Reviews with content warning for Self harm - Half Bad

I really don't need or want to read about a teenage boy being tortured while waxing poetic about his deadbeat dad. One I might've been able to deal with, but both is just too much. I've read the plot synopsis for this and the two other books and tbh I don't think I'll get much out of finishing this book or reading the other two.

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max_vampire's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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cherryblossomreads's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad tense 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

5.0

This is definitely a "first in the series" filled with questions and fewer answers. Nathan is very hard to not care for and even at his worst I just wish him happiness.
The plot moves slowly in this one, but I do not mean this as a bad thing. It gives the reader time to get to know the characters.
The magic seems realistic and is so subtly described I believe it exists somewhere. I love this about it.
When the book ends you definitely need to pick up the next - if not for the plot, then for Nathan.

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vikv_art's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This is a reread and I loved it. When I first finished the book back in 2018 (I think) it was 3-3.5 stars, but after I read it I couldn't stop thinking about the characters so I continued with the series, which is my absolute favorite series. The first time I read it the graphic content triggered me, but now that I knew what was coming not so much. But even if it was a reread I had forgotten so many things as the whole series is really fast paced and exciting and definitely a page turner so it was nice reminding myself of them. The friendship between Nathan and Gabriel developed almost out if nowhere (kinda- we just didn't see that much of them bonding on the page), but as I know what happens in the next two books and they are my favorite characters I don't mind haha. It's interesting that I loved Nathan much more now than than I read the book for the first time.

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kassidyreads's review against another edition

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dark medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

1.5

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syuudim's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark sad tense fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

09/28/2020 – i definitely liked this a lot more than i was expecting, and now that i've finished it, while what i feel for this novel is not quite a love-hate relationship, it's culminated in more of a... love-but-i-remain-wary sort of feeling.

this is a book that's amazingly written. the writing is deceptively simple, and dangerously compelling. it's light on description but heavy on content, and things happen Fast, my god. from the very beginning, the story swoops you up in a whirlwind that you have very little chance of getting out of because you're caught up in somewhere in between 'this might as well happen' and 'i wanna see where this takes me.' which is how i found myself reading till well past 3 am, despite telling myself at 1 am when i first started that i was only going to read three chapters. give it a try. see where it goes. and then i ended up 66% of the way finished within two hours of me picking up the book.

it's hard for me to describe what the writing style is, but it's damn good, and it's consistent. it's such a style, such a choice, and it finds ways to put words together in the simplest ways but in the most ways you never ever thought of. this is an author who's created her own method of writing and has mastered it, is comfortable in it, and the end product is amazing.

there's a lot of torture and abuse going on, all of it thankfully non-explicit. i really couldn't tell you how this book made me feel, because i was so busy enjoying it. i was so into the story, i as the reader simply did not matter. so wrapped up in the writing, in the story, in nathan, that i just didn't have to think. nathan, the protag, goes through a lot – which is the understatement of the century. it's so impressive how she can write the way she writes, the way we can witness everything that happens to him, and yet still i can feel for him as a character despite the fact that he's not written as the typical ya protagonist – all angsty and tragic and teen-ey (even though he's probably the one ya protag who deserves to act that way!) – nah, this boy is simply Dead Inside. and it's Good. there's no lack of character, and his voice just sounds real. again, it all happens Fast fast. and it's not an effect of bad or lazy writing – that's just the style the author went for, and it works in a way i can't explain because i don't even understand it myself.

i say all this, but i will admit i have more mixed feelings than i wish i had for a book that i enjoyed reading so much. i have my reservations about this book for numerous reasons, just because there's several. nuances and possible symbolisms that i just cannot tell if they are there by accident? was it just ignorance and bad naming? or is it just commentary that's very unsubtle and a little ham-fisted? who knows. i really tried not to think about it as i read, and the writing was just so objectively, breath-takingly captivating (in the most bare sense) that it was easy not to! jury's still out on whether that's a good thing or not.

but bonus:

a pleasantly surprising revelation about a character's sexuality

sadly didn't last long because i was so constantly worried that

she was going to kill him off? gabriel (my god his name is gabriel because of course it is and it's beautiful) is in love with the protag, which is a revelation that came out of nowhere but also everywhere and was beautiful and somehow made sense all at once. i continue to hope he shall not tragically sacrifice himself or something for nathan's sake, because nathan's still in love with annalise which i was okay with in the beginning until she was fine with letting her brothers torture him this close to death. wow, is this section spoilers galore. anyway, despite the casual lgbt addition that i personally really enjoyed, i cannot, cannot find it in me to not fear that it's not going to crush my heart, because the way it's set up, i'm really not counting too much on the author having them end up together. we shall see.

lots of worries. lots of feelings. not all of them good, but the good (at least in the moment) heavily outweighed the geh am i going to regret this terribly?.

tldr; it's a good book. finished it in just under 4 hours like a man possessed. if my gut instincts are correct, i almost don't have it in me to keep reading the rest, but the overall experience excelled so much that i think i owe it to myself to keep reading.

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