Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Saving Noah by Lucinda Berry

77 reviews

sophie______a's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Injury/Injury detail

ksamaine95's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

I signed up for Psychological thriller.. this was giving horror. 

4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I give this rating because I can’t imagine how hard it was to write about something so controversial, triggering, and nuanced. This is how you use your pen to inform, confront and create space for difficult real life topics. not demonized, not romanticized. 

I would not say this made me question my morals or force me to “see both sides”. It did shine a light on the harsh extremes we put on delicate and devastating situations. 

As a story by itself I would give
2 ⭐️⭐️

I found the characters deeply irritating. I think the mother and father had to be rigid in their roles and stances for this to work. As someone as in the mental health field, I wasn’t triggered by the content as much as I was internally at war with my professional brains and my human/gut reactions to the characters & their responses. 

I spent the last three chapters repeating “girl — hell no!” I think the twist was necessary.  I called it early but felt maybe that would be too obvious.  I’m glad it was not what I was bracing myself for. 


I’ll probably sit with this one for a bit before reading more by Dr. LB. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Vomit

Moderate: Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Drug abuse, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Grief, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

kazzarreads's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.0

The dark and disturbing subject matter made this a tough read. Check your triggers before giving this a go as it's certainly not for everyone.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Vomit, and Suicide attempt

k8lynn's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense fast-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

5.0

this is the most difficult book i have ever read. i cried so hard. but it really opens up questions in your mind you never thought you'd ask.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Mental illness, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Vomit, Grief, Suicide attempt, Gaslighting, Abandonment, and Sexual harassment

scar1508's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Incest, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Vomit

kinsportch's review against another edition

dark sad tense fast-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Grief, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Bullying, Confinement, and Rape

aleen_elizabeth's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Incest, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Murder, Outing, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

noraestelle's review against another edition

challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

1.5

I finished reading this book about a month ago. I wanted to really take time to think about it and let it sink in before writing a review. If I’m being honest it left me feeling numb, in a reading slump, and mad. None in a positive way toward the book or author. This is my third Lucinda Berry book, it was final decider if I would continue reading books by this author or not. Needless to say this author is just not for me. 
To give my most honest review there will be spoilers throughout this. I will try to make it known but here’s your warning. 
I will start with I have no problem with the authors writing style, if anything it’s what kept me wanting to try again. Something about it is effortless for the reader and while I don’t love the plot twists they do get you. Unfortunately, those are about the only positives I have. 
Every book that I have read by this author is coming from the prospective of a mom who is just a bit too obsessed with their son. That’s it that’s the basis of every story. I am not a mom nor to I want to be so I can’t really speak on that aspect of things. Sometimes I can’t even imagine what these fictional women must be going through. But their thoughts and their actions are so unlikeable and bizarre when it comes to their sons. It’s honestly gross. They’ll go as far as breaking up their marriages, betraying friends, breaking laws, neglecting their other children just for their son. I don’t know it’s just very unnerving to me. 
With this book specifically you go into it knowing the main part of the story. The main characters son admits to SA little girls and basically alluding to a story of a mother and son bond and I would say that’s very accurate. It’s very mixed feelings toward Noah because it’s disgusting what he did point blank period, but you start thinking like there are people like him in the world. And when it’s a child having these feelings it makes you look at it in a different tone. And while I do think that’s a good thing there were parts in this book that were just plain disgusting and honestly did not need to be in there at all. 
• A very minor one that probably just affects me would be people throwing up. There is way too much throw up in this book. 
• There are very random religious undertones in this book and I don’t know. It just rubbed me personally the wrong way. 
Now the parts that I had major problems with. 

• The random rape in this book is honestly disgusting and unnecessary. Nothing ever comes from these things happening and there’s a literal rape scene to start out the book. Like there is no point and no message to receive from it besides that Noah is going through things too which in my opinion could of just been conveyed in a different way.

• There is a specific scene in the book where the little sister is talking to the mom. They are trying to keep what happened from her in a way to protect her. I won’t give my opinion on that, what really bothered me is the statement she made. Something along the lines of “I know what Noah did to those girls but I’m not afraid of him. He touched them down there. He can touch me down there because I know he won’t hurt me and I love him” when Noah hears this he says how sweet she is….. am I the only one that found this disgusting, inappropriate, and unnecessary? It literally did nothing. It’s never talked about again, they didn’t tell her other wise like that was just it.

•The whole plot twist with the dad I don’t know. It made me angry but I’m sure that’s what it was meant to do but also at the end of the day it did nothing. Besides to show he’s not only a terrible dad he’s just a terrible person. It doesn’t explain anything or add anything to the story or give any closure. If anything it leaves you with a thousand more questions.

• and finally the ending was just weird to me very weird religious undertones. Just such an unsatisfying ending. I personally teared up when

Noah took his life. I feel like ending it there would of honestly been better.

Overall just thinking about this book makes me mad again and disgusted all over again. Do not recommend. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual assault, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Medical trauma, and Suicide attempt

lemanley's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• 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: Child abuse, Death, Mental illness, Pedophilia, and Suicide

luna_98's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad 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? Yes

i don’t know how to rate this book. it was so good in the sense that it made me feel things, it left a mark on me. but i doubt i’d reread and i don’t think i would recommend it. the story is so raw, vulnerable, and difficult and i feel like it was written in a way only a child psychologist could pull off (hence DOCTOR lucinda berry!!). 
it altered my brain chemistry and made me uncomfortable and uneasy but because of that, it was an impactful and real life story. it made me question how would i handle this situation if it happened to me. it’s unlike any book i’ve ever read and part of me misses the person i was before reading it lol. 

in short, if you read books to make you happy and feel good, do not read this. 
if you read books to FEEL emotions and delve into the human experience, then proceed with caution. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Pedophilia, Rape, Suicide, Vomit, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Bullying, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Violence, and Blood

Minor: Incest and Sexual assault