Reviews tagging 'Medical trauma'

How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

49 reviews

viireads's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective tense slow-paced

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

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Terminal illness, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cancer, Chronic illness, Confinement, Stalking, and Pregnancy

Minor: Animal death, Death, Drug use, Suicide, Murder, and War

jmcampbell57's review against another edition

The child euthanasia rollercoaster was deeply upsetting and I couldn't continue.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Terminal illness

Moderate: Suicide and Medical trauma

bethboo's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

I have mixed feelings about this book. It was recommended to me, similar to Cloud Cuckoo Land. I don't know how true that is, since I have never read CCL. This book didn't have a main character. It was a collection of stories from different peoples points of view. Each narrative had certain details that ran through them all or references to past stories. Each one had something to do with human nature in the face of a death focused world. It was interesting and it felt like there was some weight to it because of the pandemic. 
It had a few stories that were just plain weird. Not dark or edgy or different. Just fucking weird, that made me make a face and wish that their narrative would end ASAP. Those kind of took the magic out of the book for me. Like the pig one or the copycat Eternals moment at the end. 
I really enjoyed the story of the guy who worked at the amusement park and fell in love with the mom. I enjoyed the painter's story. The one with the guy working at the print house was sad.
My stars are given for my level of enjoyment, not the inherent worth of the book. So, while the book was very well written with a cast of characters trying to piece their humanity, culture, and image of death together was a wonderful subplot, I found myself bored at moments and a little unattached to certain characters. I'm glad I read it, but it will not be a reread option for me. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Grief, and Death of parent

Moderate: Medical content and Medical trauma

lilacwhisker's review against another edition

emotional inspiring mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A must-read. My new favorite book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cancer, Chronic illness, Death, Terminal illness, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Death of parent

Moderate: Addiction and Abandonment

danaaliyalevinson's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful 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? No

5.0

Beautiful, emotional, sometimes funny, Kafka-esque, and existential. This book is about love, death, the need for human connection; about the failures of capitalism and hope that humanity will find a way to chart a better future. This is one of those books that will have me thinking for a long time. 

To call it a novel I think is somewhat of a misnomer. It’s kind of a strange love child between a novel and a short story collection. But the stories are all interwoven and take place against the backdrop of a singular uniting event. This structure also drives home one of the themes of the book, which is the ways in which we form human connection, sometimes unexpectedly. Sometimes the narrator from a previous chapter will pop up as a side character in another person’s chapter and we get updates on their life, which was also always welcome.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Medical content, Grief, and Medical trauma

thepermageek's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

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

5.0

A soaring novel that is structured almost like a series of overlapping and intermingling short stories. 

Only thing I wish is that this had been longer! 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content and Medical trauma

Moderate: Grief

danikajoan's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-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

Wow wow reading this directly after Sea of Tranquility made for a very interesting pandemic/sci-fi double-feature 😬 I really liked this one, especially once the stories began to weave together. It is MUCH more sad than I was expecting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Suicide, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, and Death of parent

colwellcat's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

"This is a fucking heavy book.  Desolate and sad,  but also ambitious and lightly insane."

How high we go in the dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu, released earlier this year. 

 An utterly haunting and beyond strange book about death, resilience and moving on from loss in an uncertain future.  Not really a novel as much as a series of short stories or vignettes with a central thread. 

The pace is slow,  and it does feel a bit muddling for a while in the second half - I very nearly DNF'd, so I  can't recommend this unreservedly. But despite the constant morbidity, there's an odd beauty to its meditative reflection. 

"You had a vision of what life would be like for future generations and acted like the planet had a gun to our head. And maybe it does."

Uncannily prescient, this is (another) global plague narrative, written before the present pandemic, against the backdrop of a dying, climate afflicted Earth. 

Hard content earnings for,  well,  most things,  but especially child death,  terminal illness,  medical trauma and suicide. Save this read for when you're in a good frame of mind.

4 stars.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Death

Moderate: Suicide, Terminal illness, and Medical trauma

colie923's review against another edition

adventurous emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, and Alcohol

Moderate: Infidelity, Racism, Xenophobia, and Medical trauma

emzireads's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism

Moderate: Terminal illness, Medical content, Grief, and Medical trauma

Minor: Suicide