Reviews tagging 'Panic attacks/disorders'

Liar, Dreamer, Thief by Maria Dong

7 reviews

heydri's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious 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

4.25

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Mental illness, Stalking, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Car accident

asiamd's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense 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

This book was absolutely INSANE but in an incredibly good way!! This is the second book I’ve read this month that was way out my comfort zone and I am once again happy that I decided to take the leap! The first part of this book will have you thinking you know who Katrina is and how this book is going to play out, but by the second half, you’re starting to be just as confused as her and I truly think that’s the best part of the book. If this was a movie, I’d have to compare to Gone Girl not because it’s about the same things but because the theme and feel of the book reminds me of it. 
The next thing I want to say is the portrayal of Katrina’s mental illness and how it was weaver into the story was actually incredible, I genuinely can’t explain it without giving spoilers but please read this book to find out. It’s the type of book that makes you want to reread it when you get to the end just so you can find all the clues that you missed in the beginning! Overall 10/10

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Kidnapping, Medical content, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Violence, Gaslighting, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Stalking

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Abandonment, and Gun violence

pisces1_1318's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

What did I just read? I don't know how I feel about this book. I agree with the other reviews on the first part of the book being slow. Once you get past the slow part it seems to go from 0 to 100 very quickly. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders and Mental illness

whenjessreads's review against another edition

dark funny medium-paced

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

3.5

It was initially difficult to tell what genre Liar, Dreamer, Thief fit into - was it literary fiction? Magical realism? A thriller? Some sort of contemporary take on the difficulties of trying to live an average life when your mind is anything but average? Maybe all of the above.

I’ll give you a super brief run down: the MC is a queer Korean-American train-wreck of a human being, who is lightly stalking someone she works with… until she watches him jump off a bridge (while blaming it on her), and has to put aside her rituals and obsessions that keep her safe in order to figure out just what the f*** is going on. Oh, and also attempt to keep her head in the real world, instead of the children’s-book-Korean-fantasy-land that she occasionally lives in. Yup.

I adore books that blur the line between reality and fantasy, and I love that this book did so through the lens of mental illness and an unreliable narrator. Not knowing whether the mystery was real or imagined was something that definitely kept me going.

I also really enjoy reading first person narration when the MC has a psyche like a bowl of noodles. (Maybe it just feels more familiar 😂)

One personal issue - I just think I’ve read a few too many books over the past few years with the formula “average girl sees something bad happen and automatically becomes a questionably amateur detective”, otherwise I might have rated this one higher. I also think the pacing was off in places, and the bad guy was a little one-dimensional. 

Honestly though, the MC was so messy and complex that I enjoyed this book anyway - and probably would have enjoyed it even without the mystery aspect.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Minor: Car accident, Stalking, Cancer, and Gun violence

stardustdreamer's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

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

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Ableism, Toxic relationship, Death, Gore, Stalking, Injury/Injury detail, Domestic abuse, and Blood

Moderate: Medical trauma, Car accident, Panic attacks/disorders, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Cancer, and Suicide

azazellos_fang's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective tense 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? Yes

4.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Panic attacks/disorders, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Stalking, Ableism, Murder, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Abandonment, Gaslighting, and Suicide

kmsander4's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense 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? Yes

3.75

I have mixed feelings about reviewing Liar, Dreamer, Thief.

On the one hand, I really struggled to get into this book. The first 50 pages or so felt like a real slog. Katrina kept slipping in and out of her "dream world" and I was having to contend with paragraphs explaining geometry to me. I left geometry back in school. I couldn't figure out what it was doing in a book that was described as a page-turning thriller.

Then, all of a sudden, it turned. The twists started to appear. Characters started to become shadier and shadier, fewer things were adding up, clues kept leading Katrina all over the place. Now, the pages were really turning. I wanted to see where this was going. I began to understand Katrina's dream world. I even realized the purpose of the geometry talk as it guided me through the evolving storyline that quickly become more twisted and convulted.

The ending? Well, I saw some of it coming but certainly not all of it. Clues that I thought were being dropped for me to connect, turned out to be big fat red herrings. And who doesn't love a good red herring?

So, in short, yes, the first chunk feels a bit tedious but once you push through it, the thriller really shines!

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Mental illness, Stalking, and Panic attacks/disorders

Moderate: Murder and Vomit

Minor: Gun violence, Violence, Terminal illness, Kidnapping, Car accident, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, Death, and Cancer