Reviews with content warning for Miscarriage - Breakfast at Tiffany's & Other Voices, Other Rooms

Reviews tagging 'Miscarriage'

Breakfast at Tiffany's & Other Voices, Other Rooms by Truman Capote

33 reviews

acogna's review against another edition

lighthearted fast-paced

3.5

I don't know why we still point to Scott Pilgrim as the prime pop culture example for manic pixie dream girls when this book predates that by almost fifty years.

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vivisms_82's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

If you have seen the 1961 film, just be prepared this novella of which it is based is vastly different. Holly Golightly is a very modern woman for its 1958 publication. As much as I adore Audrey Hepburn and I think she did great with the script she was given, I like this Holly so much more. Set in the 1940s, on the upper east side of Manhattan, an unknown narrator recounts meeting slender, Tawny haired, Holly and their time together. We meet Holly in 1943; she is nearly 19 years old. A tale of escape; the endless pursuit of searching for one's place in the world whilst trying to be true to who they are.

Michael C. Hall narrates and he is marvellous.

Spoilers ahead!!

I love Holly - she is hedonistic but not obnoxiously so. She has interesting views for the time; no doubt a reflection of the numerous ladies in Capote's circle :) She is of the opinion people should be able to marry whomever they wish, thinks most people are bi-sexual, she has had 11 sexual partners (it is implied this is somewhat in exchange for money, jewellery and her cafe-society lifestyle but also because she dam well wants too!). She regularly visits a man in prison - he gives her $100 each visit in exchange for her company and her passing on information to his mafia "family" on the outside. She gets pregnant by Jose but miscarries during her deep despair and grief over the death of her beloved brother Fred. She lives life to the beat of her own drum and will not be tied down to anyone or anything. I love her voice, the free-spirit, open-mindedness she has. The sad truth is that this is mostly influenced by circumstance beyond her control - her and her brother were orphaned in Texas and went on to live with a man called Doc and his children. He then marries her before she is even 14 yrs old! No wonder she ran away and sought out a world of carefree fun and glitz with little regard for sensibility and responsibility. She likes her freedom and regular mentions her dislike for animals being caged. Tiffany's is the only place she feels calms her anxiety and restlessness. The last we hear from her is in 1956 where she was in Africa and a statue was made in her likeness.

Brilliant!

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kimveach's review against another edition

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reflective medium-paced

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

3.75

After watching the second season of Feud, I felt I needed to read something by Capote besides "In Cold Blood." I enjoyed "Breakfast" and the other short stories. Most of his fiction was a thinly veiled autobiography. His way of looking at people and his ability to turn them into interesting characters were intriguing. Now, I need to rewatch the movie to see how it relates to the book.

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hazeld's review against another edition

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funny reflective fast-paced

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

5.0

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mysimas's review against another edition

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Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

1.5

How are people tagging this as light-hearted is beyond me, this is a story of a sad little girl - runaway child bride who'd slept with people, or should I say had been sexually taken advantage of, even before she married at 14 - who's all alone in the world and goes through all kinds of bad things in the present-time plotline of the book, including

miscarriage, numerous unwanted sexual advances, abandonment, the death of her beloved brother, a (probably accidental) entanglement with mafia and her subsequent interrogation, and more

... Light-hearted, where??

Also, for the most part, it was just boring. Yet another bleh manic pixie dream girl fantasy. I did perk up at the

mafia twist

, but by then the story was over. :(

Last but not least, heads up for a lot of racism and for some reason hate against lesbians (???).

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caribbeangirlreading's review

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fast-paced

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

2.5

Full disclosure - I have never watched the movie adaptation with Audrey Hepburn. However, I did go into reading Breakfast at Tiffany's with pre-conceived notions. I expected this to be a lighthearted novella. It was not. For starters, Truman Capote sure does love him some racial slurs. And Holly Golightly was just a sad train wreck of a character. But also, boy was this campy and very, very gay.

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herelieshenry's review against another edition

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lighthearted mysterious reflective fast-paced

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

4.0

Truman was an incredible writer, and I think overall the prose here is as masterful as his tends to be, but it’s worth noting that this book has a lot of depictions of people having deeply entrenched biases and using very derogatory language. Personally, I find the “historical accuracy”/“it’s of its times” argument complicated at best when it is employed: to be clear, I’m willing to approach a work where it’s at, but if I think the bigoted sentiments being depicted are being endorsed within the narrative or by the author, the time and place in which it was written doesn’t make a difference in my judgment of something. Ultimately, I don’t think Capote was agreeing with the characters in this work (or in much any of his work, really), so much as showing us a lense into the world he saw around him. That being said, I still wouldn’t be able to in good conscience recommend this to people as an “entertainment” read, especially without huge caveats for period-typical language and depictions of various kinds of bigotry.

Something I find interesting about Holly Golightly in the book, as opposed to the film, is that she is far more overtly flawed and ergo more human—I know a lot of people say she’s the manic pixie dream girl prototype, but to me, the film embodies that much more than the book. The book contains fragments of that, for sure, but it feels more like a story about people perceiving someone in that way than a story pushing the concept; Holly’s presence is ephemeral, fleeting, but also incredibly sharp and sometimes callous, and in her, I can’t help but see Nina Capote (or Lillie Mae Faulk), Truman’s mother. I think that in itself is a big part of why she’s seen in such a glittering way despite being a relatively bad friend and person, not to mention the animosity broiling beneath the narrator’s surface towards her just as much as his affection for her. Glamorous, hell-bent on becoming part of a particular upper echelon of society, and ultimately, as cruel beneath the surface as they are enthralling: these words describe Holly, Truman, and Nina each in their own right.

At its core, this is a story of home, of belonging, of identity, and of the search for that: but central to that, too, is both hopefulness and uncertainty. The characters at play, obviously save for the cat, are generally not very likeable. The facts about Holly Golightly are on unstable ground, and how accurate the narrator’s interpretation of her is, as well; as for the narrator, his identity in the story is built up entirely around his connection to Holly, and despite us knowing his life extends beyond her, he does not share it with us. Their characters are reflected in the cat, who ultimately may have found a name of his own, but as he doesn’t belong to Holly or to the narrator in the end, we never learn it; he is ultimately both a symbol of freedom and of belonging, and in the end, it seems he may be the only one who has settled into a home. Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a dreamlike snapshot of New York café society from its fringes, transient and grimy, longing for home and leaving us wondering if the narrator or the central heroine ever found it.

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alipp's review against another edition

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lighthearted medium-paced

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

2.75

I thought I’d enjoy this more than I did, I hadn’t seen the movie for 10-15 years but it was a bit different than I remembered. Didn’t recall all of the slurs used. Holly Is an interesting character and I wonder how it would’ve been different if written by a woman. Felt like I had to finish it bc it’s a classic & the second half went down easier than the first! Took awhile to get into it for such a short book though.

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andersonstovall's review

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dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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rachel_here's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.25

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