Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee

15 reviews

lennie_reads's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful mysterious 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Violence, and Blood

Moderate: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Kidnapping, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Death

cecilielaugesen's review against another edition

adventurous challenging funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted medium-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

3.75

I like the broad representation in this book, and I like the way it’s written - it’s funny in a beautiful kind of way.
Other than that I found this book very underwhelming and a bit disappointing.
Mainly because the main character, Monty, is useless and very annoying. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Kidnapping, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, and Gaslighting

Minor: Ableism, Biphobia, Confinement, Mental illness, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Acephobia/Arophobia, and Colonisation

valerian_honeybee's review

adventurous emotional 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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexism, Sexual content, Acephobia/Arophobia, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Medical content and Medical trauma

madicana's review

adventurous funny lighthearted fast-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Child abuse, Homophobia, Mental illness, and Injury/Injury detail

voidature's review against another edition

slow-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

1.5

i don’t know how to start this review tbh. there’s a lot to say and none of it is very good. i only gave it two stars because the writing itself is good, but she as a white woman had no business writing this kind of story with the amount of racial slurs used and the general theme, and i spent the entire time while reading it beside myself with mixed feelings.

it’s disgusting to ship percy with monty and it’s gross that they still get together at the end given how monty treats him throughout the novel but especially in the beginning—because this is the monty percy would have been exposed to since they were boys. a monty who will say racist things to him when he gets upset, percy who is supposedly his best friend, and even despite that percy is so patient with him and has to *teach* him about racism even when monty barely makes an effort to understand or accept that he has a white savior complex.

monty went through a huge character growth arc, but percy didn’t have the same kind of growth, and monty went through that growth at the expense of percy’s dignity, being written with an illness, who was used as a prop for him. not to mention scipio’s crew, who were also used as props to help monty grow.

i have no idea how or why this book is so highly rated given the contents of it and how the author chooses to write her characters. and after reading the reviews and finding out she’s transphobic as well, i’m unsurprised to find that my gut feeling about this book reading the way it does is correct.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Moderate: Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, and Injury/Injury detail

hollowhallow13's review

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted 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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexism, Violence, Medical content, and Alcohol

Moderate: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Suicidal thoughts, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

littlesnowcloud's review

adventurous emotional reflective sad 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

4.5

Significantly heavier in topic than the summary blurb suggests, with a bit more magic involved than expected. A good read with good characters. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Medical content, Death of parent, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Infidelity

nonnavlis's review

adventurous tense medium-paced

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

4.5

This was such a delightful read! The writing style of the author is so marvellous. It's not at all short on evocative prose, but never the sort that trips you up; it reads so smoothly and is also quite witty. I'm someone who is just branching into more modern writing and often struggle with a dislike of the style of it, but this was great. The completely unrestrained queerness was also very delightful and the characters are engaging. It's unrealistic in the good way--you probably won't see the story beats coming and they're a bit silly when they do, but in a way you want to happen because it's all the more fun.

It was also lovely to see some unexpected disability representation later in the story! (I am not considering this is a spoiler as it's something I would've wanted to know as a disabled person, but sorry if anyone feels a bit cheated in my saying so).

The only problem I had with it was the handling of racial tension within the story. I respect the author's desire for some diversity and their certainly earnest and well-meant attempt at handling it, but it did feel pretty simplistic and glossed over in a way I expect a reader of colour would find even more awkward/uncomfortable than I did as a white reader. It's unfortunately one of those stories that probably would've benefited heavily from some sensitivity readers that it seems it did not have. The fact that the author even has an author's note chapter at the end of the book dedicated to summarizing her historical research and influences (where she refers to slave-owners as masters rather than enslavers which felt to me like a pretty glaring sign of lack of knowledge in this area), but still fumbled this as much as she did is why I've removed half a star from my rating. I did see after finishing that this is part of a series so I'm hoping it will be handled better in future stories, since we all have room to learn.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Ableism, Cursing, Homophobia, Racism, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Slavery, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Colonisation, and Classism

Minor: Gun violence, Infidelity, Forced institutionalization, and Fire/Fire injury

20sidedbi's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective tense fast-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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Racism, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Ableism, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, Misogyny, Slavery, Violence, Medical content, and Grief

Minor: Confinement, Cursing, Infidelity, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Islamophobia, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, Fire/Fire injury, and Colonisation

a_bloom's review

adventurous emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense fast-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? It's complicated

5.0

The writing is absolutely PHENOMENAL and so freaky funny. It's also heart reaching, but you can always kinda see it coming. It's technically a long book but something you could get through in a couple of days. 


<Spoiler>It also talks about a lot of interesting topics that were seen as taboo (although some of them aren't brought to a whole lot of detail considering the whole book is told from the perspective of a traumatized white teen boy who's an Earls son... But he slowly starts to learn, grow, and mature as he keeps ALMOST DYING.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Biphobia, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Sexual content, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Vomit, Police brutality, Medical content, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Outing, Gaslighting, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment