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woolleylg's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
Graphic: Animal death
Moderate: Suicide attempt
amydunning's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts and Suicide attempt
daggotry's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Graphic: Eating disorder, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Suicide attempt, and Religious bigotry
mwoe's review against another edition
Graphic: Suicide attempt
schnurln's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Eating disorder, and Suicide attempt
abbywdan's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
But I guess I’ve read too many books lately that have cliffhangery endings (the bee sting, the guest), and I’m over it. It doesn’t feel earned here. That said, I loved the rest of the book.
Graphic: Suicidal thoughts and Animal death
Moderate: Suicide attempt
nordstina's review
3.5
There is a sustained undercurrent of anxiety throughout Worry. Things on the surface are not as they appear. Jules spends her time on a secret social media account searching for mommy bloggers and conspiracy theorists. She amuses herself by reading these, but becomes obsessed with searching. While the relationship with the sisters is complicated, their mother adds another degree of pathology, often pitting the two sisters against one another, when also saying that they bring out the worst in one another.
At times this book can be funny (there's a three-legged dog named Amy Klobuchar, the girls go home and get "touched up" by their plastic surgeon dad as a sign of love), but also there is a sense of dread throughout. There is not all that much of a plot, as just when it appears something changes in their relationship, it reverts back to baseline.
The ending of this book will be polarizing- and triggering to some folks. If I had known going in about it, I may not have read, but I also don't want to spoil. I would have rated this book higher, if not for the ending.
Thank you to Scribner via NetGalley for the advance reader copy in exchange for honest review.
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Animal cruelty and Animal death
Minor: Suicide attempt
mmccombs's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
4.0
Graphic: Toxic relationship, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, and Animal cruelty
Moderate: Racism, Religious bigotry, Medical content, Antisemitism, and Transphobia
reallybadwolf's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This novel was described as “Seinfeldian” and wow, what an apt descriptor. This novel follows two sisters in the every day minutiae of life as they are just completely awful to each other and everyone around them. It’s so funny, so witty, so shocking at times. I had such a good time reading this.
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Antisemitism, Rape, and Suicide attempt
elvenpanther's review
- Strong character development? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Poppy’s ideas about dead art, to me, are just as numbing as the ideas in the play. The shows I watch are dead. The middling novels I take apart bit by tiny bit for Booksmarts are dead. Dead art is everywhere. Dead art is my life. By the time we get inside, I’m exhausted.
The novel follows Jules and her younger sister Poppy, who has moved into her NYC apartment. The sisters have a very mercurial relationship, most likely thanks to the awful relationship they share with their mother. It feels as if their mother purposefully sows discord between the sisters because if they pull away from each other, perhaps they’ll value her time and ideas more. Their mother very much wants to maintain a position of power over her daughters and is extremely narcissistic. While both sisters had definitely dealt with a childhood full of emotional acrobatics, I believe, even though the younger of the two, Poppy was beginning the process of healing and trying to move past her traumas and struggles. Jules on the other hand was very much stuck in a rut. Between the lack of enthusiasm with her career, dissatisfaction with her perceived lack of life accomplishments, a dependency on social media and internet memes to drown out the overwhelming press of the problems around her, Jules has a lot of aspects of her personality that many could relate to. I didn’t really like Jules as a person though, I think because you could see throughout the novel that she wasn’t really trying to make an effort to improve her life. Not to mention how purposefully mean she could be towards her sister. This very likely is from mental health struggles, but it was still frustrating not to see any growth from her. I was really hoping to see the sisters grow closer in a positive way, or to at least see Jules gain a tiny sense of direction. That’s often how life goes though, so I can’t fully fault the novel’s message for that disappointment of mine.
The ending was abrupt and to many, may seem incomplete, but it fits in with the rest of the novel and it’s commentary on the bleakness of a society where we are so bombarded and overwhelmed with struggles from every angle that sometimes all we can do is numb ourselves to those issues with whatever distractions are available.
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Body shaming, Gaslighting, and Emotional abuse