beth’s Reviews > The People in the Trees > Status Update

It's so interesting to me that people have distorted cultural relativism to mean "things are culturally specific and such things that would be deemed abuse in our culture is not elsewhere", rather than simply a (correct) observation that cultural practices, ideas, etc, are products of their environment/local conditions. Defending every cultural practice as benign is to identify with the ruling class of that society.

Every time I think he's saying something that can't get any worse, Yanagihara says "Wait, what if I had him add some misogyny on top? For a bit of extra flavour."

the power these men (and a woman with them) have over this woman they've encountered is insane. nightmare fuel

I would have arrested this man before he had the opportunity to abuse anyone simply for thinking about women this way

I definitely like this more than A Little Life so far. I guess the subject matter is more interesting to me. I think her writing style works very well in the hands of an awful narrator.

'And in that moment I promised myself two things: first, that I would hate Esme Duff, and second, that within a few months it would be I, not Esme, whom Tallent would consider the expert.'

his obvious misogyny too... truly awful unreliable narrators are so interesting to read