Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

32 reviews

gh1's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense slow-paced

2.5


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

jbrown1120's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark fast-paced

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

clareehebert's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

4.25


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

eleeowart's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark informative tense medium-paced

4.0

Read this to pay dues to one of the original crime reporting novels and Capotes journalistic prose made clear why this is a classic. Really enjoyed how it was written (alternating between those investigating, and the actual guilty parties). Capote gave insight into the lives and minds of people who commit these awful motiveless crimes, while still honoring the lives of those lost AND the ones impacted via their line of work. Overall, really well done. 

Didn’t LOVE the racist slurs/phrases used but understand it was reporting and that was the 1950s. 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

hoey_girlboss_queen's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

truly captivating book

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

vireoeo's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.25

I went into this book curious about the origins of modern true crime, and came out of it with a lot of complicated and unexpected emotions. This book bounces around between a half-dozen stories throughout time, which is one of my favorite narrative devices and is executed really well.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

bcooper21's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious tense medium-paced

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

henrygravesprince's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

3.75

Capote’s prose is masterful, but the non-fiction aspect was handled in a way I don’t find responsible, and I think that, as one of the first major modern true crime media “sensations”, In Cold Blood embodies many of the same problems that true crime media, particularly dramatizations, maintains today. I don’t dislike Capote, and in fact I quite like his writing for the most part, but I couldn’t in good conscience give this book a wholly glowing review. There would still be issues if I looked at it the way one looks at fiction, but monumentally less — that said, it is not purely fiction, and I can’t look at this novel & not be acutely aware of the fact that these were real people & the facts were embellished in ways that can’t really be brushed off, in my opinion.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

librarymouse's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging emotional informative sad medium-paced

4.25

This text was jarring in that there was vibrant and comprehensive descriptions of seemingly innocuous details and then facts like Hickock's pedophilic tendencies were dropped into the middle of a paragraph, only to be left and then picked up again after dozens of pages. The descriptions of the Clutters, their family life, their friends, and their pastoral joys made the details of their deaths all the more profoundly upsetting. I appreciated the depth of research that went into this book and the information given on the communities the Clutters and their killers spent time in, but I am also, in some ways, upset with the lengths at which this book works to humanize the killers. It's bitter to feel something akin to empathy with either of them or the men that lived with them on death row.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

dudajoia's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

5.0

Na introdução da minha edição, quando eu li que o Capote se gabava de ter escrito uma obra-prima, fiquei com um pé atrás com ele, e no fundo quis provar que o livro não era tudo isso. Mas pior que é. Você demora a se acostumar com o ritmo e as descrições muito bem detalhadas de tudo envolto na trama, mas logo cada menção mostra o seu propósito, com o talento e o domínio de texto do Capote piscando o olho pra você. Não esperava o tamanho respeito no texto que (apesar das discussões) afirma ser o primeiro de seu tipo, digo isso depois de consumir muito "true crime". A humanidade latente das páginas toma a sua atenção e seu fôlego como reféns, o que não é fácil para uma história tão cruel e tão triste como essa. Ele é excelente ao mostrar todas as pequenas sombras, as sutilezas, as ironias e o absurdo de tudo isso. Jornalismo literário em excelência. Quanto às críticas, 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings