Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

59 reviews

lwarburton's review

reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent and Cancer

Minor: Mental illness

melissa_b_67's review

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Medical content, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Body horror, and Cancer

Moderate: Alcoholism and Mental illness

cepbreed's review

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

I hate this book. It’s even worse that it’s a memoir, this is her actual life and yet I’m imparting all of my painful feelings onto her family. Michelle Zauner has crafted a story that has forced me to become both daughter and mother, a dangerous evolution for me, a daughter who is so single minded. I knew I would relate very rawly to her experience. I mean how could I not. I’m a half Korean half white girl born and raised in America whose connections to her heritage and mother are never good enough. That speaks for the daughter side of it all, but seeing Zauner take on the primary caregiver role for an extremely chronically ill person has put me entirely in my mother’s shoes. Obviously I didn’t die, but I was nearly there. I hated myself so much, for being so sickly, so full of hatred, so ugly, so weak, but my mother stood witness to it all. She absorbed my pain and never let hers show. Zauner’s words have cut deep into old scars and torn my heart in two. This memoir is everything to me and I’ll never be the same. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Mental illness, Terminal illness, Death, Death of parent, Medical content, Cancer, and Chronic illness

Moderate: Abortion, Addiction, Alcoholism, and Alcohol

Minor: Child abuse, Excrement, Car accident, and Vomit

bothsidespsych's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent and Cancer

Moderate: Racism

Minor: Mental illness and Vomit

supercat_earl's review against another edition

dark hopeful sad slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Cancer, Death, and Death of parent

takarakei's review against another edition

emotional reflective medium-paced

4.5

A deeply personal memoir about mother/daughter relationships, and being an Asian American balancing two cultures. Michelle's relationship with her mother (and father) is very complicated. Much of the book deals with her mother's battle with cancer (check full TW!). Those of Asian and particularly Korean heritage will find many cultural comforts, especially when it comes to Korean food descriptions. The art teacher passage/letter wrecked me. Being a fan of Japanese Breakfast, I never knew their first album was a picture of Michelle's mom and that she wrote some of the songs for her.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Medical content, Cancer, Grief, and Death

Moderate: Mental illness and Excrement

Minor: Addiction, Racism, Alcoholism, Abortion, Infidelity, and Car accident

This book focuses very heavily on Michelle's mother's battle with cancer, and the struggle of caretaking through terminal illness. Michelle has a sometimes contentious relationship with both her parents. Her father deals with substance abuse issues.

taradoeswriting's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective sad fast-paced

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Cancer, Grief, and Death

Minor: Mental illness, Xenophobia, Racism, and Abortion

toffishay's review

emotional reflective medium-paced

4.5

A beautiful, emotional memoir about family and turmoil and loss and grief. I cried as my stomach growled reading about the delicious food that held so many memories. Our lives are these complicated tapestries of feelings and events. What an honor to read this exercise in exploring a life.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Grief, and Death of parent

Moderate: Alcohol, Medical content, Excrement, Emotional abuse, Medical trauma, and Vomit

Minor: Dysphoria, Addiction, Suicidal thoughts, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Car accident, Violence, Xenophobia, Abortion, and Mental illness

emilyrowanstudio's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

3.75

This is a hard book for me to review as parts of it I found so heartbreaking and gripping, yet others I really didn't care for. I really enjoyed the story, just not the way it was told.

What I loved - I have potentially never read a mother/daughter relationship told with as much nuance and tenderness as Zauner tells with hers. The complexities, the devotion, the lessons learned too late - be warned, her Mother's slow decline, death and the immediate aftermath is told in STARK detail. I would advise against reading this if a close family member of yours, especially a Mother figure, has recently passed.
Zauner's relationship with identity, her strained relationship with her American Father, and struggle to communicate in her mother tongue with her Korean family is not one I can relate to, but I empathised with her sense of struggling to belong. After reading Zauner's story, I feel I am closer to understanding the displacement and unique position that come with mixed heritage than after any other account i've heard before.

What I disliked - please note, a lot of this comes down to personal taste rather than poor writing or storytelling, but for my tastes, a good quarter to a third could have been cut from the food descriptions of the book. Personally, I don't like a lot of description in my books, preferring dialogue, emotions, and the things unsaid to set the scene in my preferred style of storytelling. However, if you enjoy detailed descriptions of food and cultural settings, you will love this. Although I understood Zauner's relationship with food is deeply tied up in her relationship with her Mother and finding her way through the grief that came from losing her, and that's why it was included, for me there was still too much of it. I also don't know enough (anything) about Korean food to really enjoy much of this book for what it is - to my detriment! If you're a lover of Korean food you will surely find Zauner's descriptions mouth-watering.

Overall i'm definitely glad I read it, I just wish it had been over quicker.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cancer, Death of parent, Grief, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Abortion, Body shaming, and Mental illness

samchase112's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Grief, and Cancer

Moderate: Medical content and Xenophobia

Minor: Mental illness and Abortion