophobia, Emotional abuse, and Transphobia