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dawnarchitects's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
erinarkin20's review
4.0
Bleed Like Me by Christa Desir is one of those books that I couldn’t put down. If you have read Fault Line by Desir, you already know that she doesn’t pull any punches and this is especially true in her newest book. I found myself unable to put this down until I finished and while it moves quickly, it is in no way what I would consider a light and easy read but please don’t let that deter you from reading.
Gannon is seventeen and has spent the last five years being invisible. Ever since her parents adopted 3 Guatemalan boys, she has taken a back seat to everything going on in her family and the only way she could ever feel anything was when she was cutting herself. All of this changes the day she meets Brooks. He jumps into her life and slowly takes over everything because he sees past the walls she has put up to everyone around her. Eventually Gannon trades one addiction (cutting) for another (Brooks) and her life blows completely out of control.
I don’t know how she does it but Desir knows exactly how to create these beautifully damaged characters that make me want to crawl into the pages and just hug them until all their problems go away. In the case of these two characters, they become severely co-dependent and create a situation that as a reader, I knew wouldn’t end in a great way. Despite that, I was rooting for them the entire book because they both got dealt a really crappy hand in life and could have used something good to happen to them.
I loved the secondary characters in this story. Dennis and Ricardo were the family that Gannon didn’t really realize she had and they initially were a source of stabilization for her. Despite coming from a family that had a mom and a dad, Gannon never really had parents that had time to focus on her because of the situation with her brothers and I loved that Dennis and Ricardo never really gave up on her.
Ali was another character that made things interesting as I got the feeling she thought she and Gannon were closer friends that perhaps Gannon did…at least at first. She was always pushing Gannon to talk and share information whereas Gannon always held pieces of herself back.
The only people in Brooks’ life were those tied to him through his foster home or through drugs and it became very clear that other than Gannon, he didn’t really have anyone in his life he could lean on. This made it extra hard to see him struggle because his biggest fear was losing Gannon because he wouldn’t be able to make her happy.
As their relationship changes, it is very clear these two are obsessed with each other and it creates a very tenuous situation. I don’t think this book will be for everyone but if you feel like you can handle it, definitely check this one out when you can as it is well worth it. Kudos to Desir for taking several sensitive topics and creating a story that I was unable to put down and even now has me thinking of the characters. While this review probably does the story no justice, take my word for it. You should add this to your to read list if you haven’t already.
Thank you to Edelweiss and Simon Pulse for the review copy.
Gannon is seventeen and has spent the last five years being invisible. Ever since her parents adopted 3 Guatemalan boys, she has taken a back seat to everything going on in her family and the only way she could ever feel anything was when she was cutting herself. All of this changes the day she meets Brooks. He jumps into her life and slowly takes over everything because he sees past the walls she has put up to everyone around her. Eventually Gannon trades one addiction (cutting) for another (Brooks) and her life blows completely out of control.
I don’t know how she does it but Desir knows exactly how to create these beautifully damaged characters that make me want to crawl into the pages and just hug them until all their problems go away. In the case of these two characters, they become severely co-dependent and create a situation that as a reader, I knew wouldn’t end in a great way. Despite that, I was rooting for them the entire book because they both got dealt a really crappy hand in life and could have used something good to happen to them.
I loved the secondary characters in this story. Dennis and Ricardo were the family that Gannon didn’t really realize she had and they initially were a source of stabilization for her. Despite coming from a family that had a mom and a dad, Gannon never really had parents that had time to focus on her because of the situation with her brothers and I loved that Dennis and Ricardo never really gave up on her.
Ali was another character that made things interesting as I got the feeling she thought she and Gannon were closer friends that perhaps Gannon did…at least at first. She was always pushing Gannon to talk and share information whereas Gannon always held pieces of herself back.
The only people in Brooks’ life were those tied to him through his foster home or through drugs and it became very clear that other than Gannon, he didn’t really have anyone in his life he could lean on. This made it extra hard to see him struggle because his biggest fear was losing Gannon because he wouldn’t be able to make her happy.
As their relationship changes, it is very clear these two are obsessed with each other and it creates a very tenuous situation. I don’t think this book will be for everyone but if you feel like you can handle it, definitely check this one out when you can as it is well worth it. Kudos to Desir for taking several sensitive topics and creating a story that I was unable to put down and even now has me thinking of the characters. While this review probably does the story no justice, take my word for it. You should add this to your to read list if you haven’t already.
Thank you to Edelweiss and Simon Pulse for the review copy.
jlove731's review
5.0
Love this one from Christa!
PS. Ricardo is mine ;)
EDIT ----
I was lucky enough to read a VERY early copy of this book and it was absolutely amazing. It IS amazing. This one will have your heart aching in 10 different directions. Absolutely adored it. And yes, Ricardo will always be mine.
