I wanted to love this a lot more than I did. A few too many issues make it a soft pick.

Misty is a cam-girl who is sexually assaulted at a house party by three of her supposed friends. The boys‘ mothers close ranks to protect their sons, while Misty has her sort-of stepfather to back her up.

The cam-girl thing could have been really powerful but it wasn‘t. The three mothers were all awful, without a redeeming feature between them.

My biggest issue though was all the POV changes and the sub-plots / vignettes of other local people / bit-part players. Too distracting and I hope it‘s just my digital ARC but there wasn‘t any indication of the change of POV - not even a paragraph break. One sentence ran into another and you had to figure it out for yourself. Sounds like I hated it 😬 but I didn‘t - just needed a bit of tightening up in places. And a better layout in print. 🤞

3.5 stars

Unfortunately, this book was not for me. It may be for you if you’re interested in snappy, fast-paced novels with multiple POVs that deal with the topic of sexual abuse and very unlikeable characters. To be honest, I can’t recall the blurb describing the synopsis as it does now, when I first requested it on Netgalley, because otherwise I would have skipped it altogether (I was under the impression that it was an AI-related novel????? clearly I was wrong).

From page 1, I struggled to become interested in the story. The writing style is primarily what put me off. I like to get thrown in a story with multiple perspectives, but in here I found that neither had a particularly strong or distinctive voice. The point might be for the writing style to be messy, for a lack of better word, but I found it unfinished and boring to read. A lot could have been edited out.

I also enjoy reading from an unlikeable character, but I need to be able to understand why they are the way they are. In The Benefactors, the backstories never really lifted off the page or imprinted in my mind why these people were the way that they were.

The first 40% of the story felt like it didn’t really need to be there for me, I probably would have preferred to get straight into the main act and learnt more about each family along the way, rather than a prelude of “here are all the characters you need to care about, but I won’t give you a reason why until the halfway point.” If you know you’re going in for a 2-act kind of story, this might not be as annoying.

Ultimately this was not the book nor genre I was expecting and as a result it has found the ‘wrong reader’ for it. If I hadn’t been reading an arc, I would have put it down much earlier on. If you like quick, snappy, topical contemporary stories, don’t let my review deter you, as this may be a great read for you.

With thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

Oh dear. I wanted to like this. I really did. The premise? Provocative, timely, socially sharp. Female power, privilege, and a sickening tangle of loyalty and denial? Yes. Conceptually, The Benefactors is loaded. In execution, though, I found myself adrift in a sea of disjointed voices and people I could not, for the life of me, bring myself to care about.

Let’s start with the characters. Frankie, Miriam, Bronagh - three women of wildly different backgrounds who’ve all somehow managed to raise sons accused of the same horrific act. And what do they do? They circle the wagons. They lawyer up. They make excuses. And sure, it’s a clever framing device to explore class, complicity, and maternal blindness, but the problem is this: they’re all vile. Not complex in a morally grey, “ugh I hate how much I love you” kind of way. No. Just brittle, self-serving, and emotionally unreachable. If anyone had a single redeeming quality, it must have been buried somewhere in the excessive tangents and murky prose because I didn’t find it.

I’m all for a bleak, unflinching look at the mess of human nature - but if I’m going to spend 300 pages with a cast of self-obsessed, hollow people, I need something. Insight, maybe. Pathos. A scrap of charm? Instead, what I got felt like trying to bond with a broken espresso machine. Lots of noise, no warmth.

The writing style didn’t help. Fragmented, slippery, almost aggressively evasive at times. I get that Erskine’s known for her short fiction, and that stylistic DNA is all over this novel, except here, it felt jarring. Not artfully elliptical, but erratic. I don’t mind a polyphonic structure or shifting POVs, but here the whole thing just collapsed into narrative static. It was like trying to tune into a dozen radio stations at once and getting mostly static and the occasional mumble about class politics or someone’s deeply unlikeable interior life.

Misty, the girl at the centre of it all, could have been a compelling voice. But even she felt more like a symbol than a person, used to carry a theme rather than inhabit the story. And don’t get me started on the “Benefactors” cam site subplot. It had potential to interrogate power, performance, and survival, but instead it felt half-baked and almost performatively “edgy.”

There’s something grimly ironic about a book so focused on people who refuse to reckon with the truth, while the novel itself refuses to cohere around anything emotionally legible. I don’t need likable characters. But I do need to feel something beyond aesthetic fatigue and low-level irritation.

2 stars, generously. Because the ideas are good. The ambition is there. But the execution left me disappointed. This wasn’t a sharp social commentary so much as a muted, meandering walk through the psychic clutter of people I couldn’t wait to leave behind.

Huge thanks to Hodder & Stoughton | Sceptre & NetGalley for the ARC

wow wow wow are we not ok but a definitely ok from reading this book. and i mean because it just bowled me over. the skill, i cant describe it enough to give it justice. because i just felt that writing skill ooze from the page. it seemed so true, and place and paced that only true talent can pull off.
i was pulled in by the themes of the book. but they arent pushed down your throat. but they are so dam important!
im sure i wasnt the only one being pulled in many overthinking directions over this. as woman especially its a real book that makes you think. you can feel the rawness of it. from the mothers, from the victim. just wow.
the mothers in this book are all from a place of private. and they know it. and they go on to use it when their sons are accused of raping a girl at a party. and guess what "kind" of girl this victim is. well not from their side of the isle shall we say. and one of those you just no judgements would be made. yuk.
we lean in and learn so much about our characters. you feel you could picture them both in tone and looks and personality.
you want to read so much more as each character is given over to you. you definitely wont like some of them. you will definitely be shaking with some of them. and you will definitely be heart hurt too. but in the best way. in the needed way. in the perfect way of this book.
i wont give away how it all plays out. but you will be glad for that. for coming to this fresh makes it all the better. your emotions will be on their edges just like mine were.
i dont know what spell Wendy put me under for this book. but she can do it again any time.

This is a brilliant novel and one that will probably be a bit of a marmite book for readers - the shifting perspectives won't be for everyone and could be frustrating for some readers, but the people who love it will love it. It takes a moment to settle into the novel's shifting perspectives but once you do it's brilliant. Like with her short stories, Wendy Erskine is so skilled at breathing life into her characters and portraying them in complex, nuanced ways. It's a thoughtful exploration of class, community and consent at the hands of an extremely talented writer and for such a serious subject there's lots of wry humour here too.

'The Benefactors' is a highly assured debut novel which offers an absorbing, nuanced and timely exploration of consent. The novel follows the perspectives of Frankie, Bronagh and Miriam, the mothers of three teenage boys who have been accused of sexual assault - as well as of Misty, their victim and her family.

Everything about this incident is complex: Misty's initial sexual encounters with these boys were consensual but then became non-consensual, even though she didn't say "no"; she had allegedly sold drugs to the boys; and, a skilled make-up artist, she has fake bruises when she goes to the police. And while the boys come from respectable families (though with divergent backgrounds and personalities), other factors make Misty less likely to be believed, in particular her 'Benefactors' account (a fictionalised site in which women offer different - generally sexual - online services to paying male customers).

The use of the mothers' perspectives is especially effective - all three want to protect their sons but approach this incident from different angles: Frankie grew up in children's homes but now lives a live of luxury after marrying a wealthy widower; Miriam has recently lost her husband in a car accident and is trying to make sense of the fact that her husband had a young woman in the car with him at the time; and, perhaps most interestingly, Bronagh runs a high-profile charity supporting look-after young people so has to juggle her public support for teenagers like Misty with her desire to exonerate her son.

Erskine uses close third-person perspective to describe different events from the perspectives of the characters most closely connected to this case, but intersperses this with short first-person narratives from other characters - some which relate directly to the main plot (for instance, the police officer who had to examine Misty, or one of Misty's 'Benefactors') and some which are more oblique but which relate to the novel's themes. This adds further depth to this novel which is about much more than sex and consent, as it also explores family, class and money.

I thought this was an outstanding novel which avoids offering easy answers to difficult questions. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an ARC to review.

I loved this book! Really loved weaving between different POVs. Also perfectly scratched The Bee Sting itch for me!

Initially I found it slightly difficult to get into but once I did, I was hooked. The perspectives of the mothers/family members made this a very interesting read as it does not really focus a lot of the men involved but rather the women. The only one criticism that I have is how the novel was structured where random people kept popping in with opinions and experiences but I think that this just may be the NetGalley ARC version. Overall, I really enjoyed it and the slow burn was worth it.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC.

