Reviews tagging 'Alcoholism'

Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

36 reviews

moonwillow27458's review

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexism, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Body shaming, Terminal illness, and Gaslighting

emjames22's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Homophobia, and Suicide

haileyeh's review

dark sad fast-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, and Suicide

Moderate: Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Forced institutionalization, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Cancer, Homophobia, Infertility, Infidelity, and Abortion

taylorgraves555's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Sexual content, and Alcohol

readingwith_bre's review

dark slow-paced

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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, and Suicide

gabriella_'s review

dark emotional funny sad tense

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

4.5

this book is going to haunt me, i know it. parts of the book are tough to swallow (esp the fatphobia/body shaming, ableism, and homophobia) but if you can power through, it’s so worth it. idk if this is a hot take but i think it has a similar message to the barbie movie but it does it better

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Cancer, Confinement, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

subtlymelancholy's review

dark emotional reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

It's a slow start but if you really like Old Hollywood (before the collapse of the studio system, so like 1940s-60s) once you start it's REALLY difficult to put it down.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Cancer, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Infidelity, Misogyny, Sexism, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Suicide attempt, Lesbophobia, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

There are a lot of seriously triggering topics covered in this book and it's not really something that can easily be skipped over. It's also a combination of the characters' internalized feelings and the result of the time and place the book was written.

riley2005's review

dark emotional funny reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism and Drug abuse

Moderate: Cancer, Fatphobia, and Homophobia

Minor: Abortion

lowkey need a hbo remake miniseries about this, was so sad when jennifer died, she was my favorite character

rose12435's review

dark emotional sad fast-paced

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

4.0

This book is dark and like bojack horseman for girls that enjoy drama and misery. While this book isn't happy, I genuinely enjoyed finding out how much worse the characters could get.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Body shaming, Cancer, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

This book is dark and not afraid to hurt it's reader. Please please please be careful when reading it

robyn1998's review

dark funny informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

I'm glad I read this, but if I ever read the trigger warnings I would've left it alone. There's an enormous amount of diet talk, specific weights (some of which were a bit too real for me), ED behaviour and so on. Not to mention the fatphobia and dehumanisation of women. 
That being said, it's 4 stars because it was somehow so entertaining. I just couldn't put it down. It was like a time capsule and I love that in a book, especially when it's set in the US in the middle of the 20th century. Makes me want to read more Truman Capote books. I liked the characterisations, even though the characters themselves were mostly horrible.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexism, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Abortion, Suicide attempt, and Classism