Reviews with content warning for Medical content - Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close

Reviews tagging 'Medical content'

Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close by Aminatou Sow, Ann Friedman

10 reviews

hmatt's review against another edition

hopeful reflective medium-paced

3.0

This was a big "buyer beware" for me, because it is very much more memoir than sociology/anthropology. It is advertised as this, but I think I let what I wanted the book to be crowd out what it is. I was hoping for a deep dive on the science of friendship and the value of close friendships, whereas this is a deep dive on one particular friendship with some fun facts thrown in.

In that light, my comments on how the book feels a bit heteronormative are mostly moot. There isn't a lot of discussion on diverse gender friendships, but I suppose that's because the authors are not involved in one. There is a large section about diverse racial friendships, though, which I found insightful. I appreciate the call out for Angela Chen's book Ace, but I was left wanting more on the nuances of platonic vs. romantic relationships... and on a bunch of topics, honestly.

This was a quick audiobook listen for me, and I recommend that format. The authors narrate, and when they are quoting others they have that person read their own quote, which is super fun. For a low-stakes read, this was interesting, but I'm left wanting a lot more on this topic.

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bessadams's review against another edition

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emotional informative reflective medium-paced

3.5

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alexandramiller's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

This provoked a lot of thoughts, the chief of which was how much I love my friends

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bgirl_jazz's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

This is a beautiful and honest telling of not only a good friendship, but the work it takes to maintain a good friendship and how easily relationships can suffer or fall apart without that work. There is a romanticism to the friendships described, but the narrative does a good job going behind that curtain and also details the strain perception can put on reality. I feel as though the narrative through line gets a little lost at times, and there might have been one too many additional voices (or the use of those voices didn’t go deeply enough on the related topic for me), but the format of the audiobook was really interesting and gave a lot of life and color to the book. Would recommend the audio version!

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maggies's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

Loved loved loved Aminatou and Ann's storytelling and perspective on enduring, soulmate-like friendship. Should be read by any who aspire to friendship of any kind.

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cheye13's review against another edition

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emotional informative inspiring medium-paced

4.0

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eslsilver's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense slow-paced

3.5

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aqtbenz's review against another edition

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emotional informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.0

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internationalreads's review against another edition

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emotional funny informative inspiring fast-paced

4.0

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readalongwithnat's review against another edition

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inspiring fast-paced

4.0

I ended up listening to this one since the authors have a podcast together and they narrate it. I’m glad I went this route because I tried to read the physical book last year but couldn’t get into it. I liked this one a lot! Especially enjoyed that they talked about the challenges of a biracial friendship.

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