I found this book really difficult to engage with and unnecessarily complicated to read due to sudden changes of character perspective which were really jarring and disjointed.
Unfortunately in the end I didn't care about anyone in the book and it all felt like too much effort for little reward and I'm afraid that, unusually, I didn't finish the book.
Thank you to netgalley and Hodder and Stoughton for an advance copy of this book.

Wendy Erskine’s The Benefactors follows four families in the aftermath of an alleged sexual assault involving three boys and a girl, all in their late teens, in modern-day Belfast. Whilst a lot of the story is seen through the eyes of the mothers of the three boys (three very different women who will do everything in their power to protect their sons), and although we also get a fair amount of the girl’s perspective on the principal events, at heart this truly is a polyphonic novel in its purest form.

Interspersed with the narratives centred around the ten or so main characters - all told in the third person - there are approximately 50 further short chapters written in the first person that combine to offer a broader depiction of the context in which these main events take place, thereby presenting us with a rich, fantastically observed tapestry of contemporary Belfast. Though initially these short chapters might seem slightly jarring (for it’s not clear how, if at all, they fit into the main storyline nor who each of them is being narrated by) I was soon able to stop trying to scour them for clues and instead simply enjoy them almost as pieces of flash fiction or simply little vignettes of city life, often full of the striking images and witty lines that are characteristic of Erskine’s prose.

There is something about the short story form (in which the author largely made her name) that is undeniably present in this novel, and yet the way in which all the different components, perspectives and characters intertwine to form a skilfully constructed whole, plainly suggests the work of an accomplished novelist. Combined with her brilliant characterization, razor-sharp eye for everyday detail, and deft, original treatment of a number of important subjects (motherhood, the class divide, sexual violence, consent), this makes for a highly recommended read which will cement Erskine’s reputation as one of the most interesting voices in Irish fiction today.

The Benefactors by Wendy Erskine will deservedly be the book everyone is talking about when it comes out on 19th June. It's Erskine's first novel but she's the author of two brilliant short story collections, Sweet Home and Dance Move, and this skill as a short story weiter really shines through in this novel which is voiced by a kaleidoscope of characters narrating the assault of a vulnerable girl by the golden boys in their community in Northern Ireland.

It is reminiscent of Donal Ryan or Sheila Armstrong in this chorus of voices, which I think are so suited to great short story writers, but this novel is slightly different in that the book meanders back and forth between different characters, throwing new ones into the mix unexpectedly.

This book deals with a lot of really heavy topics really well, but it also injects such humour, and the specificity of that humour and the particular accents and turns of phrases really grounds the book and the characters in reality so well.

It's a really enjoyable book to read given all the different voices, but a heartbreaking one too. A book about assault is always going to be grim, but it thankfully minimizes the details of that event to just one chapter, but delves into the shockwaves it has on the community in really interesting ways. Even when I wanted to scream at some of the characters they didn't stop being compelling - the mothers of the three young men in particular - and I just think that Erskine has a particular incisiveness, talent, and ear for voice that is so impressive.

I was excited to read Wendy Erskine’s debut novel because I love her short story collections and the premise of the Benefactors sounded *so* intriguing. It didn't disappoint; this novel carries over the mastery of prose, dry sense of humour, and nuance of character that is ever-present in Erskine’s short fiction. An absolute banger of a novel and one I will definitely be recommending.

I hate to say it but I didn't enjoy this book. It felt really disjointed as vignettes of the characters are spliced into the mnarrative with no context or warning and there were a lot of "stereotypes" which made the characters feel not quite real. At the start we are introduced to Misty, a young woman who does cam work for "benefactors", her primary client being an American southern ( fried) good ole boy. Misty goes to a party and alleges she has been sexually assaulted by three young men. The setting is Belfast and the three mothers of the boys, despite being from different social classes, use everything in their power to protect their sons and so battle begins with Misty, who also has strong parents to champion her.

A Greek chorus of contemporary Northern Irish motherhood that reminded me of Megan Abbott’s writing in how it dissects relationships and class structures. Given that I read it after watching Jack Thorne’s drama Adolescence on Netflix, I also found it incredibly timely in the context of UK discussions around boys and the parenting of boys. I loved how the style afforded us insights into multiple perspectives, including perspectives difficult for me to share, like Frankie’s. I’m planning to seek out Erskine’s earlier short story collections now!

