Reviews with content warning for Suicidal thoughts - Chain-Gang All-Stars

Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

32 reviews

paigebypage__'s review against another edition

dark emotional informative reflective tense 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

5.0

I've been torn open and left hollow. This book is harrowing in ways that will never leave me, and I think that's for the best. Easily one of the best books published this year. Absolutely groundbreaking, and the first time I have ever described a book as a Must Read. It is unmissable.

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angievansprang's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective 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? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book is a feat. You will have so much reckoning with your own thoughts on what the true essence of humanity is and whether any of us are truly deserving of high cruelty. The anecdotes sprinkled throughout in footnotes that detail true statistics on our current prison industrial complex remind you that this book is not a work of pure fiction. Incredibly written and enthralling. Should be required reading for all.

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tinyplanet's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective 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? It's complicated

5.0

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sierraburrell's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark informative reflective sad tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

I felt a lot of things while reading this book. So many of the characters stayed with me for a while after I finished it. It feels weird how close this type of “entertainment” feels to actually existing. I really want this world to be better. I want things to be different. I always appreciate a book that makes me feel things deeply, and this book did that.

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literaryintersections's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

“But, as always, the massive violence of the state was “justice”, was “law and order,” and resistance to perpetual violence was an act of terror. It would have been funny if there weren’t so much blood everywhere.”

If I could give this book 100 stars I would.

I brought Chain Gang All-Stars with me to Scotland not knowing how timely this book would be. Yes this book highlights a dystopian America that feels like it could be right around the corner - a privatized system that pairs corporal punishment with entertainment, pitting incarcerated people against each other in weekly “Death Matches” where only one can survive. This doesn’t feel too far off and Adeji-Brenyah confirms that with key footnotes highlighting the horrific ways our current system strips people of their humanity. But what struck me, especially reading this book during the humanitarian crisis in Palestine was the idea of freedom and if we can ever be free when our governments, systems, policies and practices can take our rights, our families, our lives at a moment.

The quote above really struck me - I actually put the book down and had to take a visible breath because this is happening right now. A state engaging in immense violence in the name of murdered citizens being looked at as justified while any type of resistance or protest is condemned. And we are witnessing this. We are watching it unfold, maybe not as entertainment but it’s everyday, consistent violence, gaslighting, us vs them rhetoric. A complete loss of humanity.

I never want to get to the world that is described in Chain Gang All-Stars. But I fear that in many ways we are already there. And there is so much blood everywhere.

This is one of the best books I’ve ever read. Do yourself a favor and read it. You will learn something. Your ideas of punishment and criminal justice will be challenged or nurtured. And you will feel deep empathy and sadness: for the people in these pages (Loretta and Hamara and Hendrix and Simon and Sunset and Mari and Razor and Bells and…..) and for the people in our world currently being stripped of their humanity every second of every day. And you will be sad for yourself - being complicit in the systems that make this horrible world turn.

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lycheejelly's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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jhbandcats's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective 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? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A devastating diatribe against the US prison system, this book uses violence to show the misery of the incarcerated. It’s shocking and eye-opening and one of the hardest books I’ve read this year. The suffering is almost unrelenting, the rare delicious meal or soft bed breaking up the monotony of the characters’s wretched existence.

The character development is focused on the now - very little attention is given to the lives the people had before they entered the killing-as-entertainment program. We learn just enough to know that these are not the same people who earlier committed murder, rape, and arson. The irony is that they’re now being told to kill, and to do it in a spectacular manner to make the games masters and the promoters as rich as possible.

As pointed out in an interview Mari gives, there’s no good solution to the problem of incarcerating so many people. But clearly the current situation isn’t working and there needs to be change.

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