Reviews tagging 'Torture'

Tan poca vida by Hanya Yanagihara

597 reviews

kazli's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

2.25

it was okay but it did put me in a reading slump around half way reading through it. it was well written and all that, I just think that you have to be in the perfect mindset when reading this, not to mention be aware of EVERY trigger warning. I liked the depiction of abuse, as a victim myself, but I did not like the portrayal that a healthy relationship requires a sexual aspect to it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Abandonment, Ableism, Body horror, Car accident, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Blood, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Trafficking, and Violence

ireyes50's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide attempt, Abandonment, Bullying, Car accident, Medical trauma, Self harm, Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Medical content, Torture, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Gaslighting, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Addiction, Child abuse, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

hollieadaw's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Suicide, Blood, Child abuse, Self harm, Racism, Adult/minor relationship, Ableism, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Eating disorder, Torture, Sexual assault, Death, Domestic abuse, Gaslighting, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide attempt, and Rape

oddgreyhound's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

read the trigger warnings.. it’s a good book, but it can be really hard to read, so don’t force yourself through it. 
It has hills and valleys, and more of one than another, but it made me love the characters. It’s long, but i think it’s not too long. fitting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, Self harm, Forced institutionalization, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Torture, Violence, Abandonment, Blood, Car accident, Addiction, Child abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Grief, Suicide, Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Drug abuse, Suicide attempt, Dementia, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Emotional abuse, Suicidal thoughts, and Injury/Injury detail

ecw47's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Mental illness, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Car accident, Drug use, Eating disorder, Medical content, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Blood, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Abandonment, Domestic abuse, Violence, and Body shaming

queerhoney's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Sexual assault, Suicide attempt, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Rape, Ableism, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, Self harm, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Gore, Physical abuse, Gaslighting, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual harassment, Drug abuse, Forced institutionalization, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, Blood, Car accident, Death of parent, Fatphobia, Hate crime, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Body horror, Body shaming, Gun violence, Medical content, Sexual violence, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Injury/Injury detail, and Cancer

aasiy4h's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

my gosh. this book was, to say the least, a mess. not in a bad way, but still a mess. it took me well over a month to read, which was a lot longer than i anticipated. when i read the first 2 chapters, i had immediately rated it a 5 star read and i couldnt wait to read more. maybe thats because my expectations for this book were far out from what the reality was, but i definitely feel like the blurb helped in being misleading. it makes you think its a sad but light story of a friendship between 4 boys turning into men, but that could not have been farther from the reality. the reality is that the book is about jude, one of those boys, and his mysterious past full of sexual abuse, psychological abuse and genuine disgusting trauma that i wouldnt wish on my worst enemy. i dont ever get triggered by trigger warning topics so i typically choose to ignore them, as i did with this, and i dont regret not looking but i do think this book took it wayyy too far. everything was in such vivid detail i felt like i could see it right before my eyes. and in most books, thats a good thing because it shows how good an authors writing is. but with this, it wasnt pleasant. it was literally 720 pages of torture and pain and fucked up shit. im not a fan of long books but i always try to give them a go and this did not need to be that long. i think thats part of what makes it so slow is how you do have to pause and think for a hot minute before you carry on reading and just because of genuinely how many pages there are. when i was around halfway through i started googling what the inspiration was behind it or why hanya yanagihara actually wrote a little life because i thought, wow, if this was based off someones life or something that really is heartbreaking. but no. i looked through a fair few articles and interviews and i couldnt see any reason why she wrote this book. there was no victim whose story she wanted to tell, nothing from her own or her friends experiences, nothing from maybe even some sort of study that sparked an interest or compulsion to write it. nothing. which makes me think she wrote it out of some deep dark place within herself, because who comes up with this stuff from their imagination? i tend to think that every author has a purpose for writing a book, even if its just for pure entertainment, but this feels as if there was no purpose because there was no backstory, which kind of just makes it fucked up. it was just pure pain and torture and messed up situations and was definitely not for entertainment. however, in a strange way, even after all my negatives, it was still a book i was determined to finish and the writing style was so compelling even as it makes you want to stop reading. i think its messed up and selfish what jude had been through and what he did so in the end i had mixed feelings about his character, but other than that some of the other characters were very likeable. they were really well thought out, but i think jude was too thought out in the sense that some of the information laid on the reader was just so gruelling and not needed. 
but all in all, a 4/5 stars, which is probably too generous considering everything ive just said about it but oh well.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Bullying, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Suicide attempt, Grief, Pedophilia, Body horror, Car accident, Domestic abuse, Toxic relationship, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Self harm, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, and Death

roguereader1980's review against another edition

dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

1.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Gaslighting, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Torture, Domestic abuse, Sexual violence, Rape, Self harm, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, and Sexual assault

icarusandthesun's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad 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

i'd love to write a complex and profound, thoughtful review for this book, and i've tried, i swear. but it's just not possible, because how does one even begin to review a little life?

i can only describe how i feel.

one can find two different types of people in the review section of this book:
- type A: "this book is completely mental and tragedy porn and you shouldn't ever read it", and
- type B: "this book is completely mental and tragedy porn and you should absolutely read it",
(and of course the impartial "i love it but would never ever recommend it to anyone").
so i was curious which type i'd end up being.

answer: type B. because i loved it.

of course it was tragic, and traumatic, and bloody, and cold and crazy. but it was also lovely, tender and warm.

maybe i'm just a whole other level of delulu and mental, but i found a little life strangely comforting. when i feel down, i feel this urge to pick it up, to drown in this world yanagihara has created. i want to read about the lives of all these people i've had the pleasure of meeting—jude and willem and harold and julia and malcolm and jb, and and and. 

one of the reviewers on the back of the cover said something along the lines of "i wish this book was longer" and at first i thought this person insane. but now, ... my god, this person's right. i find myself wishing i could just pick it up and continue reading. this feeling is especially strong when i'm feeling down—comfort book and all that.

720 pages, and i want to re-read it. actually, i just want to never stop reading it. 

originally, i didn't want to rate this book at all, because that would be like rating a sad, trauma-dumping (auto)biography; it feels wrong somehow. 

but i can't really stop thinking about it, and that's always THE sign that tells me that i really, really enjoyed a book. so i want to give it a good rating. 

so yeah. type B. 
do check out the trigger warnings (there's a lot of them), but if you're okay with all of them, i want you to read it. forget that "i would never recommend it to anyone because it's so sad"-stuff. i'm telling you to read it. because it's good.

it's a good book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Mental illness, Violence, Toxic relationship, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Domestic abuse, Terminal illness, Suicide, Grief, Death, Child abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Blood, Ableism, Self harm, Sexual assault, Rape, Medical content, Emotional abuse, Child death, Pedophilia, and Torture

Moderate: Infidelity, Outing, Vomit, Drug abuse, Terminal illness, Addiction, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, and Car accident

peppyb's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Alcoholism, Blood, Body horror, Car accident, Grief, Medical content, Sexual harassment, Terminal illness, Violence, Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Ableism, Domestic abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual assault, Medical trauma, Suicide, Body shaming, Bullying, Religious bigotry, Vomit, Abandonment, Sexual violence, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Death, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Chronic illness, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Suicide attempt, Torture, and Trafficking

Moderate: Toxic friendship

Minor: Biphobia and Infidelity