Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters

85 reviews

erint251's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny reflective sad tense 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Transphobia, Outing, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Abortion, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Eating disorder and Death of parent

travelseatsreads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative inspiring reflective tense 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

4.5

Detransition, Baby is a book which will inevitably polarize people. Just like its title, its contents are at times quite challenging. Even at its least provocative there will be someone reading somewhere shrieking in horror at what they just read. It is in that challenging nature of the book that I adore how brave Torrey Peters was in telling a story of gender, of mother & fatherhood, of queerness and overwhelmingly of the prejudice and trauma that everyone carries around regardless of their gender or sexual orientation.

It would have been easy and hugely less controversial for Peters to make these 3 women flawless and likeable but rather than take the easy route she showed how deeply flawed and damaged all three of them were in their own ways. There are chunks of the book that reek of misogyny. There are violent, graphic and demeaning sex scenes. There are deeply prejudiced thoughts thrown about on occasion. There are sections where you will think what the actual f*** is wrong with them. And then there are sections full of love, tenderness, fulfillment and a deep yet brutal level of understanding and self awareness. Peters shies away from the fluffy rainbow coloured persona often provided and delves deep into what can be at times an absolute tangle of beautiful destruction.

Towards the last few chapters I longed to know just that little bit more about Reese and her backstory, her character was so full and intriguing I wanted to know more about where all that angst and inner turmoil came from. That and some other lingering questions kept me from that last star.

Overall, while this will not be a book for everyone, I think everyone should at least attempt to read it with an open mind and glean from it what they can.
What Peters showed effortlessly throughout the book is that none of it is easy, being trans, being queer or indeed immersing yourself into those worlds as a straight cis female. It's complicated and I loved Detransition, Baby for that honesty and rawness. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Abortion, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Outing, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Death, Drug use, Hate crime, Mental illness, and Grief

karolinaz's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Infertility, Infidelity, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Outing, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail

lixard's review against another edition

challenging funny 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

5.0

i may finally understand those who rate a book highly even with conflicting feelings of it. there are parts of this book i think about basically every day which just speaks to how well peters is able to bring to light things that all women experience but never truly realize. the biggest one is the conversation, through reese's (and iris's) toxic and abusive relationships as a way of affirming their gender? i thought about that one for hours and had a long discussion with my roommate about it... and i don't think i'll ever stop thinking about it.
another is the conversation between reese & katrina about how race and gender and class intersect with motherhood, that women are not all given the same assumption of/decision for motherhood.
oh! and i loved the elephant metaphor, the wim hof method, the sex and the city problem, etc. just so much thought put into how each of the characters see the world. good on ya.

i have nothing else to add except that i wished we knew what happened to their little trio family :(

without further ado some quotes that i had to steal off goodreads because my hold expired before i wrote them down: 

 “She’s suggested, in the way that naive cis people do, with a hint of self-congratulation at their own broad-mindedness, that it seems like trans people are starting to be everywhere, that maybe gender doesn’t matter that much. In his reply, he can’t help but let loose an old defensiveness on this topic. “I think it’s the opposite,” he says too sharply. “The whole reason transsexuals transition is because gender matters so incredibly much.” 

 “Yes and no. Some days I still love you and some days I don’t.”
Reese waited, sensing there was more. So he let her have as much of the truth as he could bear. “But the days I don’t love you…I have to work hard to make those days happen. The days I do require nothing of me.” 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Transphobia, Violence, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Deadnaming and Abortion

oliviareese's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body shaming, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Homophobia, Infertility, Infidelity, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Grief, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Outing, and Dysphoria

carol_c26's review against another edition

dark 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? It's complicated

5.0

my heart ached for Reese and Ames and Katrina. a painful and beautiful look at family and queerness and love and motherhood

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Deadnaming, Infertility, Infidelity, Misogyny, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Transphobia

Minor: Drug use, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt

gusanadelibros's review against another edition

informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt

thanmayi's review against another edition

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? It's complicated

3.75

 This book isn't written for the comfort of cis women and that's something that a lot of people in these reviews seem to be missing.

This book is so beautifully written and is unapologetically trans, it looks at the darkest parts of being a trans woman, transitioning and detransitioning. I don't think I will ever be able to do this book justice when I talk about it. What I will say is that this is an important book, one that everyone needs to read at least once in their life. 

I will emphasize going through the content warnings because this book has a lot of heavy content. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Transphobia, and Outing

Moderate: Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Miscarriage, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Pregnancy, and Toxic friendship

My only issue with this book however was the entire cheating plot

paulawind's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective slow-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 was a bitch to go through because the topics tackled there were so complicated and hard to swallow, but it is brilliant. What I love most about books is how they expose me to different perspectives, put me into the head of people completely different from me so in result I start looking at the world around me through their eyes. The problems I’ve never considered to even exist now mount to the size of existential dilemmas and life-or-death situations. 
This book goes through everything starting with gender identity, trans experience, through motherhood, femalehood, feminism, to class and race differences and how it all intersects. Definitely the best book I’ve read this year so far

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts and Transphobia

Moderate: Suicide attempt

Minor: Racism and Suicide

solenekeleroux's review against another edition

emotional reflective 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Miscarriage, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, and Pregnancy

Moderate: Body shaming, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Outing, and Dysphoria