Reviews tagging 'Medical content'

Roxy by Jarrod Shusterman, Neal Shusterman

18 reviews

rachelbram's review

medium-paced

3.0

Extremely disappointed by the portrayal of Adderall, as well as of ADHD. I don't think this was their intention, but the authors really imply that people who have ADHD and are prescribed medication will abuse it, when people who abuse Adderall usually do not fall in those categories. Where the hell was Ivy's doctor? How did she "up her dosage" when the book never indicates she used less than legitimate means to access her medication?

I feel like it's a cool idea in theory to portray drugs as gods. But I can't think of a way to execute this concept without inherently moralizing these drugs, simply by giving them personalities. I'm still not sure what to make of the idea that a drug can fall in love with a person? What does that mean?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Drug use, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Death

Minor: Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, and Medical content

bright_eyed_and_bookish's review

dark hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

I thought the personification of the drugs and the metaphor of the party were choices that made the book quite interesting. I think it is a cool way to help educate people on what the drugs in question do. I did think at times that the authors tried to make it a little too poetic. It would be useful if the book told us which drug each fictional name referred to, because I understood most, but not others.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Medical content

aishablue's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Blood, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, and Mental illness

Moderate: Alcohol, Car accident, Medical content, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, and Violence

booksargram's review

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child death, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gaslighting, Self harm, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Alcoholism, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Mental illness

princess_peach's review

challenging dark reflective sad tense fast-paced

4.0

I enjoyed this book as much as one can enjoy a book about addiction. It was interesting to have the perspectives of both Roxy and Adderall along with the two main characters, Issac and Ivy. I've seen some criticisms about stigmatizing the use of Adderall, which I understand and maybe the authors could have at least put an author's note highlighting that medications help many many many people and that medication stigma is a harmful barrier to people asking for or accessing needed medications.

I think the scenes with Rit(alin) and Adderall are really helpful to show how much the medication does help and how it is a good tool to use for ADD and ADHD. Ivy's increase in productivity and focus when she's taking it as prescribed shows that it works as it's being used. Ivy's misuse of the medication shows that it, along with any other drugs, can be harmful when misused. Roxy's statements about how it "helps people" are more clear-- more "told than showed", whereas Adderall's was more "shown than told."

I don't think that the book specifies that Adderall is inherently more or worse than other drugs that are used or misused; rather that it can be misused. I think it's an interesting approach to use prescription drugs as the main drugs of the book because prescription drugs may be more accessible. A guide for the names of the drugs would have been helpful, and the "Party" could have been a little more clearly explained. Also, the time line of events seemed a little rushed for me, though to be fair, I don't know if there's a "typical" timeline for addiction.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Dysphoria, Gaslighting, Medical content, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Car accident, Grief, Violence, and Vomit

hannalizzy's review

dark mysterious sad fast-paced

3.5

I liked this book! It was definitely worth a read. I’ve never seen a story that balances a dream world/real world so well in live time and multiple POVs. I found the different drug references interesting, and it was kind of fun to try and figure out what characters represented each drug. Fast paced, well done, very sad but with a hopeful end for one of the siblings. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Car accident and Death

Minor: Grief, Medical content, Suicidal thoughts, and Vomit

racheleclark's review

challenging informative mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Medical content, Self harm, and Suicidal thoughts

chloeeee's review

dark emotional sad slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, and Death

Moderate: Medical content, Mental illness, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Car accident, Eating disorder, Vomit, Violence, and Suicidal thoughts