Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Personal Effects: What Recovering the Dead Teaches Me about Caring for the Living by Robert A. Jensen

5 reviews

swamprat410's review

dark informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail

lilla_my's review

challenging dark reflective medium-paced

3.5

I was really excited for this book but it ended up being disappointing. This book had SO MUCH potential!! I think the problem with the book doesn't lie with the author or his retelling of events, but with the editor. There were grammatical mistakes and there were parts that should've been taken out or abridged, things that should've been rearranged, etc. Sometimes it felt like awkward journal entries rather than a memoir or a book on mass fatality incidents.
I hope the author continues to write nonfiction and that if he publishes another book, it ends up in the hands of a better editor.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, and Murder

Moderate: Genocide, Police brutality, and Mass/school shootings

clarabooksit's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective medium-paced

3.5

Jensen has dedicated his life to an important and fascinating job. Here he details some of the most horrific and tragic mass fatalities in the last several decades with sensitivity, grace, and unwavering respect for both the living and the dead. There were parts of this book I could not put down.

However, I find I have to agree with many other reviewers that this needed better editing: there are so many repetitions—some passages are nearly verbatim in two or more chapters—and there are parts that feel anecdotal, even superficial, where I wanted more information, depth and nuance.

I’m glad I read it, though, and I’d still recommend it. It’s a good read but maybe not an exceptional one.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Violence, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Genocide, Gore, Blood, and Fire/Fire injury

queenqueso's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

4.0

A heavy read for sure, but one with equal parts intense emotion and calm understanding. Definitely heed content warnings but still worth a read .

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, and Grief

cblunier's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Gore, Violence, Grief, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail