Cover Image: The Girl at the Door

The Girl at the Door

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Member Reviews

“The Girl At The Door” totally missed the mark for me. It felt as though there wasn't enough backstory provided to set the scene so I mostly hadn't a clue what was going on.

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Oh god.
I was so fucking uncomfortable reading this book. It's shock for shock sakes. Very casually, someone talks about being beaten and slapped around during sex, as well a some dubious consent situations. The whole novel explores a professor (who is an asshole- kudos to the author for getting the perfect voice for 'entitled-pretentious-white-dude-who-teaches-philosophy tone right) who has been accused of rape.. It also takes place in a post-event society where everyone has moved from civilisation to utopia. There's a lot happening here and not enough pages or chapter length to explore it. In fact, the story seems to happen for a few pages, then take a break to be smart, then come back to the story. Perhaps there's something to be said for meaning getting lost in translation or maybe I'm just not intelligent enough but...I didn't get this book. I didn't find it hard-hitting or gripping. It tried on a difficult topic for size and it didn't fit.

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I am very unsure of The a girl at the Door and will leave a full review soon. Not a bad book but not a great, I’m letting it sink in.
Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for an arc copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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I was drawn in by the seemingly topical subject matter of the novel, but I'm afraid to say I hated the way it was written. The sexism is over-the-top and extremely off-putting, and honestly I can't imagine who would want to read this. Sorry to be so negative but there was nothing I liked about the book.

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This book is set in Miden, a society constructed after something called the Crash. It is run by Commissions, you need to be accepted in to live there, it is a place where positivity is enforced and you even need permission for people to visit.

It's told from the perspective of Him (the professor) and Her (the professor's six month pregnant girlfriend) - we don't learn any names throughout. One day, 'The Girl' tells the pregnant girlfriend that her professor raped her a couple of years back.

The story follows life for the two of them in Miden, after moving from their country, as well as the Commission having to basically decide whether or not he is guilty by having his friends and peers fill out questionnaires about his character.

The writing style, I didn't gel with, and a lot of it confused me. The information about Miden was peppered into each chapter and I think I would have preferred a proper bulk background of the commune at the beginning.

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I didn’t like the writing in this book it made no sense. I had to stop reading sorry. I had to keep re reading parts and eventually I stopped as it was confusing and odd

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A young woman living with her boyfriend/partner a relatively new relationship that has this young woman 6 months pregnant .Pregnant resting on the couch a knock on the door a young girl is there a young girl who tells her the man she lives with had raped her he was her professor they had a relationship and she know realizes he had sexually molested her,
This chilling novel takes place in an idyllic community told through the accused point of view the girlfriends different voices .This is a chilling haunting raw novel not a comfortable read at times but a book that will involve ans shock you.An unusual compelling thought provoking novel.

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I found this opaque and enigmatic, not always in a good way. A young woman turns up unexpectedly and tells the female narrator that she'd been raped by the narrator's boyfriend... only she didn't know it at the time. We think we're in a story about non-consent but we're not really. Turns out that we're in this constructed society called Miden after the Crash outside: both the narrator and her boyfriend (also a narrator, both unnamed, turn-about speakers) have come here from outside and the story really turns on a sort of bureaucracy of investigation.

It's hard to put a finger on what's going on and what the book is about. The boyfriend is obnoxious with his sexist talk reducing women to body parts. Miden seems to be a kind of new world built on objectivity where people suppress their subjective feelings: such as the founder of the colony (?) who also just happens to be the father of the raped girl.

The whole thing is shaped like the myth of the garden of Eden, but inverted. In equal measures I found this interesting and frustrating. Perhaps one for your Philosophy student friends.

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