4.11k reviews for:

Carol

Patricia Highsmith

3.96 AVERAGE

lgiavedoni22's review against another edition

4.0

emotional hopeful mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

jessprekeris's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous emotional inspiring tense medium-paced

marishimmy's review against another edition

3.0

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Overall a very slow book, but the ending was sweet!

sarahyates2's review against another edition

4.0

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thought i was gonna die during parts of this. thank god for the ending

lilyfacerette's review against another edition

4.25

challenging emotional hopeful inspiring relaxing sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

autumnnook's review against another edition

2.5

reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

anqiec's review against another edition

4.75

mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: N/A

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

erin1096's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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I really loved it. A queer classic. Absolutely a product of it's time, but the characters still felt timeless and the writing style was effective nonetheless. Not for everyone, but the characters felt very real, and flawed in very real ways. I want to go read literary analyses of this book now.

qdbarclay1994's review against another edition

4.0

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4.5/5

scatterbrainbooky's review against another edition

2.0

emotional reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

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This book was so boring and tedious. However, at the time of publication (1952), I can appreciate that a sapphic romance would have been original and daring. I wasn't into the insta-love aspect, the age-gap power imbalance, and I didn't understand why Therese was so drawn to Carol for the first half of the book - Carol was so patronizing and aloof. Thankfully things picked up for the last quarter of the book, and I did really like the ending.