Reviews tagging 'Alcohol'

Beyond the Wand: Growing Up a Wizard by Tom Felton

146 reviews

rad_reads_123's review against another edition

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challenging funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.0


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cristina_reading24's review against another edition

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emotional funny informative inspiring lighthearted reflective medium-paced

4.75


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bookswithlauren's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0


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hematthews's review against another edition

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emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.0


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torturedreadersdept's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing medium-paced

5.0


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midnightrose_reads's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

Tom Felton’s autobiography Beyond the Wand is lighthearted, warm, inspiring, and at times sad. I felt an enormous amount of affection towards Tom as he reflected on his life and career. Definitely would recommend!

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jazzofmine's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

3.5

This was a good book, but in my opinion not super memorable. So I started with ⭐️⭐️⭐️ but couldn’t quite justify ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ since this is probably my least favorite of the books I’ve read/listened to recently.  It was fine enough to listen to on my commutes one week. 

Part of the appeal was listening to it narrated by the actor. I read and watched all the Harry Potter books as they came out when I was younger. So when I came across it (having not heard of this book previously) I was intrigued. I think if I was reading it physically I might not be hooked enough to keep reading.

Part of what isn’t sitting right for me with this book is that a tone of forced modesty came across to me throughout most of the book. It was fascinating to hear about some of Tom’s experiences, especially relating to his role in Harry Potter. So I wouldn’t hype this up a ton to a friend - however, kind of a fun read for a HP fan looking for a nostalgic, non fiction read.

Oh - apparently Tom Felton struggles with mental health problems and the second half or so of the book turned toward that. So to his credit, I’m sure writing this was part of him being self reflective and working towards healing. ❤️‍🩹  There are some vulnerable bits as he shared some of his experiences when he hit a rock bottom and got rehab for alcohol and marijuana use. 

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bzliz's review against another edition

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funny reflective medium-paced

4.0

I was looking for a relatively short audiobook to listen to in the car and saw this was available on Libby and decided to give it a shot. I have a lot of nostalgia for the HP series but choose not to interact with it these days as I have no interest in supporting JKR. I’d like to assure readers like myself that while Felton does mention her at times (unavoidable if you’re going to discuss the series she created), he does not directly praise her, though he also does not condemn her bigotry.

The stories of child actors are always interesting to me because it’s such a unique life experience. Tom’s tales from the set will be a delight to any HP fan. He does unfortunately compare his experience to that of the main trio several times which triggers a dual response in me- 1) your own experience isn’t negated because someone else faced more challenges in a similar situation and 2) who are you to comment of what these other people were going through?- and I can’t shake either one.

In later chapters post-Potter, he doesn’t always give context for when some events took place so you may need to cross reference Wikipedia or IMDB to get an idea of the time frame. He also tends to remind readers of who someone is in the context of his life, as if he’d been advised by an editor that readers will forget who someone is from one chapter to the next. Didn’t love that.

All in all, I enjoyed it but it’s not one I’ll ever revisit. Non- HP fans will likely not care much for this.

Content warnings:
Alcohol, alcoholism, addiction- Tom discusses his struggles with alcohol and his stint in a rehab facility.
Drug use- some mentions of marijuana use.
Mental illness- some feelings of helplessness and dissociation discussed. Tom advocates for more public discussion of mental illness and notes those feelings in himself, though he does not mention specific diagnoses for himself or anyone else. 

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jonilouise3's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective fast-paced

4.75


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lapuce1006's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny fast-paced

3.5


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