Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Play It as It Lays by Joan Didion

71 reviews

batrick_pateman's review

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dark emotional reflective sad fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

"In the heat some mornings she would wake with her eyes swollen and heavy and she would wonder if she had been crying."

my god this was brutal. bitter, relentlessly bleak, scathing in its portrayal of late 60's hollywood culture. i have to start reading happier books. hopefully The Virgin Suicides will be a bit more fun and upbeat :) 

didion's prose is excellent and reminds me a lot of shirley jackson's (jacksonian? shirleyesque?). it's stripped-down and deceptively simple: words and sentence structures are basic, but every word and every single detail is chosen and placed with such thought and precision that what you end up with is deep, moving, and psychologically complex in just a few lines. didion captures such a rich, anguished mixture of feelings with such brevity, and I like it a lot.
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samiisteffenn's review

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challenging dark emotional reflective fast-paced
  • 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

5.0

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itiafurniture's review

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The character development was slow to grow, and it was difficult to find any redeeming qualities for any of the characters. Wasn’t sure what I was supposed to appreciate; the prose was jolting, the character writing too garbled, the plot unclear. 
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cillehh's review against another edition

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dark reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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sarah_hutchins's review

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reflective fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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ashley_turch's review against another edition

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

2.0

I think I may be too stupid for this book. I get that it reflects a depressive state quite well, but it became incredibly hard to move through about halfway through. I struggled to finish it because of how slow it was, and I couldn’t follow what was going on. I normally love books about women losing their mind, but I guess this just wasn’t for me. 
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ms4321's review

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challenging dark mysterious reflective sad slow-paced
  • 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

Joan Didon's exploration of the dark underbelly of Hollywood and the gritty seedy side of tinsel town's glitz and glamour facade.

Play it as it Lays is a sad, dark and hollow tale of mental illness and of a woman in crisis mode. We see a character going through the motions everyday and waiting for something....but also nothing at the same time. Maria drives for hours and hours in the desert with no particular destination in mind, processing the breakdown of her marriage, the institutionalisation of her only child, and her recent abortion. 

The writing style is sparse in a way that adds to the story's overall bleakness. It is written in a stream of consciousness format, conveying the mental deterioration, disillusionment and detachment of the main character. In this respect, it really reminded me of a slightly more adult version of the Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. However, i felt that it lacked a little something that makes Plath's novel more memorable. In refelction, the fact that I am closer to Esther's age and stage in life than Maria's possibly had something to do with this. 

Overall, I'm glad to have read Play it As It Lays. However, I defintely am a bigger fan of Joan Didon's nonfiction work. 
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samarakroeger's review

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challenging dark reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

a book that sucked me in and spat me out. loved the use of perspective in the narration, the short chapters, and the general sense of unease and desolation. it’s purposefully empty. 

didn’t love the racism, homophobia, sexism, ableism, etc…
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todelisus's review

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challenging dark reflective tense medium-paced
the last two pages sealed the deal

A fascinating, little book. Can’t say I enjoyed the story, more like I enjoyed what (and how) the author tried to tell the reader with the story.
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katrinaamartin's review

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dark emotional sad tense slow-paced
  • 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

4.25

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