Reviews with content warning for Suicide attempt - Alone with You in the Ether

Reviews tagging 'Suicide attempt'

Alone with You in the Ether by Olivie Blake

25 reviews

megannoelle's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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

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embelle's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

I don’t even know what to write for this review, as I still haven’t fully processed this book. I feel like I could read this book 5 times and still not be able to process it. I’m convinced that this book is unlike anything I’ve ever read before or anything that I’ll ever read in the future. Just wow wow wow. The Acknowledgements from Olivia Blake also totally had me in my feelings too

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martynaneo's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

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mashley512's review

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective fast-paced

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

4.5

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aileron's review against another edition

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challenging reflective slow-paced

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

1.0

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m4rtt4's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced

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

3.75

What a book! For someone who seldom reads romance, this book was an excellent choice — I still wasn't very interested in the love story, but oh my god, the language! I could listen to anything written by Blake for hours to end, she really has a skill to bring out the magic in the most mundane of things. The audiobook was also very skillfully narrated, I highly recommend it!

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ninahuynh's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional tense slow-paced

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

5.0

"A Love Story". Turmoil and recognition. Love and addiction. Lost and denial. Yearning and fear. Regan and Aldo's relationship has more waves than the ocean. While they both understand their own flaws, they're both volatile and have so much inner turmoil that many of us may recognize in ourselves and relate to. While they seem to be opposites, their polarity is what brings them together.

As much as I don't want to like it, their relatability (inner dialogue) is what keeps me chewing through. That acknowledgement!

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jbellomy's review against another edition

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emotional medium-paced

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

3.0

Torn. The more I think about it, the more I dislike it -- it's like if an early 2010s NLOG watched Garden State and thought, "hey, I bet I could make that angstier." The messaging is icky, the format is needlessly convoluted (form following function? Olivie Blake could NEVER), the dialogue in the first half is so so stilted and offensively twee. The male lead literally does the Augustus Waters thing, but instead of a cigarette, it's a joint that he *doesn't* smoke! (OKAY FINE he does it for a different reason. But in the acknowledgements Blake states that the first image she had of the character was ~a guy who's not smoking the joint he's holding~ and I'm like girl. You obviously watched/read The Fault in Our Stars and the most iconic, silly, parodied-to-death character quirk stuck in your brain and eventually your subconscious convinced you the idea was yours. HOW did no editor catch this. HOW.) (I know it was originally self published but dear god why didn't someone take this out of the final version.) However. There were some moments I really loved (e.g. the church scene kicked absolute ass). It's interesting that most of the negative reviews praise the first half of the book, but I much preferred the latter half. Blake captures the early throws of romantic obsession so well. There were scenes that fully transported me back to my high school relationship, which is wild since these characters are in their mid-late 20's, and, judging by the ending, Blake does not seem to be aware that their relationship is dangerously codependent. Troubling, but what can you do? They're so misunderstood and unique and they simply must let their freak flags fly/ignore all other flags, namely red ones, and dive head first into their all-consuming love! Seriously though, Regan and Aldo think they're hot shit because they've got quirky names and they're malnourished insomniacs and they're mentally ill and have special interests -- like half the book is them saying to each other how different from the rest of the world they both are -- but has anyone told them about the internet?? We're all in the DSM here. Maybe you're not different. Maybe one of you is just kind of rude, and one of you is just kind of mean, and that's fine, but it is not aspirational or romantic. BUUUUT at the same time, *I'm* a kind of rude, kind of mean, mentally ill obsessive freak, and I also get even more insane when I fall in love with someone, so, like, relatable content I guess.* I was an early 2010s tumblr NLOG. And I kinda like Garden State. I'm not going to read the Atlas Six because I cannot stand another second of Olivie Blake's clumsy pontificating about bees or math or philosophy or time or whatever she thinks will make her self-inserts sound smart, but I'm not leaving this book with 100% negative feelings. Tl;dr no regrets about having read this; would not recommend to anyone I respect.

*Regan is out here representing the neurodivergent trust fund babies who are fully incapable of holding down a real job. Though I do not approve of her male manipulator ways, gotta appreciate the rep. She just like me for real.

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monda's review

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challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.0

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lindseyas's review against another edition

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challenging emotional inspiring reflective slow-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? Yes

3.5

This was a tough book to get through in multiple senses of the term. The prose, while beautiful and spellbinding and fitting the scene and characters perfectly, was pretty uppity and unsuitable for a proper reading experience. I found myself spending more time trying to decipher what the characters and narration was trying to say than actually paying attention to the plot of the novel. But, I think that Blake's niche: fluffy, flowery language that shows off what a great author she is to ask the flaws of her characters. And, in fact, these characters were pretty flawed. I think there is no one out there that can judge either one of these characters when they are inspired by Blake's own struggle with bipolar disorder, herself and medication/therapy — there's just no way to do that. I can't help but say that I see a lot of myself in Aldo: putting my problems aside to be the caretaking companion, even though it sometimes just breaks you down. I think the character study was pretty masterful in the book, but my GOD did the writing style make this a tough lesson to crack.

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