Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls by T Kira Madden

11 reviews

mscalls's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

sarahmerfi's review

dark emotional reflective tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, Rape, and Sexual content

Moderate: Addiction, Toxic relationship, and Grief

Minor: Death of parent

jarku's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Death of parent, and Alcohol

Moderate: Infidelity, Racial slurs, Terminal illness, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Toxic friendship, and Abandonment

Minor: Eating disorder, Toxic relationship, and Lesbophobia

yomireads's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad

3.5

I'll state straight away, my bad for not checking content warnings.

This book is deeply painful and unflinchingly honest about very difficult things, and I was not the target audience for this story. Having said that, I appreciate and applaud the courage and skill of this memoir. It's a beautifully written and powerfully moving story that I believe needed to be told. I know there are many who will benefit from reading this and feel seen, connected to, and unalone in these pages.

For my part, I found the nonlinear storytelling to be confusing and quite hard to keep straight in my mind as far as who was alive, when events happened relative to one another, and the relative age of anyone at any given moment. I was deeply disturbed by the graphic depictions of her sexual assault, but feel uncomfortable truly criticizing it as I know feeling disturbed is a part of what is meant to be evoked, and any victim should be permitted to claim their story and find strength in it however they can. 

All else that might have made me squirm, I have no true qualms as far as the memoir goes, as a critique of non fiction, by its very nature, can't be about story content. It's about a life, and no outside observer/reader can truly say what deserves to be included in that realm. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Bullying, Drug abuse, Drug use, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Lesbophobia, and Alcohol

Moderate: Domestic abuse and Homophobia

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Biphobia, and Infertility

merldia's review

dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

A perfect book for girls who grew up with fathers but not dads, for girls who had more identity crises by 20 than most have in a lifetime, for girls who were betrayed by their families, and for girls who love their families despite all that.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

elliott_the_clementine's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring fast-paced

5.0

Update on 05.09.2024: I did not reread this book for a long time in fear that it would not be as powerful the second time around. It was an unfounded concern. Beautiful once again. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Bullying, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Car accident, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Cultural appropriation, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Classism

Moderate: Excrement, Fire/Fire injury, and Abandonment

Minor: Ableism and Body shaming

jackelz's review

challenging emotional reflective

T Kira Madden was born to a single Chinese, Kānaka Maoli (Hawaiian) mother and a Jewish father who was married to someone else at the time. Even though her father divorced his first wife and married Madden's mother when the author was still quite young, he was absent from her life — hence the title, which also nods to the death of her father in early 2016. Both of Madden's parents were, in fact, absent in different ways throughout her youth, largely due to addiction. 

 

She stood out in her private school and was bullied for her appearance; she was the horse girl who had a back brace, headgear, braces; she was called "Kinky Chinky,” and she lived in extravagance with her designer shoe-brand name. 

 At times the stories seem random, and the book wasn’t formatted like a traditional memoir. There isn’t much of a lesson to learn from her experiences, but I understood her longing for connection. Her childhood was absolutely wild, and me being the same age as her, there was a lot that felt familiar. 

 

Madden holds nothing back in these pages. It's a story about trauma and forgiveness, reckoning with her queer and biracial identity, about families of blood and affinity. Part 3 was my favorite and I could read a book just about that. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Bullying, Drug use, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, and Alcohol

Moderate: Child abuse, Homophobia, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Grief, and Death of parent

shewantsthediction's review

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Bullying, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Grief, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Moderate: Infidelity

Minor: Abortion and Pregnancy

dianna_reads's review

challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Death of parent

bookishcori's review

challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual assault, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Death of parent