Reviews tagging 'Car accident'

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel

66 reviews

pokewhat's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring fast-paced

4.5

Bechdel's memoir is a gripping retelling of her early life and her relationship with her father as well as herself. The illustrations capture so many details of her past, while her prose captures you and carries you through the pages. 

The way she relates all the things that happened in her life then, with her sexuality, her father's sexuality, her tense home life, her father's death, and her coming to terms with it, all along with occurrences in literature that dominated her life during those times, as well as the greater world, it's honestly impressive. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship and Car accident

Minor: Pedophilia and Suicide

kaetheluise_nckl's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Death, Outing, Death of parent, Sexual content, and Car accident

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship and Grief

Minor: Blood, Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, and Injury/Injury detail

OCD (mentioned briefly, undiagnosed)

tiernanhunter's review against another edition

dark emotional funny reflective fast-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Car accident, Suicide, Grief, and Mental illness

Moderate: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, and Physical abuse

krivas91's review against another edition

reflective slow-paced

3.5

3.5 stars? I always find it weird rating an author’s autobiographical content…but there’s still things that can be said. I appreciate the author’s extreme openness with her readers, and found it just really interesting to view her experience coming out as a lesbian while becoming aware of her father’s sexual activities and advances toward young men (teenagers), and figuring herself out as a child of two parents who did not outwardly/visibly show her love and affection hardly ever. 

However, there were so many times that the text was just so heavy (in the emotional sense, but also the literal-literature sense), and I found myself asking if we were even intended to read the images when she would picture mostly illegible letters by her father. 

Also, one review here noted the “references to classic literature that are carefully, artfully implemented and never daunting,” but I’d have to disagree; I understand that she connected to her father through literature and that’s why she included so much of it in her recollection, but I do think I felt like I was really missing something when I didn’t understand references or a few high-vocabulary words. I don’t think she could have written her way totally around that (or that she should have), but I do fear that some readers who could really use exposure to the coming out + family relationships content might be turned off of this book earlier on because of the dense presence of classic literature references.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Sexual content, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Car accident, Suicide, Lesbophobia, and Death

jaywithwhiskey's review against another edition

lighthearted reflective sad slow-paced

2.0

It was fine. I think this book was much more hyped up than I enjoyed it. I read this after someone told me this is where the Bechdel test started - sadly I thought it was this book particularly - so I was waiting for when it came around. It never did. I was bored through most of the story sadly, I couldn't relate this this story but I appreciate it for what it is. Just not for me. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Car accident, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Drug use, Lesbophobia, Misogyny, Death, Infidelity, Rape, and Grief

beata's review against another edition

 Maybe I didn't pay close enough attention to the blurb, but when I read that the father was gay, I did not expect to see in the book itself that he slept with "boys" aka his high school students. Then I immediatly thought oh, he killed himself because the truth was out and he was facing charges. But no, he maybe killed himself because his wife was finally fed up and asked for divorce. He was even facing charges years before, on surface about giving alcohol to minor but if the author is to believed with unspoken accusation of at least soliciting minor (maybe even full on sexual assault). 
The story is messed up on many many levels. First, her father was himself sexually abused as a child. Then he went on to do this to others. Then we learn that his psychiatrist very possibly had an affair with him during court mandated appointments?! Of course I also can't forget physical abuse of his own children. And last but not least was the author glossing over the abuse her father inflicted on others. 
I'll be honest with you, I've read graphic novels a lot longer than this one, and they felt shorter.
I will not rate it, lately I'm more reluctant to rate non-fiction, especially of the memoir kind. Who am I to say if someone's life story is a 3 or 5 star?
This will definitely stay with me, though not necessarily in a good way. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Death, and Death of parent

Minor: Sexual assault and Adult/minor relationship

waytoomanybooks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

4.0

There's nothing I can say about Fun Home that hasn't already been said by better, smarter people with better, smarter vocabulary, so I'll just say that I found this book deeply relatable, deeply sad, and deeply hopeful. It's a gorgeous book with gorgeous prose and gorgeous illustrations. I highly recommend it, but it's not for the faint of heart. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Grief, Lesbophobia, Pedophilia, Death, Death of parent, Mental illness, Car accident, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Infidelity, Suicide attempt, and Suicide

thesuperkim's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense fast-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Car accident, and Death

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Suicide, Alcohol, Lesbophobia, and Infidelity

Minor: Toxic relationship, Sexual assault, Homophobia, and Body horror

maggiegirouard's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Sexual content, Adult/minor relationship, Death, and Death of parent

Moderate: Physical abuse, Alcohol, Car accident, Medical content, Infidelity, Violence, Mental illness, and Cursing

literaryinluv's review against another edition

dark emotional funny hopeful reflective slow-paced

3.75

You can't really put a rating on someone's life or perspective of their life. But you can on the execution. This memoir is littered with literary references, sometimes to a fault, but I enjoyed most of them anyway. However, it also got a bit convoluted due to this. Overall, though, I enjoyed it, and I believe the rating may be higher if I read it a second time in the future.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent and Death

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Car accident, and Suicide

Minor: Infidelity, Lesbophobia, Alcohol, Homophobia, Grief, Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, Sexual content, and Biphobia