Reviews tagging 'Death'

Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange

16 reviews

brittanymccubbs's review

challenging emotional 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? It's complicated

5.0

What a wonderful book. Tommy Orange has done it again. Tommy Orange really draws you into his writing and the stories he weaves into his books. This book follows a group of characters all from the same family, for the most part. We move through various generations and see what being Native means to them, and how it impacts their lives.

This book deals with the idea of belonging, addiction, recovery, generational trauma, and what home means when your peoples’ land was stolen from them. It’s about the way violence and trauma affects the lives of victims and the people around them. This book holds so much emotion, and so much gravity. It tells the tale of a family who are now the descendants of people that were the victims of a massacre. It dives into the trauma carried with that, and the conflict involved in finding out who you are in a place separated from your tribe and your people.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Gun violence, and Death

kimmykelly's review

challenging emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Grief, Drug abuse, Genocide, Alcoholism, Suicide attempt, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Dementia, Addiction, Bullying, Drug use, Deadnaming, Abandonment, Self harm, and Violence

readingwithkaitlyn's review

reflective sad slow-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: Gun violence, Blood, Murder, Racism, Death, Addiction, Drug use, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Mental illness, Grief, Child abuse, Colonisation, Hate crime, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Terminal illness, Alcoholism, Toxic friendship, Medical content, Animal death, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, Ableism, Cancer, War, and Alcohol

Minor: Slavery, Domestic abuse, Confinement, Animal cruelty, Cultural appropriation, Suicide, Fire/Fire injury, Pedophilia, Antisemitism, Car accident, Pandemic/Epidemic, Ableism, Sexual assault, Bullying, Transphobia, Vomit, Body shaming, Rape, Racial slurs, Child death, Infertility, Miscarriage, Dementia, Misogyny, Excrement, and Abandonment

savvylit's review

dark emotional reflective 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? It's complicated

4.5

Tommy Orange can write multiple points of view in a truly unparalleled manner. Beginning with a man who has gone mute after escaping the Sand Creek Massacre, each character's perspective is unique and wholly their own. Despite the years that lapse between vignettes, each character's presence carries from one descendant to the next in a way that illuminates the way that trauma is inherited.

As a fan of There There, I was delighted to not only get to know their ancestors but to have a chance to revisit Orvil, Opal, Jacquie, Lony, and Loother. When we return to the modern-day Readfeather family, each character is reckoning with the aftermath of the events of There There. The spectrum of emotion they each experience is both heartbreaking and palpable. Lony, the youngest member of the family, has a particularly devastating way of dealing with his trauma that feels so true to both his age and way of seeing the world.

If you're a fan of historical fiction and character studies, you can't miss Wandering Stars!

Thank you @netgalley and @aaknopf for the e-ARC of Wandering Stars in exchange for my honest review! All thoughts and opinions are my own. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Mass/school shootings, Death, Genocide, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Murder

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic

ktdakotareads's review against another edition

dark emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Death, Drug use, Grief, Cancer, Classism, Suicidal thoughts, Confinement, Abandonment, Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Self harm, Toxic friendship, Drug abuse, Racism, Addiction, and Blood

Minor: Mass/school shootings and Gun violence

caseythereader's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional 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

Thanks to AA Knopf for the free copy of this book.

 - I knew Orange would break my heart with WANDERING STARS, and he sure did.
- Orange expands on the legacy of colonization and the generational traumas that stem from it, showing different ways they manifested throughout the decades.
- Orange’s writing is so gorgeous, the kind of writing that you can’t imagine being done any other way.
- I reread THERE THERE immediately before this one, and am happy to report that the anti-fat bias in the first book is almost entirely gone. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Alcoholism, Blood, Colonisation, Cursing, Medical content, Addiction, Drug use, Alcohol, Death, Genocide, Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, Grief, Gun violence, Self harm, Injury/Injury detail, Cancer, Mass/school shootings, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Racism, Suicide, and Violence

Moderate: Rape