Thiis book was harrowing as it was insightful, It still shocks me that there are women going through this sort of thing every single day. This is a great read for someone who likes to read about strong women and stories of sisterhood in the toughest of times.

I can't with this pdf it's making reading this painfully hard. I'll try it on ebook and see what happens because the premise is still intriguing to me. DNF'D

The download date was unfortunately missed, I would be happy to re-review if it became available again. I have awarded stars for the book cover and description as they both appeal to me. I would be more than happy to re-read and review if a download becomes available. If you would like me to re-review please feel free to contact me at thesecretbookreview@gmail.com or via social media The_secret_bookreview (Instagram) or Secret_bookblog (Twitter). Thank you.

A microcosmic view of being a woman in the 21st century, this book offers is an opportunity to relate, heal, grieve and learn. Chimene and her chain’s experiences are that of you and your friends. These are not new stories to us but offer us a new way to observe them. You find yourself wanting to offer a kindness to Chimene that you’d never offer to yourself and there’s a real beauty in that lesson and an intelligence behind this first-person story of such a global issue.

Whilst slightly repetitive at times, this book has left a lasting impact on me.

“There is a fearlessness in the way women love each other.”

Thank you to Net Galley and Orion Publishing Group for the opportunity to read this book.

I raced through this. Chimene Suleyman's story of one man's deception and abuse of her, and it turns out, countless others, is shown to be part of a much bigger picture of misogyny, racism, collusion and abuse of women hidden in plain sight. The chain of support that Suleyman finds from, and gives to, other women who have encountered this man is the saving grace of this book. There are some grim truths here. The men laughing at misogynistic comedy as male comedians spill their true thoughts on stage; the friends of the abuser who choose to stay friends even after learning the truth; the women who choose to believe the "psycho ex girlfriend" stories rather than face that their new boyfriend may not be the lovely guy he professes to be.

There is a beautiful lyricism to the writing with perfect poems chosen to introduce sections. Chimene Suleyman writes prose like a poet, telling the story so perfectly that it lodges in your mind, describing the dirty snow of a wintry Brooklyn, the huge husky-like dog she sees from the car as she drives to the clinic and thinks of as she fills out the forms. The account of her meeting Jacob, a good while after being abandoned at the abortion clinic, making a connection, relaxing, laughing and drinking in a bar and then realising they had met before. That he was one of those friends of her abuser, who had refused to engage with her, knowing she was one of many, many women, is chilling.

She writes of the intersections of race and gender, of belonging and not belonging. Of being defined as a woman by what she is not. Her thoughts on motherhood and mothering rang so true to me, a woman who has no children: "Motherhood is not binary: the women who want children, and the women who don't. There is a crossover that takes place on both sides, envy on both sides, doubt on both sides" She writes about caring for her friends' children, burying a godson; about teaching poetry to teenagers who don't want to learn, and understanding them, listening to them. She says: "This is not an exercise in self-celebration. What I am telling you is that while I am not a mother, I am not childless". This is the sort of book I could have taken a highlighter to and chosen every passage. I know women will read this book and I really hope men do too and look at their assumptions, their behaviours, their friendships. And while this book is serious and profound it is also incredibly easy to read. It is urgent, it flows and rings so, so true.

A searingly honest, raw and painful account of misogyny and abuse in relationships and the ways society protects and excuses these "complicated" men. It is also a very hopeful tribute to the sisterhood, of how women look out for each other, believe, and stand side by side with each other. The chain is literally the interwoven strength of numbers of women who have experienced this first hand and have not only survived but thrived in the truth after the betrayal.

January 2017, & the author arrives at an abortion clinic in Queens, New York with her boyfriend. He opts to wait in the waiting room but when the appointment is over, he is nowhere to be seen. Arriving home, all his possessions are gone, & then he sends a harsh text abruptly ending their relationship. In the aftermath of this cruel betrayal, the author discovers that she is not the first (or last) that this man has used & discarded - there's a trail of women left bewildered, angry, & down thousands of dollars. In these darkest times, it is friendships with fellow women that help the author to heal & move forward with her life.

Such a personal memoir is difficult to give a rating, as how do you review someone's experiences & feelings? It's obviously written from the heart & the author's pain is evident. It can become a little ranty & meandering at times but given her experiences I understand it. On a wider scale, the author looks at how society is set up to facilitate this kind of behaviour: from friends who are inclined to ignore or condone the behaviour of this type of man, to the double standard that women are socialised into keep giving badly behaved men another chance but when they are hurt & deceived, they are told they should have known better.

I think all women who date men should read this book. There are many (of course not all), far too many men who don't view women as people - the best comparison I've seen (can't remember where I read it unfortunately) is that they view us as NPCs (non-player characters) - there to just facilitate their lives without any inner life or needs of our own. Alongside narcissists & those being 'red-pilled', dating is no longer pleasant for many women. Not that women get away scot free, they can also be misogynistic (aka 'I'm not like other girls') & judgmental towards other women.

The author brings up some really interesting points that I've been thinking about since I finished reading this book yesterday. The main thing I personally took away from this book is that we need to stop viewing ourselves & other women through the male gaze. Such an important point that need reiterating. Overall, honest memoir about a difficult experience, but it can meander a little & become a little repetitive. 4 stars.

My thanks to NetGalley & publishers, Orion Publishing Group/Weidenfeld & Nicolson, for the opportunity to read an ARC.

⛓️ REVIEW ⛓️

The Chain by Chimene Suleyman
Publishing Date: 28th March

Currently struggling to rate this one…

📝 - In January 2017, Chimene Suleyman was on her way to an abortion clinic in Queens, New York with her boyfriend, the father of her nascent child. It was the last day they would spend together. In an extraordinary sequence of events, Chimene was to discover the truth of her boyfriend’s life: that she and many other women had been subtly, patiently and painfully betrayed.

💭 - This is a horrifying and yet somehow unsurprising story. A man, unnamed throughout, is able to manipulate dozens of women, spinning webs of lies about his mental health, his family, his job, and everything else, taking advantage of the caring nature of these women until he leaves them broken. But taken piece by piece, his actions are reflected in many relationships, the casual lying and manipulation unfortunately commonplace. Suleyman takes the reader through her own experience in detail, how she was left a shell of herself after less than a year with this man, and how months later, it was women who helped her rebuild and reclaim her identity. Throughout the book, Suleyman delves into other women’s stories, and also begins to unpick the cultural systems that helped this man continue his tirade against women. However, I did find it sometimes repetitive, and felt that some issues could’ve been unpacked further. It is difficult to rate this as it is a memoir recounting some horrific experiences, and that isn’t for me to judge, but the writing beyond the experience just felt like it didn’t go far enough.
Still one I would recommend, but be aware of content warnings.

#bookreview #bookstagram #readersofinstagram #memoir #netgalley

I didn't intend to read this so fast, I wanted to savour the language, the lyricism. I wanted to sit with the lessons, the recognition, the heartbreak, the rage. But I found that I couldn't stop reading, to remain connected to the chain, to nod along and cry along and laugh sometimes. An honest and spellbinding book,

The Chain is a gripping account of the author's experience of a relationship with an abusive man who discarded her at a time of extreme vulnerability, and her subsequent journey of discovery about the web of toxic relationships he'd ensnared other women into. Once I started reading it I couldn't put it down and read it in two sessions. The author writes beautifully and forcefully about her own experience and the experiences of the women she connected with, about the support those women gave each other in the face of the fallout from the abuse they experienced from this one man, and about the casual and routine misogyny entrenched in Western culture which women face from so many men every day. I'm not a good enough writer to truly convey the power and importance of this book, but I'd recommend that everyone - male and female and of any age - reads it. It must have taken great courage to write and Chimene Suleyman has done society in general and women in particular a huge service in doing so. The more these toxic men have a light shone on their behaviour, the better society will be.

3.5-4 stars

I had been sooooo eager to read this, ever since I first saw it online. And whilst we don't (we do) judge books by their covers, this one really drew me in.

There were some very good bits of this book, and some bits that didn't quite hold my attention.

At times I forgot this wasn't a storybook, because there's some horrifying things in it that you hope are just fictional. But then you remember that the world can be like this and people can be like this, and it's not a nice thought.

I tell you, she really sells New York as a place to live! I've never been someone who dreams of visiting America, but like others, New York has always held a bit of a fancy idea in my head, of Times Square and Broadway. But she's really got to the nitty gritty in this book; the crime, the dirt, the rubbish, the smells, the murders - it all seems simply delightful 😛. But it is a great analogy to what she went through actually.

It is very powerful. She has not held back. Everything - the good, the bad, the ugly, the sad, the loving, the racist, the sexist, the horrific, the unbelievable, and the beautiful - everything is there. She's been raw and honest, and produced something so harsh but good.

I am a white woman living in England. Chimene is a woman of Turkish-Cypriot descent living in the USA. I will never pretend to know what that's like. But she's portrayed such a vivid image that it is impossible not to feel something towards it. You become like the people in the book, like Chimene herself. You can feel what it's like and it's not all positive.

I was worried at first that it might be a bit of a man-bashing book under the guise of feminism. But it couldn't be more different. It's bashing one man in particular who deserves it and a whole lot more, and I hope he gets the chance to read this.

My two negatives, if you can call them negatives, are as thus. Firstly, there is a lot of what I would call, poetic language. Where instead of a sentence being written in a way that you or I would say it, it's; been written in a way that looks good on the page. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing if it was only now and again, but it's like she's tried to make every sentence a standalone shocking one and it jars a little.

And also I found it a bit repetitive. The first quarter, say, was really good, but I did wonder what she would be filling the rest of the book with. I think it might have been stronger with a smaller page count, 100-200 maybe. I know all the stories in the book from these women are worth hearing about and I'll never back down from that, but I think if you're going to fill your book with these stories, there needs to be some kind of order, and things need to be condensed, otherwise it becomes a bit too long and samey.

On the whole, it's not the most cheerful or uplifting book, but it does show how important sisterhood is, even between strangers.