Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

1377 reviews

lily1304's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective 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

4.5

The plot is so slow that I didn't realize how much I loved the characters until like halfway through. The story is bittersweet and makes me want to hug my friends.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Suicide, Grief, Medical trauma, Car accident, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cursing, Sexual content, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Abortion, Pregnancy, and Cultural appropriation

dmchesher's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, Gun violence, Mental illness, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Grief, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

aubreyrae_m's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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

5.0

This book was unlike any other love story/realistic fiction book I’ve ever read. I would highly recommend this book to people who enjoy books that have characters that feel like real people, with flaws, mistakes, and feelings.

I would not recommend this book to anyone who longs for a happy ending at the end of the story. There is some resolution, but the problem is not resolved completely.

Books like these are frustrating because you want the characters to make different choices, but they’re also exciting because they allow you to connect to the characters. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Death, Drug use, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Car accident, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Bullying, Homophobia, Mental illness, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Death of parent

Minor: Suicide, Pregnancy, and Alcohol

sabrinaboyk's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad 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

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Car accident, and Death of parent

Moderate: Sexual violence

Minor: Cancer and Homophobia

squidface's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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

4.5

I raced through this book, which is a testament to Kevin's ability to pace well, write readable characters, and overall keep me that engaged. I nearly gave this a 5/5 but the book has a few flaws that downgraded it for me.
Don't get me wrong, I absolutely adored this book, flaws and all (which is definitely one of the themes of the book - loving someone wholly despite their flaws and your flaws). I loved the literary references, the use of Shakespeare and Emily Dickinson, and thought it was interesting that those things fell away as the characters got older - but yet it was sort of a turning plot point in the later third of the book to bring Macbeth back in so the characters could emotionally connect again (sorry if this doesn't make much sense, I'm trying to keep the review as spoiler free as possible).
I felt, as others have pointed out, that Zevin was using some kind of word of the day thing and tried to shoehorn in as many random words as possible. Tuberose was overused as an adjective. She misused the word tautology (who proofed this?). 
I disagree with whoever said she clearly doesn't understand music - those observations about Miles Davis et al in the book are made from a character point of view and definitely aren't the views of the author.
Although I did at times find the characters to be thinly veiled versions of parts of Zevin, for the most part they're adorkable.
Despite the flaws, I think Zevin is an amazing and accomplished writer. And this book is definitely worth a read. 
For me it actually could have gone into more elaboration about the games world itself and the business side of it, but I suppose in the end the book focused on relationships between people, and that's what mattered more, because it played to it's strengths.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Ableism, Death, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Racism, Sexual violence, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Medical trauma, Car accident, Abortion, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

nbakken's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide

Moderate: Chronic illness, Drug use, Gun violence, and Sexual content

Minor: Vomit, Abortion, and Death of parent

asourceoffiction's review against another edition

emotional 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

3.0

I don't think I understand the hype. This is a very well written book, and has some very good ideas about relationships, emotions and misogyny in the gaming world. But for something that can get so deep about gaming, it feels surprisingly superficial about real life, despite the topics it covers.

I think my main issue was that I really didn't find much to like in the characters. Sam and Sadie's friendship felt like a crash course in how not to communicate. The character I loved most didn't get enough page time, and the one I hated got more than they should. The real world sections manage to feel like a summing up more than they feel like a story.

The game worlds and concepts were fascinating and beautiful. But ultimately I got a little bored with the minutiae (in fact, my favourite part of the book was immediately followed by a huge game-immersed section that kind of ruined it for me).

I didn't dislike the book overall (despite how this review sounds!), but it didn't have the impact I'd hoped. It feels like I should have loved it but unfortunately it just didn't hit the spot the way I expected.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Misogyny, Mass/school shootings, and Death of parent

Moderate: Domestic abuse

ashleighf's review against another edition

emotional 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

2.5

I had really high hopes for this book; I had seen many people giving it 5 stars and raving about it. However, it fell very flat for me. **Potential spoilers beyond this point...**

There were things I did like about this book, the first being the exploration of emotional topics, like death, grief and emotional/ physical abuse. The final 100 pages in particular became a bit more enjoyable to read. I thought it was refreshing to explore a plutonic friendship between a girl and boy, and how it can evolve over a long period of time. The concept of this book had so much potential, and generally, I enjoyed reading about the production and making of video games.

However, I have major issues with this book...
The first problem that took a while to get used to was the style of writing - it was written in 3rd person and kept switching between different people's thoughts and perspectives. This made it harder to follow, and the sentence structures were short and disengaging. I understand that this is sometimes a creative choice, but a whole book written this way made for a boring read.

Secondly, I connected with Marx's character much more than I ever did with both the protagonists. Both Sadie and Sam were generally unlikable, and feeling sorry for their starts in life wears off pretty quickly!

My final big problem with this book is it was simply boring to read; it had a lot of unnecessary detail and at most points throughout the book there is no sense of direction. You are literally just reading about the next stages of Sam and Sadie's lives as video game producers. Mostly I found myself reading on because of the pretty cover, rather than it being an interesting read. 

I'm glad I read and finished this book, however I don't think I would recommend to friend. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Grief, and Death of parent

fi_sandison's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Abortion, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

brokenpickle's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Cancer, Chronic illness, Death, Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Grief, Car accident, and Death of parent

Minor: Ableism, Animal death, and Abortion