Literature / Domestic Abuse

Examples of Domestic Abuse in Literature.

A short story dealt with a man who was a painter and was married to a woman who constantly verbally abused him, constantly belittling and insulting him. It ends with it being revealed that he has the power to trap anything he paints into the painting — and he has begun to paint his wife's picture.
Acid Row:
- Franek was physically, sexually and emotionally abusive towards Milosz' mother; when she eventually couldn't take it anymore and ran off, Franek insists she abandoned him and their son. Sophie later realises based on some comments Franek makes that he probably murdered his wife in retaliation for her trying to leave him.
- Laura Biddulph's ex-husband Martin wasn't physically abusive as far as anyone can tell, but he was emotionally abusive, being extremely controlling and manipulative towards her and trying to alienate their daughter from her out of spite (Martin never wanted to have a child, so he's mostly doing it to punish Laura for keeping the pregnancy). Their relationship also came off as predatory, given Laura is significantly younger than her ex and quite naive, which Martin knowingly took full advantage of to make her dependent on him.
In The Anderssons by Solveig Olsson-Hultgren, Mandi ends up in an abusive marriage with Rutger Stjärnstedt, which she can only escape by signing herself into a mental asylum (and later on, she decides to commit suicide). And when her daughter Louise gets a Jewish boyfriend, she too is abused by Rutger.
Occurs several times in the Beka Cooper trilogy of the Tortall Universe. Child Beka got her first taste of policing when she tracked down her mother's latest boyfriend, who beat and then robbed her. During her time as a trainee guardswoman^notei.e. a cop she witnesses Yates Noll beating his sister Gemma. Beka also arrests a woman who was threatening her husband and kids with a knife; in court, multiple witnesses testify that she beat them regularly. It's treated very seriously, an aversion of Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male.
Big Little Lies: In both the book and the miniseries, Perry Wright/White is a Wolf in Sheep's Clothing with wife Celeste. From the outside looking in, they have the perfect marriage, perfect family, and the fact that their sex life is so passionate is the envy of many characters. However, even those who've known them for years are unaware of this, the only exception being Celeste's therapist who first brought this up to her in private. The abuse gets gradually worse and worse, but that passionate sex life everyone is jealous of? Is the result of it.
In Anna Quindlen's novel Black and Blue, Fran is physically, emotionally, and sexually abused by her husband for years. Unable to go to the police for help, given that her husband is a police officer, she flees along with her son and attempts to hide from him by getting herself and her son fake identities. It doesn't work.
In the world of A Brother's Price men are so rare that many gender roles are reversed. It's commonly known that some wives abuse their husbands, but it's not a flat subversion of Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male; there is one very high profile case where a man took advantage of his older wives' infatuation with him in order to abuse his younger wives without consequences.
Brown Girl in the Ring: Rudy is depicted to have hit his wife, Gros-Jeanne.
The Cat Who... Series: In book #20 (The Cat Who Sang for the Birds), this results in the death of the second victim, who fled to escape it, along with evidence that her boyfriend was up to something else dirty. But when she returned to retrieve her personal belongings, he was waiting there and killed her.
Chocoholic Mysteries:
- Emotionally controlling version in the form of Richard Godfrey, Lee's ex-husband. Among other things, he actively tried to obstruct her efforts to get a degree and was furious when she not only succeeded, she made the dean's list in the process; in Cat Caper, when he finds out she's in some trouble in Warner Pier, he tries to worm his way back into her life via paying her legal bills, but she recognizes this as another attempt to control her and rejects him again. Bear Burglary reveals that he was actually shocked out of his previous behavior by her blow-up at him, and changes for the better as a result.
- In Bear Burglary, Nettie mentions a former employee of hers who ultimately had to move all the way across the country to get away from an abusive husband.
- Snowman Murders reveals that Nettie, along with Sarajane Harding and George Jenkins, is involved in a sort of Underground Railroad that helps battered women escape from worst-case situations of this.
