Reviews tagging 'Injury/Injury detail'

Yerba Buena by Nina LaCour

32 reviews

indydc's review against another edition

dark emotional medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Death, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Child death, Drug use, Addiction, and Grief

Moderate: Sexual content, Sexual violence, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, and Death

Minor: Cancer

lynxpardinus's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Medical content, Death of parent, Mental illness, Addiction, Child death, Drug use, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Sexual violence, and Pedophilia

Moderate: Sexual content, Trafficking, Vomit, Alcoholism, Terminal illness, and Racism

Minor: Violence, Confinement, and War

katharina90's review against another edition

hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

Well written literary fiction that strikes an interesting balance between melancholy and more hopeful notes.

Definitely a slow burn and the side-by-side storylines in the beginning took me a while to get into but overall I really enjoyed this book.

What resonated most with me was the thread of yerba buena, flowers and other plants that winds its way through the novel.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug abuse, Infidelity, Grief, Death, Addiction, and Sexual content

Minor: Blood and Injury/Injury detail

ienbdri's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring 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

3.75

Was this book realistic or perfect? No. Is it a good read for when you need a sapphic relationship and people that successfully battle their childhood demons? Absolutely. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death, and Drug use

Minor: Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual violence, and Terminal illness

andreadelo's review against another edition

emotional hopeful 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? Yes

3.75

Simple yet reflective. I picked this up expecting mainly a romance but found two stories about the difficulties of finding oneself. I liked the bittersweet moral but sometimes the book felt a bit too on the nose with its metaphors, sometimes explaining  instead of describing. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Trafficking, Sexual assault, Rape, and Sexual violence

Minor: Child death, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Cancer, Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug use, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, and Panic attacks/disorders

glmarie0428's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring 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

4.5

 This book felt natural and surreal in a way that makes it fit more into the fiction genre than romance, which is different for me.

It all starts off really dark with a young girl who needs to leave town because she has watched her girlfriend be lifted out of a river dead and then proceeds to leave home ASAP by sleeping with someone for money and taking off with a guy that she barely knows. Both women do not have great home lives or experiences with love, so it interesting to watch how they interact with different people whether or not they are in a romantic sense. I would love to reread this novel to better understand the symbolism of the Yerba Buena, but it is constantly reoccurring. The connection between the two women at the end is worth all of it in the end, as their connection is tender, genuine, but also understandingly hesitant.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Drug abuse, Drug use, Grief, and Sexual content

Minor: Abandonment

zarap's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful 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

One of my favorite books of this year so far. Nina LaCour's writing isn't embellished or flashy, and it doesn't need to be. Sara and Emilie pulled me in from the beginning and I loved getting to know them better and then finally seeing them start to grow together. There's a lot of darkness in places, especially in the beginning (check CWs), but also so much warmth and light and healing. Not a perfect novel perhaps, but perfect for me. If Nina LaCour decides to write copy for cereal boxes, I'm there (but I'd definitely prefer novels). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Terminal illness, Grief, and Death

Moderate: Drug abuse, Rape, Infidelity, and Addiction

Minor: Injury/Injury detail and Blood

blackcatkai's review against another edition

emotional hopeful 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

3.5

CW: death, implied-suicide, drug/alcohol abuse, overdose, rape, underage sex work (mentioned), cheating, grief, mental illness, trauma

This was a pretty great start to LaCour's entry into the adult fiction world. It does cover a lot of heavy topics, so take any content/trigger warnings seriously before diving in. With the way the blurb sounded, I DID think it'd be a little more focused on the two MC's coming together than it actually was.

This is mainly a contemporary literary fiction novel about two women's lives and the trauma & experiences they go through throughout their lives before those lives intersect. it touches on them together in a couple points (similar to Normal People by Sally Rooney), but it focuses a lot more on their individual events without each other. I found the pacing in the middle to be a bit slow, but it had a strong beginning and ending and I ultimately was rooting for them.

I hope LaCour continues to dive into the adult fiction world, I will absolutely continue reading her work. I was just expecting a little more here & was honestly a bit confused in points.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Addiction, Alcohol, Blood, Death, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Grief, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Classism, and Mental illness

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Suicide, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Ableism

lacey_wi's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Sexual content, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Infidelity, Fire/Fire injury, Drug use, Drug abuse, Death, Blood, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Pedophilia, Murder, Sexual assault, Rape, Cancer, Abandonment, Addiction, Toxic relationship, Terminal illness, Grief, Death of parent, and Child death

Moderate: Homophobia and Dementia

voidboi's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Rape, Pedophilia, and Infidelity

Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, and Sexual content