Reviews with content warning for Suicide - Dreamland

Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

lzjolo's review against another edition

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funny hopeful informative inspiring sad medium-paced

4.0

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jwalton23's review

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emotional reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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jade_sanderson's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

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

3.25

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klm2620's review

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emotional reflective slow-paced

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

2.5

Slow moving plot with predictable ending

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kelly_e's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

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

2.75

Title: Dreamland
Author: Nicholas Sparks
Genre: Romance
Rating: 2.75
Pub Date: September 20, 2022

T H R E E • W O R D S

Musical • Cliché • Unpredictable

📖 S Y N O P S I S

Colby Mills once felt destined for a musical career, until tragedy grounded his aspirations. Now the head of a small family farm in North Carolina, he spontaneously takes a gig playing at a bar in St. Pete's Beach, Florida, seeking a rare break from his duties at home.

But when he meets Morgan Lee, his world is turned upside-down, making him wonder if the responsibilities he has shouldered need dictate his life forever. The daughter of affluent Chicago doctors, Morgan has graduated from a prestigious college music program with the ambition to move to Nashville and become a star. Romantically and musically, she and Colby complete each other in a way that neither has ever known.

While they are falling headlong in love, Beverly is on a heart-pounding journey of another kind. Fleeing an abusive husband with her six-year-old son, she is trying to piece together a life for them in a small town far off the beaten track. With money running out and danger seemingly around every corner, she makes a desperate decision that will rewrite everything she knows to be true.

💭 T H O U G H T S

Nicholas Sparks is one of those authors I have a love/hate relationship with. He was originally an auto-buy author for me back in the 2000s and early 2010s, but his more recent releases haven't exactly been my cup of tea (except The Wish). Dreamland was certainly no exception, and despite all of that I will continue adding his future releases to my TBR. It's like I just can't quit!

The first half of Dreamland was engaging, yet the two perspectives felt completely disjointed from one another - kind of like two separate novels running along side on another. This structure really bugged me as there really didn't seem to be any inclinations of how they'd connect.
And I honestly preferred Colby's portion, despite loathing Morgan. I enjoyed the mystery of Beverly's sections throughout the first half, but that side of the novel went in a direction that just didn't sit well with me.

Additionally, I liked the musical aspect and the idea of a lost dream. I also thought Sparks did a good job at portraying farm life realistically - the long days and never ending hours - while avoiding some of the more stereotypical 'farmer' traits. When it comes to Colby and Morgan, he came across a lot older than her. In fact, he seemed a lot older than he actually was which really played with my mind.

Finally, my biggest issues is how the two perspectives came together. In my opinion, it was very poorly done. It felt as though Sparks was going for the shock value of thrillers, and it just didn't work for me at all. Without giving too much away, it came across as distasteful and incredibly insensitive. The overuse of mental illness as a plot point irks me to no avail. The epilogue could have easily been left out and I'd have been happier with how it ended more realistically.

Despite this one missing the mark, I will likely continue to add his books to my TBR, although I am no longer rushing out to pick them up on release day. It's quite possible my tastes have evolved since my early days reading Sparks, but they are still easy and quick reads.

📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• Nicholas Sparks devotees
• musical readers

🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S

"The logical side of me knows that what we want and what we get are usually two entirely different things."

"But love, I realized wasn't always enough."

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raimeyreads's review

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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papilooonglegs's review

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emotional lighthearted medium-paced

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

2.5

I love Nicholas Sparks but I feel like this is the worst of his works that I’ve read so far (I have not read everything by him). It seems that the more books Sparks writes, the faster these characters fall in love; and the same can be said for Dreamland. I personally like it when the relationship develops a little more naturally. One of the first things we find out is that the main character is 25, around my age, and the way he is written makes it feel like he is closer to middle age. I understand that he had to take on a lot of responsibility but it still doesn’t feel like I’m reading from a 25 year olds point of view. It was also confusing to go back and forth between the two plots with no context. It pretty much felt like reading two separate books until the last quarter of the book. Finally, it was clear that Sparks is very out of touch with a lot of the topics in this book, not only the out of character 25 year old but as well as social media and how people act when their loved one has a mental illness especially someone with a past history of suicide attempts (i.e. gun safety). Overall I’m going to be cautious in the future when reading Sparks latest works.

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lgibson314's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

while I love that Paige was Beverly and the ending of the book created so much sense about the choice of characters, I do no like how mental health was shown in this book. Paige having Bipolar 1 was great representation, but it wasn't accurate and could even create a negative view of this disease because of her psychotic break. I feel there was more research and understanding needed about this mental health issue before writing a romance novel with it included. It felt out of place and incredibly inappropriate to me that this was a large aspect of the book.

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