Reviews tagging 'Medical content'

The Pisces by Melissa Broder

3 reviews

roraisabella's review against another edition

dark sad fast-paced

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

2.75

this book was enjoyable, but i just couldn’t get past how insufferable the main character is. she is terrible and selfish and while that might be the point i don’t know, i just couldn’t enjoy her never-ending monologues. her internalised misogyny is too much. the love scenes were good but not a lot else. don’t read this if suicide themes, animal abuse and addiction trigger you. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Misogyny, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Medical content, Car accident, Suicide attempt, and Alcohol

literarytaurean's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

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

5.0

Melissa Broder just solidified herself as my favorite author alive (Rooney is probably second). She is always so raw and ugly in the most realistic sense while sucking you into mentally and sexually disturbed scenarios. Her writing is honest and twisted and relatable and I couldn't find anything better for myself. She's the only author I can read 150+ pgs per sitting, she's incredible.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Excrement, Grief, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Stalking

cheye13's review against another edition

dark reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

Sigmund Freud and Judith Butler would go to town on this. And the ensuing debate would be more interesting than this novel. This was a boring Rachel Bloom's Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and a bland Zaina Arafat's You Exist Too Much.

Unlike many earlier readers, I didn't pick this up for hot mermaid sex; I picked this up because those earlier readers said it was a wild ride. It disappoints on both fronts: first of all, the merman sex, while indeed hot, doesn't happen until a full halfway through the book, and is preceeded by quite a bit of terrible human sex. Second, it was more realism than it was ridiculous.

This novel did help me narrow down my ennui of millennial literary fiction. So much of that niche relies on "shock" fiction, but the "shock" is through explicit realism, which isn't shocking at all when you've lived it. Tragic public bathroom hookups, terrible first-anal-attempt stories, graphic discussion of suicide – I can accidentally overhear all that in a nightclub line on a weeknight.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, and Blood

Moderate: Addiction, Forced institutionalization, Excrement, Suicide attempt, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Self harm, Vomit, Medical content, and Abortion