Reviews tagging 'Abortion'

What's Mine and Yours by Naima Coster

28 reviews

eyedoc's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Abortion, Addiction, Hate crime, Infertility, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Racism, Violence, Bullying, Death, Drug use, Grief, and Murder

beklovesbooks's review against another edition

challenging emotional

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

2.25

Really interesting non-linear format of moving forward and backward in time sometimes by decades other times by a month and each time changing whose perspective the story is being told from while overlapping in someway with the other storytellers and stories. It would have been helpful to start a timeline and list of characters at the beginning.

Overall a pretty depressing book as people are constantly using one another, tolerating neglect, and there’s just so much graphic emphasis on sex!

Interesting perspective of poverty, race, and generational trauma. 

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Content Warnings

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

Moderate: Death of parent, Gun violence, Body shaming, Fatphobia, Infertility, Bullying, Classism, Xenophobia, Abortion, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Miscarriage, Racial slurs, and Racism

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Cancer, Trafficking, Vomit, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Murder, Pregnancy, Slavery, Terminal illness, and Toxic relationship

briannad4's review against another edition

slow-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Sexual content, Death of parent, Abortion, Racism, and Hate crime

Moderate: Addiction, Miscarriage, Abandonment, and Drug abuse

kmorris85's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Abortion

Minor: Infidelity

marielaabrown's review

emotional hopeful reflective 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

4.0

I think it would take real maturity to write such a book with such human story-lines and complex and nuanced characters.

The ending was simultaneously perfect and too messy ~ maybe i wish it was longer

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racism

Minor: Abortion, Miscarriage, and Infidelity

ka_cam's review against another edition

emotional reflective fast-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

I thought this book was well-written, but ultimately unoriginal. Though we got a wide spread of character voices, many felt flat or like tropes to advance the story line. Predictable character choices were over-explained while other dramatic developments were unexplained

(such as major character shifts for Gee v Nelson and Lacy May).

 I didn’t feel like either mom was well developed despite the blurb centering them. I was waiting for a deeper interrogation of race, class, and gender for any of the characters but it never really happened. Still, the writing was engaging so I’d be interested in reading more by this author in the future. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism and Addiction

Moderate: Misogyny

Minor: Abortion and Miscarriage

spinesinaline's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective 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

4.25

This was a stressful book as the first chapter opens with a death and I was immediately wishing for different futures for the characters. The main focus here is on intergenerational trauma and all the complexities of family and race, so it’s a tough one to get through but so worth it. 

The story regularly flips between the past and the present so we as the readers can try to piece together the two times and how things came to be, while also allowing for some mystery in the bigger reveals. I would love to reread this one knowing what I know now because there are so many subtle hints the author leaves throughout the plot and the character descriptions that seem so obvious after the fact. 

As much as I appreciated the interrogation of race in this book, I felt uncomfortable that the mixed Latinx/white character seemed to serve as the stand-in for whiteness. Noelle is the only one contending with her whiteness, recognizing the racial violence others have faced, and feeling the blame of the world, but she rarely gets a moment to examine the racial violence that’s been inflicted on herself, which doesn’t seem a deliberate exclusion that was meant to add to the story. I understand, as much as I can, the complexity of being a mixed-race person and dealing with the traumatic and colonial history of whiteness but it didn’t feel like the character’s Latinx identity was considered much at all. I’ll defer to Latinx and mixed-race reviewers on this and seek out how they felt about the authenticity of the character. 

It’s a sad story of loss in more ways than one and all the ways that may show up in our lives, as well as the devastating consequences when the grief and trauma from these losses are not addressed or recognized, or are beaten down. I appreciated the ending and the moments of connection and lightness that the author has managed to intersperse in quite a necessarily dark tale. I also loved reading the acknowledgements and seeing how the author’s own experience as a mother so clearly influenced multiple relationships in the book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Miscarriage, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Gun violence, Racism, Sexual content, and Violence

Moderate: Medical content and Abortion

kimveach's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective 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

3.5

This was a good story with interesting characters.  However, I didn't like the back and forth between timelines.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism and Death of parent

Moderate: Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Cancer, Classism, Death, Drug abuse, Eating disorder, Miscarriage, Murder, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Addiction, Car accident, Grief, Infidelity, Medical trauma, Alcohol, Blood, Drug use, Abortion, Mental illness, Forced institutionalization, Infertility, and Sexual content

myinfinitetbr's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

In Piedmont, North Carolina, a community is outraged when students from a predominantly Black school are brought to a mostly white school.

Told over the course of 30 years in the perspectives of a Black mother and her son, and a white mother and her half-Latina daughter; each mother determined to see her child have a better life. Their kids become involved in a school play together, and create ties that bond them for decades to come.

I really liked that the narrative included the perspectives of both families with the mothers and their teens. Though the characters were well written, I found my investment in them lacking, which may have been due to the frequent shift between timelines. I still enjoyed the commentary on family dysfunction, race, identity, motherhood, and the decisions that cause a ripple effect through generations.

⚠️ Addiction, Racism, Violence, Death of a Parent, Infidelity, Abortion

Thank you Grand Central Pub for the gifted copy! All opinions are my own

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Infidelity, Racism, Violence, Abortion, and Death of parent

ktdakotareads's review against another edition

reflective 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Drug abuse, Grief, Cancer, Infertility, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Racism, Addiction, Cursing, Death of parent, and Medical content

Minor: Abortion, Violence, and Gun violence