Reviews tagging 'Eating disorder'

All This Could Be Different by Sarah Thankam Mathews

7 reviews

jdianm's review

tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Racism, Grief, and Classism

Moderate: Abandonment, Deportation, Addiction, Child abuse, Sexual violence, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Colonisation, and Sexual content

Minor: Eating disorder, Police brutality, and Homophobia

moniipeters's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Homophobia, Racism, Violence, Transphobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Biphobia, Body shaming, Child abuse, Classism, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic friendship, Addiction, Deadnaming, Deportation, Drug abuse, Fatphobia, Gaslighting, Lesbophobia, Racial slurs, Sexual assault, Chronic illness, Cultural appropriation, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Incest, Medical content, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Dysphoria, Eating disorder, and Rape

nfoutty's review

emotional funny hopeful 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault and Child abuse

Moderate: Alcoholism, Addiction, Police brutality, and Alcohol

Minor: Eating disorder and Vomit

kc_onmybookshelf's review

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Homophobia, and Racism

Moderate: Alcoholism, Pedophilia, Child abuse, Drug abuse, and Eating disorder

billyjepma's review

challenging emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.5

I had to read this in increments over several months, not because it wasn’t good or because I wasn’t invested, but because it rang with a truth too heavy for me to manage at the time. I will admit to not reading much fiction of this style—you all know that I live in weird genre stuff almost exclusively—so take this with a grain of salt if you want, but this is one of the most honest and truthful representations of what it feels like to be a twenty-something in America. All of the crushing anxieties over whether you’re political enough, angry at the right things, aware of your internalized prejudices, rebellious against the systems that you know will also keep you alive and happy, the quiet bitterness at how goddamn hard it all is—all of that is here in savage details that feel sharply unique yet fully relatable. 

Even when the protagonist makes mistakes and acts like a shitty person, Matthew’s characterization ensures that we know it’s a side effect of a deeper issue (usually internalized racism, prejudice, or self-hatred redirected outward). Our world is messy, and the people in it are clumsy, and I appreciate it when a book lets its protagonist be messy and clumsy without defining her by those things. 

The book is also rich with cultural specificities that reckon with realities I’ve never experienced or probably considered—the fears, hopes, and other turbulent, fragile emotions involved in trying to, or trying not to, assimilate into a society that might not want you. That Matthews does it with this much confidence and care feels like a massive feat. She wields emotion like a scalpel and a sledgehammer, sometimes simultaneously. It leads to a book that’s often ugly in how honest it is—which is why I had to pace my reading—but also deeply empathetic. There’s tremendous compassion in these pages, compassion that’s informed by harsh realities and supported by fragile hopes that, when carried communally, can become the precious things that keep us alive. 

A wonderful book. I don’t think I’ll ever read it again, but it has left fingerprints on me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Sexual content, Cursing, and Classism

Moderate: Racism, Eating disorder, Alcohol, Police brutality, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Grief, Addiction, Deportation, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Drug abuse, Blood, and Vomit

mmcloe's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense fast-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

Sensational. 

A Jamesian novel of manners for the 21st century. Anthropological in its detail, devastating in its prose, baffling in its psychological depth. This novel is generation-defining. I could wax on it for hours and hours and hours. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Eating disorder, Drug use, Transphobia, and Fatphobia

agustinayloslibros's review

emotional funny hopeful reflective sad 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness and Police brutality

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Racism, Fatphobia, Eating disorder, Xenophobia, Addiction, Classism, and Alcoholism

Minor: Deportation, Drug abuse, Child abuse, and Pedophilia