Mary Higgins Clark:
- In A Cry in the Night, Erich's behavior towards Jenny after they're married is textbook emotional/psychological abuse. He's not blatantly cruel to her but he's incredibly manipulative and controlling, and uses passive aggressive tactics to undermine her confidence or make her doubt herself. It escalates to physical violence in the climax, with Erich attempting to murder Jenny after his deceptions are unravelled.
- Daddy's Little Girl: It's all but stated outright that Rob was an abusive boyfriend towards Andrea even before he was arrested for beating her to death. He encouraged her to lie to and keep secrets from her family and friends when it came to him (especially as Andrea's father disapproved of Rob), and was jealous and controlling. The last time Ellie saw Andrea alive, she was in tears after a hostile phone call from Rob (prompted by Andrea having platonically agreed to go to a dance with another boy so her parents wouldn't find out she was still seeing Rob) and agreed to sneak out to meet him; Ellie says she was clearly frightened of Rob's temper and didn't dare refuse him. Given it's confirmed Rob beat her to death with a tyre iron, she was right to be terrified. The fact Andrea was just fifteen while Rob was nineteen also raised eyebrows, with Ellie and her father being convinced Rob took advantage of Andrea's young age.
- In I Heard That Song Before, it's strongly implied that Gary Barr is abusive towards his wife, Jane. He is subtly controlling of her and she appears to feel intimidated by him; at one point, he shouts at her and throws a sandwich at her face when she brings up her concerns about something. It's revealed in the epilogue that she has divorced him.
- On the Street Where You Live:
  - When Natalie threatens to tell the police she suspects Bob of being the killer if he doesn't cough up enough cash in a divorce settlement, Bob grabs her arm hard enough that it's left bruised and swollen, and aggressively states that she should be more worried about herself. Natalie later confides in Will she's now genuinely afraid of her husband and what he might do to her. When Natalie is murdered, Bob becomes the number one suspect after admitting they'd argued and even he can't be certain he didn't do it because of his black-outs (he didn't).
  - The police and Emily speculate that Richard intentionally upped his first wife's laudanum doses and lied to her about things she'd seen or heard to hide his crimes from her.
- In Where Are the Children?, Nancy's first husband Carl psychologically, sexually and possibly physically abused her; he took advantage of her youth, naivety and grief for her parents to manipulate her into marrying him, isolated her from anyone who could've helped her free herself from his influence, and made her believe she was "sick" and needed to rely solely on him. He would get angry and threaten her if she did anything to defy him. Nancy recalls disliking their twisted sexual encounters but feeling too afraid and guilty to stand up to Carl about it. He also drugged her under the guise of providing her medication to make her more compliant.
- While My Pretty One Sleeps:
  - Seamus admits to attacking and threatening his ex-wife over alimony payments, and he soon becomes a prime suspect in her murder. He comes close to hitting his current wife Ruth during an argument and makes threatening remarks towards her as well. Seamus isn't usually a violent man and is shocked at his behaviour, with the immense amounts of stress he's under driving him over the edge.
  - When Seamus says he thinks they should keep paying Ethel alimony, Ruth loses it and slaps her husband hard across the face. She's shocked at herself and apologises immediately, though she still has a tendency to berate and insult Seamus over his failure to resolve their money issues. She later laments that the stress is turning her into a "shrew".
The Cold Moons: Eldon's wife Scylla dislikes angering him for fear of being chastised and either bitten by him or cuffed by his heavy paws. Due to Deliberate Values Dissonance, the other badgers don't see this as abusive and the narrative doesn't depict it as negative. Eldon does care for his wife to a degree but the two only ended up together because it was expected from them, not because of actual affection.
This is a reoccurring theme in The Color Purple. Domestic abuse is seen as the norm in Celie's family. Celie, in jealousy, even encourages her ex-husband to beat up his new girlfriend. He gets beat up the first time, which results in a cycle of abuse.
A Court of Thorns and Roses: This is suggested to occur behind closed doors between Beron and Lucien's mom.
In Daystar and Shadow, Robin's father hits his mother for disobeying or arguing with him.
A Deal with a Demon: The heroine of the first book, Briar Rose has an abusive husband who would beat her. She actually makes a deal with Azazel to kill him, as she knows he's escalating and will get her first if she doesn't do anything.