PS. Ricardo is mine ;)
EDIT ----
I was lucky enough to read a VERY early copy of this book and it was absolutely amazing. It IS amazing. This one will have your heart aching in 10 different directions. Absolutely adored it. And yes, Ricardo will always be mine.
pikasqueaks's review
3.0
BLEED LIKE ME is the story of two people who shouldn't be together but find themselves there anyway. Amelia is a hard to like protagonist who is sad because her parents adopted a trio of unruly kids, and she has fallen to the wayside in their wake. It's hard to stomach seeing a kid get ignored for a bunch of other, awful kids. I wanted to see some kind of redeeming situation for the kids, but there isn't. They're just vile little shits. In order to deal with the pain of her life, Amelia cuts herself.
Brooks is also a little shit, but in a different way. He's stalkery and he doesn't take no for an answer. Soon after their relationship begins, the reality of his character is unveiled. He's an abusive jerk who starts to cut her off from everyone and everything, and she goes along with it, because, well, someone is paying attention to her, and that is everything when you're a teenager who doesn't see the rest of the world around her.
I take issue with some of the summary of this story, because this is not an intimate portrayal of love. It is a portrayal of obsession, self-harm, and infatuation, but these characters don't love each other. They don't know how to love themselves first and foremost, and while I'm not really the biggest fan of that cliche, I think it's important here. BLEED LIKE ME is not a love story at all.
The story attempts to make us understand why Brooks is the way he is, but honestly, it doesn't succeed. In the end, I didn't care about Brooks, I only worried for Amelia.
In today's world, who ISN'T familiar with cutting as self harm? But this book takes it a step further, and there's a particularly interesting scene that's unlike anything I've read in YA before -- something I was excited to find in this book. In it, Brooks cuts Amelia, and it turns kinda sexual. That'smykink aside, it's a kind of scene that doesn't get explored in YA enough, for obvious reasons. I appreciated how honest this was. Very much so. Like with the author's debut, FAUL LINE, she is frank and honest, albeit tactful, with how she depicts some of the darker parts of the characters and their stories.
Unfortunately, the story began to fall apart for me the moment we had the benevolent adult introduced. She comes in after Amelia has moves away from home (run away, really) and in with Brooks in a shitty environment. She's introduced in an all-to-obvious, saccharine sort of way. I didn't want Amelia to get out of her situation because of a third party. I wanted to see her grow up and bloom.
This is a problem with the author's style of writing, I think. She aims for the frank and the short, she aims to make the story as hard-hitting with the subject matter as possible, but what we lose in this style are strong, well-developed characters. This was a problem in FAULT LINE, but it was more apparent here, because Amelia is a character who needs to be understood. But unfortunately, the character development for Amelia was severely lacking.
I wanted more for Amelia. I wanted more for an ending, too. After they relocate, the reader can determine where the story is going and it gets kind of pointless to read it. We know what's going to happen, but unfortunately, we don't get a strong enough resolution.
What's unique about this story is unfortunately just the adopted brothers. Everything else, I have read in other, stronger books. Amelia and Brooks are just not strongly written enough for me to be satisfied with this book.
However, I still look forward to what else Christ Desire writes. I think she has a lot of great stories to tell. I just hope that in the future, we will get more fleshed-out characters instead of super edgy plot points.
Brooks is also a little shit, but in a different way. He's stalkery and he doesn't take no for an answer. Soon after their relationship begins, the reality of his character is unveiled. He's an abusive jerk who starts to cut her off from everyone and everything, and she goes along with it, because, well, someone is paying attention to her, and that is everything when you're a teenager who doesn't see the rest of the world around her.
I take issue with some of the summary of this story, because this is not an intimate portrayal of love. It is a portrayal of obsession, self-harm, and infatuation, but these characters don't love each other. They don't know how to love themselves first and foremost, and while I'm not really the biggest fan of that cliche, I think it's important here. BLEED LIKE ME is not a love story at all.
The story attempts to make us understand why Brooks is the way he is, but honestly, it doesn't succeed. In the end, I didn't care about Brooks, I only worried for Amelia.
In today's world, who ISN'T familiar with cutting as self harm? But this book takes it a step further, and there's a particularly interesting scene that's unlike anything I've read in YA before -- something I was excited to find in this book. In it, Brooks cuts Amelia, and it turns kinda sexual. That'smykink aside, it's a kind of scene that doesn't get explored in YA enough, for obvious reasons. I appreciated how honest this was. Very much so. Like with the author's debut, FAUL LINE, she is frank and honest, albeit tactful, with how she depicts some of the darker parts of the characters and their stories.
Unfortunately, the story began to fall apart for me the moment we had the benevolent adult introduced. She comes in after Amelia has moves away from home (run away, really) and in with Brooks in a shitty environment. She's introduced in an all-to-obvious, saccharine sort of way. I didn't want Amelia to get out of her situation because of a third party. I wanted to see her grow up and bloom.
This is a problem with the author's style of writing, I think. She aims for the frank and the short, she aims to make the story as hard-hitting with the subject matter as possible, but what we lose in this style are strong, well-developed characters. This was a problem in FAULT LINE, but it was more apparent here, because Amelia is a character who needs to be understood. But unfortunately, the character development for Amelia was severely lacking.
