Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

12 reviews

axecellentabby's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

4.25

It was my second time reading the book, but I have a much different perspective since a decade has passed since my first read through. I think the levity of the situation hit me much harder this go around.

I didn’t think much on the questions of aging before, but this time I saw more of those themes. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol

Moderate: Animal death, Death, Animal cruelty, Toxic relationship, Mental illness, and Physical abuse

Minor: Cursing, Death of parent, Car accident, Blood, Pregnancy, and Sexual content

gymjam_reads's review

adventurous emotional inspiring medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

What amazing storytelling - I was transported right into the life of a US circus in the 1930s!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty and Domestic abuse

Moderate: Mental illness, Death, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Violence

Minor: Antisemitism

rachael_jo's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death, Domestic abuse, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Sexual content

Minor: Mental illness

planetshelf's review

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I don’t know whether it’s just because of who I am, but I don’t think this is very romantic. It is very centered around thoughts of sex and overly anatomical descriptions of bodies (boobs’ descriptions were weird and often related to acidic fruits and penises sounded repulsive), but doesn’t feel at all like other books I’ve read that are categorized as romances.

The way Jacob — 90 (or 93) — is written is wonderful. I don’t know exactly what elders think, but I grew up with grandparents as my guardians and I feel an oddly sentimental connection with the more utilitarian thoughts that were written.

I feel this may be worth mentioning: the author uses non-colloquial vocabulary when referring to a body. If that might be uncomfortable for you, you probably should let this one go.

Nonetheless, I liked it and thought it was a fun journey to read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Violence, Sexual assault, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Classism, Rape, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Death of parent, Death, Animal death, Infidelity, Murder, and Sexual assault

Minor: Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Vomit, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Mental illness, Misogyny, Blood, Car accident, Fatphobia, Injury/Injury detail, and Pregnancy

jenna_justi2004's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Cursing, Bullying, Cancer, Classism, Death, Murder, Blood, Chronic illness, Drug use, Rape, Sexism, Stalking, Violence, Body horror, Mental illness, Misogyny, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Torture, and Toxic relationship

jasminn_perez's review

adventurous emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

i was disappointed in the writing. there were so many times where i was questioning what the fuck was going on and why i was reading abt it. the love story was ass bro. like ive read fan fiction that was better written. made me so sad. marlena pissed me off too that bitch was always crying about something. howeverrr i was surprised at how well this book kept my attention like i was entertained fs. i love walter and i actually cried i miss him sm. jacob and walter had a better relationship progression than him and marlena liiikkee. august got what he deserved tbfh and it was a satisfactory ending to him :)). rosie slayed always. i pictured jacob as like a nerdy lookin rob and i was satisfied he was pretty sexy. i am excited to watch the movie. but also why tf was he yelling all the time. this book changed my views on old ppl actually. like being in a home sounds so sucky and when his family forgot abt him i cried so bad. it also made me happy that he rejoined the circus at the end :3

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Grief, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Animal cruelty, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Violence, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Car accident

le3713's review against another edition

adventurous reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

I liked the book best at the end, but it was slow to hook my interest and the long list of awful things that happened was hard to get past.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Death, Violence, Domestic abuse, and Animal death

Moderate: Death of parent, Sexual content, Car accident, and Mental illness

gabb_reads's review

adventurous inspiring medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Alcoholism, Mental illness, and Suicide

Minor: Racial slurs and Antisemitism

tisdianes's review

adventurous challenging emotional funny informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Anyone that truly knows me is well aware of my genuine  love for— well, we’ll just say, ‘circus- themed’ stuffs.. a childhood story. 

Movin’ on… Anyway, this is a title that keeps getting mentioned quite often. And so here’s my approach: a read-along (e-book + audiobook) & then, enjoy the picture show! 

🎪Water for elephants by Sara Gruen [2007]

🤡Audiobook narrated by David LeDoux

🍿Movie [2011] starring Robert Pattinson,  Reese Witherspoon, et al.

#HistoricalFiction #Drama #Romance

My word this is such a good book! I did end up doing  a read-along And Wow… Not only am I impressed by how well researched and complete the dual-timeline story is, but the narration for this book is incredible, too. It’s a dramatic, heart-pounding  performance, honestly. The story, largely set aboard a traveling train circus, is action-packed and character driven while cleverly weaving a Biblical story throughout it. However, I didn’t fully grasp the latter, even though I kept noting the multiple Biblical references, until I read an author Q&A offered at the end of the book.

Quite possibly my book of the year. 

⚠️ Warning: Mature Content and Language 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Domestic abuse, Death, Animal cruelty, Sexual content, and Vomit

Moderate: Alcohol, Death of parent, Fatphobia, and Mental illness

Minor: Racial slurs

Biblical

ashley_books_cats_judo's review against another edition

emotional reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty and Dementia

Moderate: Animal death

Minor: Mental illness