In Kerry Greenwood's Death Before Wicket, Dolly Hart was frequently beaten up by her husband and sometimes put out on the street after a fight. The last time that happened, she left him and became a prostitute. She says that she didn't have to do anything for the money that he hadn't done to her, and by force.
Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern: In the first novel, Dragonflight, F'lar and Lessa are effectively in an Arranged Marriage once their dragons pair off; their first sexual encounter, triggered by the dragons, was rougher than it should have been as a result. (F'lar, not being stupid, realized that this had driven a wedge between them but couldn't fix it.) He shakes her very hard sometimes when she frightens him. This shaking is not when she is deliberately scaring him, but typically is when he is frightened for her.
The Dresden Files:
- Storm Front: Harry's client turns out to be a victim. Her husband is a warlock with a drive to get more and more power. The client sought Harry when she caught her husband looking at their children not with love, but as tools and ingredients to his next projects.
- Harry is a victim of this too. He is abused by his guardian Justin Dumorne by him trying to enthrall Harry (magically strip him of his free will).
Miranda's relationship with her much-older boyfriend in Eighteen Days To Graduation counts. He mocks her and makes her feel completely worthless. Luckily, she breaks up with him at the end.
Earth's Children:
- Iza's mate, whom she had no choice in marrying, was a cruel and insecure man who often beat her, particularly because he was envious of her status as a medicine woman. He was so horrible to her that Iza's brother Brun - their clan's leader - seriously considered dissolving their marriage, though ultimately he died in an earthquake; no one mourns him.
- Broud becomes increasingly physically and verbally abusive towards his mate Oga over time; he insults and talks down to her, hits her, tries to control who she can be friends with, and blows up on her if she does the slightest thing to set him off or tries to stand up to him. While the Clan do approve of using corporal punishment for wrong-doing, even by their standards Broud is excessively and unjustly violent towards Oga, with Brun intervening at one point.
- Brugar was very abusive towards his mate Attaroa, beating her, deliberately provoking arguments and possibly raping her. He even used their own child against her, trying to emotionally alienate Omel from Attaroa just to hurt her. He also encouraged the other men in his camp to use violence and threats to 'punish' and control women. It's widely believed Attaroa was behind Brugar's sudden illness and death; few people judge her for that specifically, but unfortunately Attaroa goes on to become an abusive tyrant herself.
Eleanor & Park: Eleanor’s stepfather Richie yells at, throws things, and hits her mother Sabrina frequently. Eleanor usually finds herself comforting her siblings regularly when their fights break out when they're not sleeping through the noise.
Forbidden Sea: Shadow in the Sea has former Alpha Bitch Cora as an adult married to the bully Marcus Stebbs, now a poor fisherman who beats her. Cora blames Adrianne for her awful life because Adrianne "stole" Cora's previous love from her.
The Great Divorce depicts two not-very-good spouses in Hell. Robert's wife is a control freak who forced him into what she considered success, and Frank Smith emotionally manipulated his wife Sarah using pity. Both of them try their shtick with the Bright Ones, but it doesn't work.
The Great Gatsby: Tom is possessive and verbally abusive towards his wife Daisy, and he's verbally and physically abusive towards his mistress Mrs. Wilson.
In the O. Henry story A Harlem Tragedy, Mrs. Cassidy makes light of her husband's sporadic abuse because she knows he'll spend the rest of the week trying to make up for it. In a case of Values Dissonance, this actually makes her friend jealous. In Real Life, using the other partner's physical violence as a means of manipulation is unfortunately not unknown. One woman observed later that her part in her abusive marriage was a sick power game.
It's heavily implied in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix that Snape's father was at the very least verbally abusive and likely physically abusive as well to Snape's mother, and that this was a large contributing factor in his anti-Muggle attitudes in his younger years.
Haze: At night, Guzzle listens to his stepdad Angus beat his mum, who won't leave him because she "loves" him. Sometimes the noise keeps Guzzle up so late that he can't concentrate in school the next day.
In Hurog, the protagonist's father is known to have been violent against his wife, as well as their children. It is hinted that, when she began to take mind-altering herbs, he didn't "come to her bed as often", which encouraged her to continue the drug abuse.
Patch's interactions with Nora in Hush, Hush are almost directly lifted from the Abuser's Handbook. He stalks her, he mocks her, he enjoys making her uncomfortable, he humiliates her in front of her Biology class, he repeatedly forces her to engage in activities she's not comfortable doing (riding a wild roller coaster, accepting a lift on his motorcycle, etc), corners her in dark, abandoned places, tells her things like "A guy like me could take advantage of a girl like you", lures her into a motel room, pins her on a bed and kisses her while she screams in protest, etc. We later find out that he had every intention of murdering her at several points in the story. None of this is portrayed as less than romantic.
The Inheritance Games: Drake is Libby's on-again-off-again boyfriend who only just stayed on this line of being physically abusive at the start of the story. When he finds out Libby's ward/sister Avery inherited billions he, in this order: acts like an Entitled Bastard making plans to spend the fortune, hits Libby when she explains the money is not theirs i.e. his to spend, then goes to the press and implies Avery had an inappropriate relationship with Tobias Hawthorne. Then there's the matter of him trying to kill Avery (twice) on Skye Hawthorne's orders for money, only to be caught, arrested, and tries to pin the blame on Libby. Luckily plenty of evidence, including his own felony record, easily disproves this.
Stephen King:
- In the novel Dolores Claiborne, the title character is physically abused by her husband. She first accepts this because she grew up in a rural community in the '30s when this was socially acceptable, but she eventually decides to stand up to him, and she eventually kills him when she learns that he's trying to make moves on their eldest daughter.
- Another novel by King, Rose Madder, deals with the protagonist, Rosie, escaping from her abusive husband, Norman, who brutally beat her many times, including when she was pregnant, causing her to miscarry.
- Carrie, also by Stephen King. It's implied that one reason Carrie's mother is so messed up is that her husband abused and raped her.
- Beverly from the Losers Club in IT has to get away from a husband who beats her so regularly that he has a belt reserved for it.
- The novel Insomnia also had domestic abuse play a part, although this time it's at least partially because malignant spiritual forces have driven the husband insane so they can use him as a tool to kill a young boy with an important role to play later in life.
In Lois McMaster Bujold's Komarr, the best Ekaterin can say about her husband is "he never beat me". His behavior—including belittling her constantly, turning anything she says that can possibly be interpreted as criticism into an attack on her by calling her "selfish", and wall-punching tantrums—is severe emotional abuse.
Mercedes Lackey's works:
- In Burning Water, there's a scene where a patrol cop is telling the waitress at a diner (who volunteers at a domestic abuse support group) about recent domestic violence cases he's responded to so that she can contact the victims and get them help before things get out of hand.
- In Steadfast, dancer and acrobat Katie Langford runs away from the circus she works at to escape her abusive and brutish husband Dick, the circus strongman.
An emotional version of this happens in Leaving Poppy, as the titular Poppy controls her mother and sister's lives with her tantrums and aggression, throwing fits, and guilt-tripping when she doesn't have her way.
The Love and Lies of Rukhsana Ali: Rukhsana finds out that her grandmother suffered frequent beatings and once a burned hand by her mother-in-law or husband.
Peta Lyre's Rating Normal: Peta's dad used to beat his mom, until a few years ago when the neighbors called the cops. She refused to press charges, but the incident apparently spooked him enough that he never beats his wife anymore, only his kids.
Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth: Alfred beats Aliena, crossing the Moral Event Horizon in the process.
Beatrice from Purple Hibiscus loses at least two children because her husband beats her. Eventually, she's driven to murder.
Sybil Jester's husband in Fiona Buckley's Queen Of Ambition. Thanks to Deliberate Values Dissonance (it is the late sixteenth century, after all), Sybil (who ran away and got work as a companion) is sacked when her employer finds out that she ran away from her husband.
In Queen of the Tearling, Andalie's husband abuses her and the children. She walks away from him, taking her children, when she's given the opportunity, but still protects him. She hints that she just suffers from irrational love, but since she also has some supernatural abilities, it is not clear in the first book whether she knows of some role her husband has yet to play. There's also Kelsea's uncle, who insists that he never beat any of his female slaves ... except the one he keeps on a leash like a dog. It is very clear that he is abusive, though perhaps not often physically so.
Sara's first foster-father in Relativity. He never directly abused her or her sister but did beat and eventually killed her foster mother.
Ravensong:
- Polly's father beats her mother.
- Jake, the "old snake" beats his wife.
In The Red Tent, Laban beats the ever-living crap out of his second wife, Ruti. It gets so bad that she eventually kills herself.
The Reluctant King: Vanora tells Jorian her lover Boso hits her sometimes, though she says it's partly her fault as she deliberately provokes him. Jorian sympathizes with Boso since she also provoked him (this all just seems pretty... unfortunate now).
The film version of Revenge of the Sith has Anakin, at the end, choking his wife, and prior to that there were hints of emotional abuse due to his possessiveness and deception of her. The Novelization by Matt Stover gives the abuse more build-up. Throughout the novel, they're happy to see each other and in love... but when they first meet and Padme tries to tell him she's pregnant, he instantly assumes she has a lover and grabs her hard enough to hurt her. Over the course of the novel, she repeatedly tells him he's scaring her, and this starts mattering to him less and less. He even once looks down at her and thinks that he likes it when she's afraid. Any time she talks about the war or the Senate, he turns on her — doesn't she understand that she should only talk about them and the baby? — and he starts to resent her job and all that time she spends at it away from him, maybe traitorous time. For her part, Padme is largely in denial over this side of him but realizes at one point that there is one Jedi she does trust... and it's not him. The realization horrifies her, at least in part because if Anakin knew, he wouldn't be happy with her.
In Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London (known as Midnight Riot in the US, getting a warrant for a ghost who murdered his wife and child is complicated by the ghostly magistrate asking whether the woman was a shrew because no man hits his wife without reason. The quick-thinking narrator tells him that she was a terrible shrew but the baby was innocent, which gets the warrant.
Sherlock Holmes prefers the city to the countryside because this is more easily revealed.
There is no lane so vile that the scream of a tortured child, or the thud of a drunkard's blow, does not beget sympathy and indignation among the neighbours, and then the whole machinery of justice is ever so close that a word of complaint can set it going, and there is but a step between the crime and the dock. But look at these lonely houses, each in its own fields, filled for the most part with poor ignorant folk who know little of the law. Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser.
The Silerian Trilogy: Ronall is a terrible husband to Elelar, beating or raping her multiple times when he's not cheating with other women. Unsurprisingly, she prefers he do that and ignore her most of the time.
A Song of Ice and Fire:
- The marriage of King Robert Baratheon and Cersei Lannister is a particularly hellish and complicated case. Robert overthrew the previous dynasty when its crown prince, Rhaegar, kidnapped (or perhaps secretly eloped with) his beloved fiancée Lyanna. Meanwhile, Cersei had her heart set on Rhaegar. Robert killed Rhaegar in battle and won the crown, but Lyanna died during the war. To ensure the loyalty of her powerful noble family, Robert married Cersei. As you might expect, the marriage of two strangers, one of whom is mourning his true love while the other is resentful of both the fact that her new husband killed her crush and that she had no say in the marriage doesn't go well. When the books start about 15 years into their marriage, they're both regularly cheating on the other, Cersei is a sociopath who verbally abuses Robert at every turn and threatens the lives of his bastard children, and Boisterous Bruiser Robert doesn't know any way to respond to Cersei except by either drinking himself unconscious or hitting her. (Robert fully and regretfully admits afterward that being physically abusive isn't right, but he honestly has no clue on other ways to deal with Cersei.) He also used to extort to his Marital Rape License once in a while in the early days of their marriage when he was drunk and pretended that 'it was all wine and he doesn't remember it anyway' in the mornings after. (Cersei recalls, however, Robert acting somewhat smug the morning after and suspects he was satisfied he'd ensured his dominance over her and was aware of what he was doing.) The happy marriage ends with Robert dying in a Hunting "Accident" that Cersei and a co-conspirator helped along by getting Robert enormously drunk right before he tried facing off with a wild boar.
- And that is nothing compared to the abuse of his predecessor King Aerys, who would not only verbally abuse his wife on a regular basis but would violently rape her whenever he was done burning people alive.
- There's also Ramsay Bolton and Gregor Clegane, both of whom are widowers. Guess who killed their wives. Go on, guess.
- Ramsay's father, Roose Bolton, could be one. He has been married twice already, and both women have died. Given the reputation of House Bolton's cruelty and Roose Bolton being nowhere as open about it as Ramsay is, it is possible and might not even have been completely physical. However, bizarrely, he is fond of his third wife, Fat Walda Frey. Apparently, he enjoys how she shudders and moans...
- Joffrey Baratheon had all the hallmarks of becoming one. His treatment of Sansa Stark, a girl he was betrothed to, starts getting bad when he kills her father right in front of her and forces her to look at his mounted head. He has his Kingsguard beat her whenever her brother scores a victory against his grandfather's forces in a war he started, going so far as to have her stripped naked and beaten before the entire court at one point. Fear of this trope coming to pass is what drove Olenna Tyrell to help kill Joffrey on the day he marries her granddaughter Margaery. Olenna also feared that Margaery's brother Loras, who is known for being close with/protective of Margaery and had recently become part of Joffrey's Kingsguard, was almost guaranteed to try to kill Joffrey if Joffrey mistreated Margaery, and would do so openly, which would lead to disastrous consequences for both the realm and House Tyrell. As a result, she decided to preempt Loras by doing the deed first, and in a much more subtle manner.
In Gene Stratton-Porter's The Song of the Cardinal, the woodpeckers.
the woodpecker had dressed his suit in finest style, and with dulcet tones and melting tenderness had gone acourting. Sweet as the dove's had been his wooing, and one more pang the lonely Cardinal had suffered at being forced to witness his felicity; yet scarcely had his plump, amiable little mate consented to his caresses and approved the sycamore, before he turned on her, pecked her severely, and pulled a tuft of plumage from her breast. There was not the least excuse for this tyrannical action; and the sight filled the Cardinal with rage. He fully expected to see Madam Woodpecker divorce herself and flee her new home, and he most earnestly hoped that she would; but she did no such thing. She meekly flattened her feathers, hurried work in a lively manner, and tried in every way to anticipate and avert her mate's displeasure. Under this treatment he grew more abusive, and now Madam Woodpecker dodged every time she came within his reach
The Storm (Arav Dagli): The husband has beaten his wife, as well as neglected her and given her gifts to "make up for his mistakes" many times. She's sick of it, but she's more sick of herself for continuing to love him regardless.
The Stormlight Archive:
- Shallan's father, which gets explored in Words of Radiance, was physically and emotionally abusive to everyone in his household but Shallan, and left all of his children with varying degrees of psychological trauma, including Shallan's Stepford Smiler tendencies (which she developed to try and make her brothers feel better). It's also commonly believed that he killed his first wife, Shallan's mother, but got away with it when Shallan refused to testify against him. He didn't, Shallan did in self-defense, and he let everyone believe he was responsible to protect her. However, the stress of letting his country and children believe he was a murderer is what drove him to take out his anger on his remaining family, eventually killing his second wife for real, and forcing Shallan to kill him as well.
- King Gavilar, loved by his brother, children, and nephews, turns out to be a terrible husband to Navani. He belittles his wife's scholarly pursuits and considers her a Gold Digger who can only leech fame from others. He doesn't even acknowledge the work she does for him; in the prologue to Rhythm of War, he expects her to do all the work running a diplomatic feast and party without bothering to consult with her and mocks her insistence that he show up and do his duty as king as nagging. When he is assassinated at the end of the party, Navani is unable to feel sad and instead regrets that their last conversation was an argument.
In Elena Ferrante's The Story of a New Name, Elena discovers that Stefano, Lila's new husband, is just as violent and abusive as his deceased loan shark father. She recalls the first time she saw Lila after her wedding, Lila had a massive black eye and her arms were bruised. No one dared to mention it because of Stefano's lineage and because every husband and father in their poor Naples village was violent and abusive towards their wives and their children. Elena herself ended up marrying and divorcing an emotionally abusive man.
John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee encountered this more than once.
- Bright Orange for the Shroud: Arthur Wilkinson's wife married him as part of an elaborate scam to defraud him of all his money; she helped her partners in the scam by verbal abuse combined with the Lysistrata Gambit in order to push him into the investments they wanted him to make.
- Darker Than Amber: Immediately prior to the opening of the story, McGee had been helping a woman get back on her feet after escaping from an emotionally (though not physically) abusive marriage.
- The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper: That the local doctor suffered terrible verbal abuse for many years in his marriage, and was being blackmailed because he had murdered her.
The Twilight Saga:
- 99.9% of Edward and Jacob's actions (especially Edward's) are blatantly fit the criteria for domestic abuse. Try sitting with the list of "red flags" while reading the books. It's frightening. And it's played as romantic. Unfortunate Implications abound.
- Bella gets her own turn in Eclipse and the first part of Breaking Dawn when she repeatedly tries to force Edward to have sex with her, even though he states repeatedly that he doesn't want to. At one point, she actually tries to rip off his shirt, which would be seen as horrifying if a man did it to a woman but is Played for Laughs in that scene.
Under Suspicion:
- The Cinderella Murder:
  - Reverend Martin Collins' father was physically and psychologically abusive towards his mother, using beatings and threats to control her. He would also beat Martin, with his mother being too afraid and broken to defend him.
  - Martin himself was emotionally and psychologically abusive to his ex-girlfriend, taking advantage of her low confidence and desire to belong to manipulate her into doing anything he wanted, though she didn't initially realise it, especially as Martin was more subtle and calculating than his father. For starters, Martin was much older than his girlfriend Nicole (who was only eighteen and rather naive) and he was in a position of authority over her as her church leader. Susan picked up on the power imbalance, asking Nicole why someone like him would even be interested in a college sophomore. Martin also had Nicole soliciting her friends for donations to the church and encouraged her to distance herself from her friends, telling her that those who questioned their relationship were "trying to corrupt [her]".When Nicole discovered Martin was a paedophile, he threatened to kill her and everyone she loved, even saying he'd hunt down and kill her as-yet-unborn children and grandchildren, if she ever told anyone... and Nicole knew he meant it. Even twenty years later, she remains petrified he will follow through on his threats.
- In The Sleeping Beauty Killer, Casey's ex-boyfriend Jason claimed on the stand and in his memoir that she could be violent when angered, including recounting an incident where he had to lock himself in their bathroom because he was terrified she'd threaten him with a knife. She was also convicted of shooting her fiance Hunter dead when he allegedly broke up with her. However, when pressed about it in his interview, Jason admits that while he and Casey had a volatile relationship, he exaggerated or made-up a lot of stuff to make her look worse. Casey has also continuously denied killing Hunter, insisting they had a loving, happy relationship. She's telling the truth.
- In You Don't Own Me, the murder victim Martin Bell was emotionally and psychologically abusive towards his wife Kendra, being especially cunning in isolating and controlling her. When she had their first child and struggled with going back to work, he persuaded her that she was better off at home despite her ambition to become a pediatrician and treated her post-partum depression and grief for her mother by feeding her drugs rather than getting her proper help, then expected her to quit cold turkey when people got suspicious and shamed her for being a "junkie". He hired a live-in nanny without consulting Kendra because he felt she wasn't capable of looking after the children herself, which was only the case because Martin had cut her off from everyone and wouldn't let her get support. He frequently made her feel guilty for her mental struggles, while also emotionally neglecting her to focus on his career and cheating on her. Steven, Kendra and Caroline describe Martin as a domineering and manipulative husband, who cared little for Kendra's well-being.
- Piece of My Heart:
  - Daniel's ex-wife Roseanne says she divorced him and got a restraining order because his brain injury resulted in him becoming cruel, resentful and dangerous towards her; he would have paranoid delusions that she was plotting against him and eventually became physically violent. After Roseanne first moved out, he tracked her down and broke into her house, drawing a knife on her and saying she'd poisoned their daughter against him. Roseanne genuinely feared he'd kill them both, pleading with him not to harm their daughter until he came to his senses and left. Some days, Daniel is remorseful for hurting and frightening Roseanne, but other days he blames her for 'abandoning' him.
  - It's revealed Daniel drugged, tortured and murdered his ex-lover Michelle when she told him she'd given birth to their son and put the baby up for adoption, with Daniel being furious at her for 'stealing' his son from him; he wanted to know where to find Johnny as well as punish Michelle for hiding Johnny from him all these years.
Warrior Cats:
- In the Dawn of the Clans arc, Tom is violent to the she-cat he lives with, Bumble, because he blames her for his mate Turtle Tail leaving. He later is emotionally abusive to his ex-mate, tormenting her and trying to hurt her by kidnapping their kits.
- In The Broken Code arc, Ashfur desperately and pathetically wants to be Squirrelflight's mate, but he's not above hurting her when she doesn't go along with it: throwing her off a ledge in anger when she speaks out against him, and mind-controlling her mate Bramblestar into attacking her.
Where the Crawdads Sing: Pa used to get drunk and beat Ma and all the kids. After the rest of the family leaves, Kya learns to stay out of his way so he won't beat her.
Jacqueline Wilson often explores this trope from the perspective of children and teens (usually them having to cope with a parent being abused).
- In Cookie, Gerry is abusive towards Dilly, though he is largely emotionally abusive rather than physically abusive (though he does slap his wife's face and roughly grabs her by the arm on one occasion). His horrible behaviour is presented as no less damaging, though, despite Auntie Avril downplaying it when Dilly tries to explain what has been happening. Gerry is extremely controlling of Dilly and he frequently mocks and insults her for being "stupid" or "useless", with Dilly having begun believing he's right. He throws screaming fits if she tries to stand up to him, often throwing it in her face that he provides for her as if that excuses him (the aforementioned slap was prompted when Dilly refused his demand to put on a diamond necklace, then claimed she'd lost it). Beauty points out that she's only dependent on him because he made her give up her job and she has to ask him for spending money. Gerry constantly belittles Dilly's attempts at cookie baking and smashes up the cookies she had made for Beauty's birthday party, insisting they're rubbish without even trying one.
- In The Diamond Girls, it's mentioned that Sue broke up with Dean, the father of her second daughter Jude, because he became violent towards her and her daughters, saying that she refused to let him slap her and her kids about. Consequently, Jude has no relationship with him and couldn't care less, saying he's a "violent nutter" who is probably in prison.
- At one point in Little Darlings, Sunset overhears someone getting slapped whilst her parents are arguing, though she isn't sure who's slapping who, even stating that they could be slapping each other. Destiny also says her mother broke up with her last boyfriend because he was violent towards her and Destiny, with them briefly ending up in a women's shelter.
- Jay from Lola Rose provides one of the most prominent and disturbing examples of this trope in Jacqueline Wilson's novels. He is blatantly emotionally and physically abusive towards his wife Nikki and terrorises his kids too (Jayni more so than Kenny). He has a habit of shouting at, threatening and insulting Nikki for doing the slightest thing to set him off (often if he thinks she's flirting with other men) and he regularly beats her bloody to "teach a lesson". Nikki has been to hospital a few times because of the injuries Jay has given her (though she never tells on him); on one occasion Jayni recalls Nikki 's face being so swollen she couldn't talk, she couldn't go out for weeks because of the bruises and that her breasts and stomach "were black". Jay is even prepared to hit Nikki while she's bedridden following breast cancer surgery, due to finding out she'd been with another man. Jay also engages in the classic abusive tactic of love bombing, crying and apologising to Nikki once he's cooled down, promising he'll change and showering her with gifts. Jayni says that it never lasts long before he gets violent again.
- Lisa strongly implies in The Worry Website that her father is an alcoholic who physically abuses her mother, but she can't bring herself to write it on the website because it's so painful and confusing for her.

Domestic Abuse / Literature

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