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jadehusdanhicks's review against another edition
4.0
These essays are incredibly moving at points, they can make you laugh and cry as well as provide fun snippets of information you never knew. Throughout them all John often references back to his personal experiences with his mental health which is incredibly written and moving to those who can relate.
As a burns victim myself one which stuck with me was “googling strangers” which circles around his time as a chaplain in a hospital when a young burns victim came in. He lived years not knowing this kids fate but eventually googled him and was relieved to see the child survived and grew up to live a fulfilling life and as a victim of similar injuries it was moving to see someone similar mentioned and written not as inspiration porn but to show progress and growth despite barriers you may face.
Overall I was suprised how much I loved this book and will definitely return to it in future.
Graphic: Death, Vomit, Mental illness, Cancer, and War
danasaur's review against another edition
4.5
Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic, Medical content, and Mental illness
Moderate: Medical content, Pandemic/Epidemic, Alcohol, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Grief, Alcohol, Cancer, Vomit, Terminal illness, Suicidal thoughts, Cursing, Panic attacks/disorders, Medical content, Drug use, and Death
lia_mills's review against another edition
4.5
Method: audiobook by the author
One thing about me is: I love a theme. Themed events, themed locations, themed decor: give me something with a clearly-stated uniting category attached to it and I will be happy. And never more so than when it comes to collections of writings - be they essays, poems, short stories, letters, what have you - give me a clear overarching connection and I will be happy.
As themes go, "The Anthropocene" is broad enough to potentially be self-defeating. If it could be anything about human life (which in a piece of media made for humans essentially means 'anything at all', since everything we communicate about will always come back to us), what's the point in having a theme at all? Maybe that's me being too simplistic, but honestly the broadness of this theme does brush against the reason why I love them so much - I like being able to categorise things, and (to a somewhat lesser extent) to compartmentalise them, and a theme like this doesn't really allow for that sort of thing.
But my own personal taste in theming aside, I freaking loved this book. From the opening review of the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" from the musical 'Carousel' - a song I also have a personal connection to, with my very first time performing in a stage show having been as one of the Snow children who appears onstage during this song, in an experience which helped spark the love of theatre that has had such a profound influence on my life - I was hooked. My favourite reviews are the ones on the 1950 drama film "Harvey" (which serves as a deeply personal and empathy-facilitating explorarion of Green's experience with depression) and on the folk song "Auld Lang Syne" (which serves as a beautiful tribute to the work of his departed friend and mentor Amy Krouse Rosenthal, and has given me a variation on the song to sing which I will remember for the rest of my life). This book has so many interesting, at times hilarious and at times profound reviews in here that are well worth reading - it's just that I love these two most, in equal measure.
One of my favourite things about art is how it begets more art - both from a creative perspective (artists, writers, musicians, etc. being inspired by those who came before them and by their contemporaries), and from an audience perspective (one of my favourite examples of this is finding music for the first time through great needledrops in film and television). And to me, this book is at its best when it highlights some of the beautiful and strange and intriguing things that humans have created. I personally lean more towards the artistic ones, but the exploration of some of the more pragmatic human creations, such as vaccines, is also excellent - informative and evocative, in equal measure.
And this book does what so many of the books I deeply love do - it makes me want to write more, and it makes me want to participate more in the world. It makes me want both, in equal measure.
I give "The Anthropocene Rewiewed" four and a half stars.
Moderate: Mental illness, Death, Pandemic/Epidemic, Grief, Chronic illness, Cancer, and Animal cruelty
grace33's review against another edition
4.25
Graphic: Grief, Mental illness, and Death
Moderate: Child death and Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Cancer
chele96's review against another edition
5.0
Moderate: Cancer
beingbrigi's review against another edition
3.0
Graphic: Cancer and Pandemic/Epidemic
rosalyn's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Mental illness, Death, and Grief
Minor: Cancer
dev921's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: War, Death, Child death, Cancer, Medical content, Pandemic/Epidemic, Self harm, Car accident, Suicidal thoughts, and Mental illness
wickedgrumpy's review against another edition
2.75
I found myself reading an essay or two about topics I had varying levels of interest in, and on to the next essay I would read the title and often put the book down because I had had enough of the meandering stream of consciousness associations for that session.
There were some things that I found value in, but it wasn’t really my cup of tea.
Minor: Body shaming, Bullying, Car accident, Dysphoria, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Drug use, Eating disorder, Gaslighting, Grief, Medical content, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Pandemic/Epidemic, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Self harm, Toxic relationship, War, Religious bigotry, Abandonment, Addiction, Alcohol, Cancer, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Death, Deportation, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Xenophobia, Alcoholism, Classism, Islamophobia, Antisemitism, Child death, Chronic illness, and Mental illness
bbygirl21's review against another edition
4.0
Moderate: Death, Fire/Fire injury, War, Confinement, Genocide, Classism, Suicidal thoughts, Bullying, Grief, Medical content, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, and Pandemic/Epidemic
Minor: Alcohol, Cancer, Chronic illness, Animal death, and Antisemitism