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Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

The Trouble with Hating You by Sajni Patel

90 reviews

drishthings's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful lighthearted 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

loved the book 
the indian aspect was *chefs kiss* 
i just got annoyed with the heroine a bit

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brokenbodybitch's review against another edition

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medium-paced

4.25

I did enjoy the book, however I do want to put a warning in here that it is a much heavier book then I was anticipating and the content warnings shouldn’t be taken lightly.

The romance in this book is pretty good, the chemistry between the characters is definitely well written and at times, they do questionable things but generally there is some reasoning (in this book the reason is very often a trauma response or something related to fears and trauma) that makes it so you can still root for the MC or LI. I really enjoy how you can tell their upbringing and what they went through up till now really motivated their actions and often times, you can see the bouncing ball of oh well this is because of this and stuff like that you aren’t left wondering what possessed them to do whatever they did.

I am not south Asian so I can’t speak on the accuracy or quality of the rep but I think the family dynamics in this book were really well done, yes don’t get me wrong a lot of the family was just straight up insufferable and I would gladly like to clock her dad in the face, however the dynamics and relationships between characters felt very real and they stayed true throught the book. I find when some authors try to write family dynamics with generational trauma and abuse and heavier more complicated things like that they will sometimes have these happy endings that while nice, ultimately don’t seem all that realistic, where as in this book her father is vile her entire childhood (for whatever reasons) and he didn’t have this seemingly instant magical turn around, his actions lined up with how his character had been set up from the beginning, and that was with all the characters I can think of.

I really enjoyed this book, yes it is a romance but it also deals with trauma from many many different angles as well as having South Asian representation. At times it reads a little more like a YA/NA romance but all in all, the characters have clear and developed backstories and it deals with trauma from so many sides that it felt like it had another purpose beyond the romance.

Extra CW/TW:
The biggest ones to be aware of are SA between an adult and minor, being told you are lying about it and other horrible things along those lines by many people but especially parental figures, and the trauma that goes along with SA, in particular childhood SA. It is handled fairly well by the end of the book and does have a positive ending but it can be very heavy at times; and I can’t speak on childhood SA but from a general SA trauma perspective it was pretty accurately portrayed. Again I’m not the authority on this, but I don’t think it is harmful rep by any means just very possibly triggering for someone with those potential triggers. It’s not a bad book I don’t think, just be very cautious going into it 

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sridevi93's review against another edition

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

3.5


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lesliehirgelt's review against another edition

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

3.25

I was looking for something lighthearted, quick, and easy to read, and this did meet those criteria. However, I felt the writing style was more appropriate to a story about high school-age characters, maybe even younger. For a story about adults, presumably in their mid-20s (ish) and into professional careers, the language choice was often eyebrow-raising (saying things like "crap" instead of "shit"; calling someone of the parents' generation "old man," etc.) and felt immature. I kept reading because I became invested in the story and liked the characters, but the juxtaposition of adult characters with immature language choice made it difficult.

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sowm's review against another edition

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2.0

I did like the romance aspect. Hated almost every other part of it though. I thought Liya was great. Hated her parents. Hated basically all the parent's except for Jay's mom. I thought this would be a lighthearted romance novel, but it was darker than that. I also think that generally, the execution could have been better.

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raina_61's review against another edition

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4.25

Fan-fucking-tastic

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zoiebell's review against another edition

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emotional funny inspiring 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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bandysbooks's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense fast-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

3.75

A love story of two people who have experienced a lot of trauma. They must learn to trust each other and that leads into a deeper than normal romance story. I liked that this book talked about actual real issues 

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renaaa_'s review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective 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

This was an amazing book. The FMC and MMC are both non traditional in their very traditional Indian community. The FMC is ostracized from her community, but she still makes an effort to show up for her loved ones. The relationship between the two main characters was really authentic and I love that they both help each other grow and handle their grief/trauma. TW for SA

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susanknights's review against another edition

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emotional sad tense 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? It's complicated

4.25


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