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overall, very odd and off-putting. would not recommend unless you enjoy reading about pretentious nyc artists and advertisers, pain, and addiction.
honorable mention to two quotes:
p. 329:
“people are like this too, you know,” he says eventually. “we break.
we put ourselves back together. the cracks are the best part. you don't have to hide them.”
and on p. 334
“movie, melatonin, and (redacted),” she says, tapping out the words on my hand with her finger. “best night's sleep you'll ever have.”
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Self harm, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Suicide attempt, Injury/Injury detail
Graphic: Infidelity, Toxic relationship
Moderate: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Mental illness, Misogyny, Self harm, Sexual content, Transphobia, Violence, Gaslighting
Minor: Cultural appropriation
Graphic: Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Sexual harassment
Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Violence, Suicide attempt
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Self harm, Violence, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Alcohol
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal death, Self harm, Violence
Moderate: Chronic illness
Upon reflection i hate this book
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Cultural appropriation, Abandonment, Alcohol
Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Self harm, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol
The only reason I finished this book was because it is my Book Club novel. I fought and sweated my way through page by page because it’s just so bad. It’s part of the trend for authors to try to make their books “deeper” by flooding every character with trauma. Pain Porn if you prefer.
The author thought that by giving each character a single-defining struggle she is making them less one-dimensional but because of that they felt almost like cartoon characters. Cleo - beautiful, thin, talented, young BUT WAIT she is depressed and has both mummy and daddy issues; Frank - beautiful, “manly”, successful, rich and older BUT WAIT he had mummy issues and is an alcoholic, Zoe - beautiful, thin, talented BUT WAIT she has seizures, Quentin - beautiful, thin, rich “snarky gay best friend” BUT WAIT he can’t come out of the closet because of his homophobic Polish family (fuck you for that Coc, enforcing Polish stereotypes) and is a drug addict, Anders - beautiful, thin, rich fuckboy BUT WAIT his step-son doesn’t like him anymore and his parents don’t visit him in the US. You see what I mean? The only half-decent characters are Eleanor and Santiago, just because they are not awful to other people, but they rarely are given voice and in the end are pushed into the role of “I can fix him” girl for Frank and “losing weight will let you find love”, respectively. Nauseating. TikTok girlies, wake up, this is not literary fiction you claim it to be.
The book obviously features a lot of content warnings - wouldn’t be a pain porn without it - but I’m not sure if it’s handled even passably well.
This book angered me on so many levels. It was the superficial depth, wannabe literary fiction, over sexualisation of everything (Zoe saying that she is “a real girl” now, after climaxing, nauseated me), disrespectful treatment of a lot of extremely heavy issues and -how could I forget - BLATANT plagiarism of other media (yes, I’m looking at you ripped-off Fleabag dinner scene). Awful
Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body shaming, Bullying, Chronic illness, Deadnaming, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Racism, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Medical content, Dementia, Grief, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Dysphoria, Classism
i technically would dock points for the couple chapters written from the random friends' povs (Quinten and Santiago) because i don't feel they added anything to the storyline, but the rest of the book was strong enough to me that i am choosing to ignore those 2 chapters
Graphic: Alcoholism, Drug abuse, Drug use, Self harm, Alcohol
Moderate: Animal death, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent