Reviews tagging 'Fire/Fire injury'

Tan poca vida by Hanya Yanagihara

490 reviews

madalynedwards's review against another edition

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

This post contains spoilers. 
This book contains many, many, many trigger warnings. 
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I’ll probably go back and add on to this review later but it’s 2 a.m. and I just finished this book and I am not okay. 

Did I read this book because I knew it was supposedly heart wrenching and I wanted it to rip my heart out and smash it into thousands of tiny pieces? Yes. Was I prepared? No. 

Okay, so I’m going to be honest, this was *almost* a DNF for me. I listened to it on audiobook at 3x speed and found myself losing interest. But I kept on trucking until 30% where I couldn’t decide if I wanted to DNF it or not. I rarely DNF a book, not that I think there’s anything wrong with DNFing, but I heard incredible reviews and wanted to keep going. I picked it back up a few days later and listened to the remaining 70% of this 800+ page novel without pressing pause. I was hooked - I couldn’t help but feel that if I put the book down, I would be abandoning the characters in their darkest times, and I so desperately wanted to see them overcome their demons and trauma (I did a little happy gasp when I got to the section titled “The Happy Days”, but rest assured friends, the happy days are not the final days.) The characters are beautifully flawed, well developed, and beautifully written. The strongest feeling I felt as I read was that of prolonged despair. Jude’s abusive past leads him to sabotaging himself, thinking he is not worthy of happiness or joy or love or, during some instances, life itself. And it’s heartbreaking. It’s absolutely gut wrenching. 

Jude, it seems, was the unluckiest individual growing up. Jude made a comment in the later half of the book how he has been lucky all his life, but that is not true. The main criticism I have of the book is that I found myself thinking “surely one person cannot go through all of this”… it seems like Jude was in the wrong place at the wrong time every time. When he would reveal details about himself in little pieces, I would find myself thinking “this is the terrible trauma Jude endured that has resulted in his thoughts and motives…” but no, each passing chapter would peel back another layer of trauma he endured. I found myself wondering how one person could endure so many traumatic events, and during times wondered why the author was adding to these layers of trauma even after Jude had been through so much. So yeah, the main emotion, along with anger (for those who wronged Jude - and trust me, there are a lot) I felt while reading was despair. Pure and utter despair. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Forced institutionalization, Mental illness, Death, Medical trauma, Rape, Adult/minor relationship, Car accident, Child abuse, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Self harm, Suicide, Abandonment, Ableism, Grief, Kidnapping, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Chronic illness, Death of parent, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Trafficking, Blood, Homophobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, and Vomit

samlv's review against another edition

emotional inspiring 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

4.5

Starts out really slow but once you get through the first 200 or so pages the pace increases and more of the plot is revealed. This is when the character development really starts 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Dysphoria, Adult/minor relationship, Emotional abuse, Addiction, Suicidal thoughts, Child abuse, Mental illness, Rape, Self harm, Domestic abuse, Grief, Sexual content, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Blood, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Confinement, Cursing, Body horror, and Car accident

Minor: Confinement, Medical content, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Vomit, Alcoholism, Fire/Fire injury, Medical trauma, Outing, Drug use, Body shaming, Alcohol, Bullying, Cursing, and Gaslighting

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

bethvance's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-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? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Child abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Death, Toxic relationship, Violence, Self harm, Sexual assault, and Suicide

Moderate: Addiction, Ableism, Bullying, Car accident, and Drug abuse

jmeyer255's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring 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

4.5

If it weren't for how intensly dark parts of this novel were, this would be a 5 star read for me. Yanagihara writes so beautifully and crafts characters with so much depth you begin to care about them like your own friends. It's inspiring how she is able to pull such positive morals from a story filled with so much pain and sadness. If you are in a mental place to read A Little Life, I would highly recommend it. Just be aware of the content warnings if you personally are dealing with issues of mental health. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Ableism, Child abuse, Self harm, Adult/minor relationship, Fire/Fire injury, Suicide attempt, Medical trauma, and Mental illness

Moderate: Rape, Toxic relationship, and Suicide

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

maisieme123's review against another edition

dark emotional sad medium-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

4.0

beautiful writing and character building, however did seem to drag but some could argue the detail was necessary. extremely tragic but is that much trauma realistic for one person?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Trafficking, Child abuse, Drug use, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Suicide attempt, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, Sexual assault, Grief, Self harm, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Kidnapping, Ableism, Fire/Fire injury, Medical content, Addiction, Blood, Death, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Bullying, Forced institutionalization, Violence, Vomit, Abandonment, Body shaming, Child death, Emotional abuse, Car accident, and Death of parent

minimimi's review against another edition

Grotesque trauma porn for the hetero author’s gays—goes far beyond the “Kill your gays” troupe. Technically, this book is horrendous and the editor should think twice about their career.
DONT FALL INTO SUNKEN COST FALLACY JUST BECAUSE THE BOOK IS LONG DOESNT MEAN YOUR REDEMPTION OR CATHARSIS IS COMING—because it’s not. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Addiction, Rape, Drug abuse, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual content, Mental illness, Homophobia, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Medical trauma, Drug use, Self harm, Toxic relationship, Grief, Cursing, Chronic illness, Child abuse, Sexual assault, Violence, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Outing, Fire/Fire injury, and Emotional abuse

ibjilln's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

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

0.25

No. Fuck this book. 
If you're looking to read this, don't. 
It is nothing but gratuitous misery porn. 
It is not a book about friendship - it is a book about enablers and people taking advantage of one another. 
The characters do not grow, or develop, but instead are simple "plot" devices to keep the pages going and they hash out the same problem over and over again. It's hard to feel anything for them when they do nothing to help themselves/their situation. 
It's 700 pages of Jude unwilling to face reality that he's been horribly mistreated by nearly every one in his world, including his "friends", and in turn mistreating those that do care.

Jude could've saved himself, and us, the pain by ending it 700 pages sooner or fucking accepting help and going to therapy

.
Once again, no. Fuck this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Gore, Medical trauma, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Ableism, Addiction, Confinement, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Vomit, Drug abuse, Drug use, Dysphoria, and Eating disorder

Dead dove; do not eat