In The Benefactors, the lives of three very different women from Belfast are drawn together as their teenage sons are accused of sexual assault. Through their perspectives and the perspective of the victim, and a series of vignettes around characters on the peripheries, we see the lengths family will go to to protect, and seek justice for, their own.

Wendy Erskine is as always a razor sharp writer, capturing situations in an unflinching manner. Here she takes a dark event and draws us in by revealing the backstories of the different characters, giving a sense of humanity to all involved, and through the multiple perspectives showing us the effects not only on the victim and perpetrators but also on all those around them. The many perspectives and voices weighing in throughout this novel seem to reflect this sense of the many viewpoints on a given situation; those looking on knowingly from the inside, those judging rashly from the outside.

As the short alternating chapters of the story unfold, the pieces of the puzzle slowly come together. The build up is slow, revealing to us where the characters are coming from in the choices they end up making. The characters are flawed, many of them unlikable, but as the story develops we understand them better. Miriam was a standout character for me, who I cared for and whose back story I felt invested in. Misty’s father Boogie was another character whose story I really enjoyed following. And yet there is a coolness, an aloofness to the overall tone of the book, offering some distance as we observe the events around the situation, and not providing us with all the answers. At the heart of this story is a nuanced exploration of the relationship between children and their parents, and a look at class divides. Excellent writing as always, and a unique structural approach to telling the story.

The benefactors follows - amongst many other characters - the three mothers of a group of boys who have been involved in a sexual assault, and chronicles the subtle ways in which the assault affects their lives and the way they view their sons. Subtle is key here, this is much more a novel of 'the things left unsaid', than a confronting or highly emotive story, and is probably much more accurate in capturing the nuances of a parents genuine reaction to finding out their child may have committed a sexual assault. I found it fascinating and quite unexpectedly gentle and tender in places, however I also found it incredibly hard to track whose point of view I was reading from as it changed throughout the novel, particularly with the first person narratives where it became very difficult to work out who was talking until the end of their 'chapter'.

Wow, what a book. Love the look at society and social class within the plot. A story and plot that captures your attention and gets your attention.
Everyone will gain something from this book. A most read.

I don’t like to mark this as low stars as there is great potential for a really great story but I struggled with how the plot and characters jumped about, I read this as an e-Arc on NetGalley and maybe it’s the format of the e-arc and perhaps I’m hard copy the character change maybe more distinguishable. We essentially follow the story of Misty who has been sexually assaulted by 3 boys at a party, we also read the perspective of the boys’ mothers however scattered in between are these random pieces of first person narrative which I found so confusing and I couldn’t work out who was speaking. If the story had just stuck to Misty and the mothers it could have been great. I’m also baffled by the title of the book - The Benefactors is essentially “Only Fans” but has very little to do with the plot. If you are going to read this one then read in hard copy!

I liked the plot, theme and original concept of the book but the writing felt too chaotic and hard to follow. Characters switch in a paragraph with no warning and it's often discombobulating to read. There's also a lot of sections that felt too bigged down with minor details.. The book felt too disordered in part and I'd keep having to switch where I was and try to work out who was narrating.

The lives of three Belfast women intertwine - Frankie, a care home kid now living a life of luxury. Miriam, recently widowed and Bronagh a charity worker. Their sons sexually assault a young girl and the crime is attempted to be brushed under the carpet.

There is enough here for a powerful read, but sadly this isn’t it. The first person narrative has been done to death but for my money only Anne Enright can do it with any verve or wit. It’s pitched as a state of the nation novel, but the narrative isn’t clear enough to follow. The writing is too opaque, figurative to actually inform the reader what is going on.

I would also draw attention to the characterisation in the novel. The women - although with ulterior motives - are seen as cold, driven, unhappy. The only real male character in the novel is Boogie (a taxi driver, the mother of Misty, the girl who is sexually assaulted). His depiction is pure poverty porn. Plus Misty does camwork as a sideline and the concept of misogyny, with regard to sex work and male violence is muddied. Misty’s main client is an American. And although we could all throw shade at America, his depiction is pure Southern fried cliche.

It’s a novel of caricature, obscurity and coldness. It’s published by Hodder And Stoughton on June 19th and I thank them for a preview copy. #thebenefactors.