I wanted more for Amelia. I wanted more for an ending, too. After they relocate, the reader can determine where the story is going and it gets kind of pointless to read it. We know what's going to happen, but unfortunately, we don't get a strong enough resolution.
What's unique about this story is unfortunately just the adopted brothers. Everything else, I have read in other, stronger books. Amelia and Brooks are just not strongly written enough for me to be satisfied with this book.
However, I still look forward to what else Christ Desire writes. I think she has a lot of great stories to tell. I just hope that in the future, we will get more fleshed-out characters instead of super edgy plot points.
dmurdock1997's review
dark
emotional
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
lilxnat's review
1.0
I really, REALLY wanted to like this book. I tried my hardest to find things I liked about this book but so many times I found myself cringing at how much I didn't like it. For me, this book was like that person you like from a distance but once you actually get to know them, you realize the idea of them is just so much better.
Okay, maybe I'm being too harsh. This book did have it moments. They were very limited, sure, but they were there. I just didn't like any of the characters and I felt like certain parts were too rushed.
Okay, maybe I'm being too harsh. This book did have it moments. They were very limited, sure, but they were there. I just didn't like any of the characters and I felt like certain parts were too rushed.
heatheray's review
3.0
The best way I would describe Bleed For Me is two incredibly broken teens who are headed down a path to destruction.
Amelia Gannon started out with a normal life, then her parents adopted 3 boys who lived on the streets from Guatemala. The boys were wild and took up all her parents time as Gannon was forgotten about unless she was needed to help out with her brothers. She only has one real friend, but they aren’t the type of friends who really sit and chat about life. I’m not sure if that’s more because Gannon doesn’t open up to people or if it’s just who they both are. Though I think that Ali kind of wanted more of a real friendship. She stuck by Gannon, pushed her to talk a bit, I think if Gannon would open up more, they would have an awesome friendship.
Then there is a Michael Brooks. We don’t know until farther along in the book what his background is so I won’t go into it in my review. I don’t like to post anything that really isn’t in or alluded to in the blurb. He is more broken that Gannon I think.
Gannon reminded me of myself (minus the cutting) in my worst relationship that I had. The things she says to Brooks took me back to that period in my life.
I want to say that Brooks wasn’t a very likable character, that was my initial reaction as I finished the book, but the more I think about where he came from, what he has gone through… he was still fighting to survive and that says something about him.
It felt like these two just were not good for each other and for the first time in a book I was hoping the main girl in the book would leave the main guy.
All in all Bleed Like Me was a good read. It was well written about a subject that I think a lot of people, especially teens go through. That being said since I mentioned teens, I wouldn’t have my teenage son read this even if it was his type of book. While it is a subject matter that I think is important that we acknowledge, the resolution to the book… I wish it would have gone another way. Then I would be ok with him reading the harder stuff in the book.
Thank you so much for my copy of Bleed Like Me.
Amelia Gannon started out with a normal life, then her parents adopted 3 boys who lived on the streets from Guatemala. The boys were wild and took up all her parents time as Gannon was forgotten about unless she was needed to help out with her brothers. She only has one real friend, but they aren’t the type of friends who really sit and chat about life. I’m not sure if that’s more because Gannon doesn’t open up to people or if it’s just who they both are. Though I think that Ali kind of wanted more of a real friendship. She stuck by Gannon, pushed her to talk a bit, I think if Gannon would open up more, they would have an awesome friendship.
Then there is a Michael Brooks. We don’t know until farther along in the book what his background is so I won’t go into it in my review. I don’t like to post anything that really isn’t in or alluded to in the blurb. He is more broken that Gannon I think.
Gannon reminded me of myself (minus the cutting) in my worst relationship that I had. The things she says to Brooks took me back to that period in my life.
I want to say that Brooks wasn’t a very likable character, that was my initial reaction as I finished the book, but the more I think about where he came from, what he has gone through… he was still fighting to survive and that says something about him.
It felt like these two just were not good for each other and for the first time in a book I was hoping the main girl in the book would leave the main guy.
All in all Bleed Like Me was a good read. It was well written about a subject that I think a lot of people, especially teens go through. That being said since I mentioned teens, I wouldn’t have my teenage son read this even if it was his type of book. While it is a subject matter that I think is important that we acknowledge, the resolution to the book… I wish it would have gone another way. Then I would be ok with him reading the harder stuff in the book.
Thank you so much for my copy of Bleed Like Me.
abbieliliana's review
2.0
um maybe let’s not romanticize toxic relationships and self harm. just a thought.
there was no point to this book. mentally ill girl meets mentally ill guy, girl and guy begin unhealthy relationship in which they enable each others issues including self harm, girl and guy run away and live in a shitty apartment with creepy dudes and work shitty jobs, guy gets upset and offs himself.
there was no point to this book. mentally ill girl meets mentally ill guy, girl and guy begin unhealthy relationship in which they enable each others issues including self harm, girl and guy run away and live in a shitty apartment with creepy dudes and work shitty jobs, guy gets upset and offs himself.