Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

If He Had Been with Me by Laura Nowlin

129 reviews

ssyydd's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense slow-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


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lindsaymc74's review against another edition

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emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75


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tialyr's review against another edition

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

3.5

Well, I hope you read the reviews because I did not and although the book wasn’t a sad book, the ending was incredibly heart wrenching. It was a slow and steady coming-of-age story from Autumn’s perspective, throughout high school watching her childhood best friend from afar, and living their separate lives. It really was a story of them finding their ways back to each other and how that culminated into a very sweet bit before the end.
I will say, Laura is an excellent writer and when I saw she had published a book from Finn’s perspective, I vowed not to read it because I cannot put myself through the heartbreak again!
I hope if you read this, you feel the nostalgia and wistfulness, and feel the ache of young love and heartbreak again for the sake of realizing the tenderness that also comes along with being a teenager.

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blankeechats's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

I feel as though a 2.5 ⭐️ is too low but a 3 ⭐️ is too high, but what can you do. This book felt very monotone however it was very realatable to me. 

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cleaisreading's review against another edition

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

3.5


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aureum's review against another edition

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dark emotional medium-paced

4.0

For people who love tragedies (me.) At least 7 chapters of my least favorite boyfriend could have been cut (skipped).
I hate suprise pregnancy tropes
chapter 81 made it all worth it

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libraryofsarah's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

 DEPRESSING.

“Can’t sad things be beautiful?”

Yes… but it still hurts. Booktok made me read this. 4 stars because it was well written but honestly I wish I had skipped this one. I should have known better. From chapter 1 I knew this book was going to hurt and it did. The whole thing was painful, in a beautifully written way. I want to scream into the void and eat a pint of ice cream now.

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dtzypig's review against another edition

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dark emotional 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

3.0


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estherhutchinson's review against another edition

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emotional sad slow-paced

3.25


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rachieanniereads's review against another edition

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

2.0

i'm really struggling to understand how this book has so much hype. this was...poorly written, i'm sorry.

where to begin...?

the narrative choice of giving us the ending at the beginning was certainly choice. can't confirm if it was a good one. it took some of the emotional impact out of it, but also made the rest of the book feel like it was written in an odd mix of present and past tense. it seemed like Autumn was speaking/thinking in reflections, but it was written in present tense.

the whole book was telling us everything, but showing us nothing. we got told, repeatedly, how cool, edgy and different Autumn/her friend groups was, but didn't get to see any of that. her "i'm not a cool kid if i do *insert thing here* because the normal popular kids are doing it" internal monologue made me cringe. the only way we were shown that she was super different and quirky and weird xd lol was that she wore a tiara...all the time...with every outfit. i don't understand pls.

the dialouge was so clunky. we barely got any for the first half of the book. but when we did get dialouge it was dry and unrealistic. "okay." "haha." "oh." it felt like reading someone talk to their nonchalant situationship that doesn't care to hold a conversation.

the descriptions of high school like felt so stereotypical with no level of realism. popular cheerleaders that have an unspoken rivalry with the edgy kids? not cookie cutter at all.

again, so many aspects of this felt unrealistic especially
multiple pregnancies among the characters after one singular time having unprotected sex. yes, it's possible, but also not common enough for it to happen twice within the same novel. one felt unnecessary, and the other felt like a convenient plot device to prevent suicide
 

i'm genuinely confused if i read the same book as all these 5 star reviews. 2 stars just because i did feel compelled in some way to finish it. 

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