Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

Penguin Readers Level 7: Homegoing (ELT Graded Reader) by Yaa Gyasi

7 reviews

caldobotanico's review against another edition

dark

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book deserves high praise for the way it leaps back and forth between times. Each chapter could be meaningful by itself but together they help us see things differently.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug use, Sexual violence, Drug abuse, Trafficking, Slavery, and Rape

Minor: Child death and Suicidal thoughts

rmperash's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Infidelity, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Grief, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Racism, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexual assault, Trafficking, War, Xenophobia, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Blood, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Child death, Colonisation, Death, Drug use, Infertility, Kidnapping, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Self harm, Sexual content, Slavery, and Suicide

lsam305's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring 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? It's complicated

5.0

SUCH A GOOD BOOK ESPECIALLY FOR BLACK PEOPLE TO READ REALLY HELPED ME UNDERSTAND WHERE I COME FROM THROUGH BEAUTIFUL STORY TELLING 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Sexual assault, Excrement, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Abandonment, Hate crime, Racism, Classism, Death of parent, Kidnapping, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual content, Slavery, and Colonisation

mima345's review against another edition

heartbreaking and triggering to me even though great writing and important messages! strong images. too strong for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Vomit, Suicide, Torture, Violence, and War

rachelwierick's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective sad fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Racial slurs, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Slavery, Colonisation, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Racism, Mental illness, Police brutality, Excrement, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, Addiction, Bullying, and Drug use

heybethrenee's review against another edition

challenging emotional 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

5.0

This book absolutely wrecked me. It reads like a collection of short stories but because we know the characters are connected through the generations it makes what happens to them that much more impactful. While fictional, Gyasi gives a voice to the unwritten and silenced stories of Black Africans and Americans as forced change and horrors over take them.  Every white person needs to read this book. The trigger warnings are unending so be prepared for an emotionally difficult read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual harassment, Death, Toxic relationship, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual content, Sexism, Religious bigotry, Physical abuse, Misogyny, Miscarriage, Mental illness, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Cursing, Colonisation, and Adult/minor relationship

jayisreading's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

I commend Yaa Gyasi for taking such a fresh approach to storytelling with Homegoing. It was an incredibly ambitious task, but one she handled phenomenally and with care to create two captivating intergenerational stories. The book starts with a split in a family lineage in present-day Ghana during the eighteenth century with two half-sisters, Effia and Esi. Homegoing, and it’s haunting, especially because it lingers in an unexpected way. Despite coming from the same mother, Effia and Esi never knew each other and led entirely different lives; one being married off to a British slave trader, while in the dungeons below, the other was enslaved and sent to the United States. From this point on and across seven generations, we get a chapter that gives a glimpse of each descendant’s life, often during significant moments in history (such as the Great Migration).

What was most powerful about Homegoing was the afterlives of every character playing a role in shaping their lineage. Through this, we see the repercussions of slavery and colonialism, resulting in the intergenerational trauma that would haunt for centuries (and, frankly, continue to haunt). The word “homegoing” marks death, but also a return to home. Gyasi pushes the reader to contemplate what shapes Black life and death, as well as what “home” means for the forcibly displaced. (There’s also a whole thing we can get into about Orlando Patterson’s “social death,” but that’s a literal essay waiting to happen.)

Homegoing is raw and emotional. While some may not be thrilled that each chapter are essentially like vignettes, I find that this approach precisely captures what Gyasi wants the reader to experience: a haunting full of unresolved ache.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Grief, Police brutality, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Slavery, Torture, Trafficking, and Violence

Moderate: Child abuse, Drug abuse, and Kidnapping

Minor: Animal death, Bullying, Infertility, Infidelity, and Suicidal thoughts