Reviews tagging 'Emotional abuse'

True Biz by Sara Nović

37 reviews

martinatan's review

emotional informative inspiring 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

5.0

What a killer, heartfelt story! I loved the use of the chapter bumpers as diegetic one-pagers on Deaf culture, ASL, and Wikipedia articles. The ending and how it resolved formative conflicts in the three protagonists’  lives was so satisfying to experience. I loved that it served as a testament to direct action, while showing that the tradeoffs in taking such action are hard to ignore when multiple parties’ livelihoods are at stake.

This novel truly feels like a love letter to the Deaf community and disabled activists. The author does a wonderful job of incorporating different archetypes of Deaf experience that dispel any thoughts of monolith from Deaf ideologies. After reading this, I am more curious about other intersectional identities that were not covered related to race, gender, religion, and other disability.

The formatting of dialogue and illustrative chapter titles speak to the spirit of the term “deaf gain” as opposed to “hearing loss”—these visual and spatial tidbits enhance Nović’s strong artistic voice. Highly recommend to anyone seeking an earnest and important coming-of-age story.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Medical content, Ableism, Body shaming, Death, Death of parent, Infidelity, Racism, Car accident, Drug use, Dementia, and Alcohol

Minor: Grief, Hate crime, Confinement, Sexual content, Fire/Fire injury, Pregnancy, Vomit, Classism, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Homophobia, Child abuse, Medical trauma, Toxic relationship, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, and Abandonment

wrh121's review

challenging informative 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? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Drug use and Emotional abuse

Minor: Sexual content

sarah984's review against another edition

informative mysterious 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

3.0

This was a frustrating reading experience for me overall. I loved Charlie's story of acquiring language and access to Deaf culture, and realizing that adults you trust can fail you just as much as those you don't, but the resolution to her plotline is so heavy handed and the "if you don't support teens they will Have Sex And Do Drugs" bit is cartoonish. The main conflict with the teacher is boring because it's entirely her fault, and all of the love triangles are stupid. I liked the sign language examples, but some of the full text wikipedia article stuff felt pointless

(including step by step instructions for building a bomb if you're into that)

and could have been included in other ways. There is one major character of colour and she exists solely to experience anti-Black microaggressions and explain the concept of BASL to Charlie.

The story itself was whatever to me but the way the dialogue is written - between verbal, sign and text dialogue - was really well done.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death of parent, and Medical content

Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Dementia, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, and Religious bigotry

Minor: Bullying, Child death, Pregnancy, Racism, Vomit, Infidelity, Police brutality, and Self harm

A major plotline involves teen characters

building pressure cooker bombs

mariekealkema's review against another edition

emotional informative 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? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Medical trauma, and Ableism

cranewife's review

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring sad tense fast-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident, Child abuse, Death of parent, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Hate crime, Ableism, Alcohol, Bullying, Cursing, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Sexual content

celine_reads_books's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense

• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Alcohol, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, Physical abuse, Racism, Grief, Dementia, Car accident, Child abuse, Death of parent, and Drug use

Minor: Classism

lacey_wi's review

challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective 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? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Racism, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Bullying, Car accident, Child abuse, Dementia, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Hate crime, Lesbophobia, Medical trauma, and Sexual harassment

professional_grandma's review against another edition

challenging informative 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? No

4.5

True Biz addresses some of the issues faced by the Deaf community by providing fictional examples through Austin, Charlie, February and several others. When a book makes you mad, you know the author is doing a good job. True Biz centered on Deaf activism for a good part of the book and faced the challenge of learning your own voice when you’ve been deprived of language. I appreciated how the author included sections explaining some key information from ASL grammar and Deaf culture such as the Deaf President Now movement. This made the book more accessible to the majority of people who don’t know of the Deaf community, yet should learn. One thing I wasn’t sure about was the heavy focus on drugs, sex, and alcohol as part of the normal teen experience. Although I understand it’s use in making the characters relatable to many people, it did take me away from the story a bit. However I do appreciate that nothing was put into great detail. Overall this book was thought provoking and highly interesting to read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Ableism, Alcohol, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Physical abuse, Drug use, and Sexual content

Minor: Racism

alysereadsbooks's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad 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? Yes

5.0

Absolutely loved this book. The ending was a little bit unfinished, but couldn’t put this down. An incredible depiction of the beauty and strength of the Deaf community. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Ableism, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Physical abuse, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Racism and Sexual content

cassielaj's review

challenging emotional funny informative inspiring 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

I’ve never read anything like this book. Nović crafts incredible characters and a complex story. Not only that, but I learned so much about the Deaf community from the history, language lessons, and medical conversations that were included. 

My only wish is that Eliot could’ve been a bigger character earlier

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death of parent, Medical content, Medical trauma, Grief, Religious bigotry, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Drug use, Alcohol, Blood, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Racism, Bullying, Car accident, and Pregnancy