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Reviews tagging 'Body shaming'
La casa en el mar más azul. Edición especial: Edición especial con cantos tintados by TJ Klune, Carlos Abreu Fetter
353 reviews
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Minor: Body shaming, Child abuse, Confinement, Fatphobia, Physical abuse
This had all the magic and comfort of a middle grade read, but for adults! I smiled my way through the whole thing. It broke my heart and put it back together. And the audiobook narration was fantastic!
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
fast-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
At first I wasn't so sure about this book, but I ended up adoring it. It reminds me of Good Omens, Ms. Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, and Howl's Moving Castle, all stories that I love. Linus' character development really touched my heart as he learned about self-acceptance and pursuing happiness. There was a lot of repetition of certain phrases, which gave it a poetic feel. It was a bit sappy, but I cried. Multiple times.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body shaming, Child abuse, Confinement, Fatphobia
Minor: Death, Violence
funny
lighthearted
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
this book was really cute. it had a major whimsical vibe, and i absolutely ADORED all of the kids. i was a bit disappointed by linus & arthurs' characters though. i just kinda found linus annoying and arthur bland.
edit: going back and changing my rating from 4 stars to 3.5 bc this book just really didn’t leave an impression
edit: going back and changing my rating from 4 stars to 3.5 bc this book just really didn’t leave an impression
Content Warnings
Graphic: Xenophobia
Moderate: Body shaming, Child abuse, Confinement, Fatphobia, Mental illness, Religious bigotry
Minor: Child death, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Violence
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body shaming, Fatphobia
Minor: Child abuse, Homophobia
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
sad
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
CW: talk of weight, fat-shaming, and dieting (with pushback against it!)
I don't remember the last time I cried this many happy tears while reading a book!
And sad tears!
And laughed!!
This book has ALL the feels and all the delightful feel-good lovely unexpected characters and yes, they're queer, and no, it's not a big deal in the story, it just is, and yes there's talk of weight, fat-shaming, and dieting, but it's pushed back against throughout the book (except for right at the very start when Linus hasn't yet met the characters who push back against it, but that's hardly any of the book at all).
I don't even have a favourite character, I just love them all!
Though, my one little disappointment was that Zoe, Helen, Arthur, and Linus couldn't all adopt all the kids together...
I don't remember the last time I cried this many happy tears while reading a book!
And sad tears!
And laughed!!
This book has ALL the feels and all the delightful feel-good lovely unexpected characters and yes, they're queer, and no, it's not a big deal in the story, it just is, and yes there's talk of weight, fat-shaming, and dieting, but it's pushed back against throughout the book (except for right at the very start when Linus hasn't yet met the characters who push back against it, but that's hardly any of the book at all).
I don't even have a favourite character, I just love them all!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Forced institutionalization
Moderate: Body shaming, Confinement, Panic attacks/disorders
Minor: Xenophobia
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
My initial impression of this book was very positive. Then I learned that it's based on residential schools, and that's just not sitting right with me anymore.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body shaming, Bullying, Confinement, Fatphobia, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia
Minor: Body horror, Child abuse, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Gore, Religious bigotry
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I love this book so much. It destroyed me in the best possible way. I am sobbing from love and joy and because I can't continue to live in this world with Linus and Arthur
Content Warnings
Minor: Body shaming, Child abuse
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child abuse
Minor: Body shaming
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Bullying, Confinement, Hate crime, Racism
Minor: Body shaming
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I originally gave this a 4.5 but I updated it to a 1 upon learning that this was based on (or at least partially inspired by) the Sixties Scoop, an decades-spanning event in which thousands of Indigenous children in Canada were forcibly removed from their homes and adopted elsewhere. That real-world context makes the "these orphans have powers" marginalization plot into a fantasy version of a real-world genocide. I'd waffled on whether to even bring up implications about race in the original review since the book seemed like it was trying to be about queerness rather than ethnicity, but it's horrible that it is actually about a major series of events in a racially/ethnically motivated genocide that hasn't really stopped in the present day. It also perpetuates a long-standing and racist tradition of depicting Indigenous people as magical or otherworldly, in this case many of the kids are literally inhuman. My original review is left intact below.
-----
The House in the Cerulean Sea is lovely and perfect and amazing; a fantastic found-family story about how things can be okay even when people are terrible and awful people don’t like the idea of marginalized people being happy.
The marginalization in question is specifically that of being a magical creature of some kind. It's set at an orphanage and deals with the evils and prejudices in the kind of system which creates orphanages for magical children but never tries to get them adopted, which may be triggering for some readers. The traumas are mostly handled as backstory, and most of them aren't fully described but rather hinted at, but there are depictions of characters being triggered by events in the present. This book has so much care and was really cathartic to read.
Woven throughout the story is an awareness of other kinds of marginalization and identities which are discriminated against, in a way that subtly nudges to say that these particular kids have lost their homes for turning into a small dog or being the literal son of Satan, but the way that this happens and the hate that their existence engenders due to bigotry and ignorance is coded as an analogue for queerphobia, specifically. It depicts internalized fatphobia/body shaming, as well as homophobic micoraggressions (the kind which pretend to be nice but still hurt).
The characters are excellent, I love everyone on the island and I'm so happy without how this book handles their stories and gives them space to be happy even though things aren't perfect. The setting is lovely, the contrast between the island and the city is cartoonishly stark because it conveys how it feels to the MC to be in each of those places. The people at the agency are well-written and terribly bureaucratic, the secondary characters at each location fit their spaces well while also informing the setting.
It's about learning how to relax, to enjoy things and have fun, to be okay and be yourself, but without pretending that bad things don't happen.
-----
The House in the Cerulean Sea is lovely and perfect and amazing; a fantastic found-family story about how things can be okay even when people are terrible and awful people don’t like the idea of marginalized people being happy.
The marginalization in question is specifically that of being a magical creature of some kind. It's set at an orphanage and deals with the evils and prejudices in the kind of system which creates orphanages for magical children but never tries to get them adopted, which may be triggering for some readers. The traumas are mostly handled as backstory, and most of them aren't fully described but rather hinted at, but there are depictions of characters being triggered by events in the present. This book has so much care and was really cathartic to read.
Woven throughout the story is an awareness of other kinds of marginalization and identities which are discriminated against, in a way that subtly nudges to say that these particular kids have lost their homes for turning into a small dog or being the literal son of Satan, but the way that this happens and the hate that their existence engenders due to bigotry and ignorance is coded as an analogue for queerphobia, specifically. It depicts internalized fatphobia/body shaming, as well as homophobic micoraggressions (the kind which pretend to be nice but still hurt).
The characters are excellent, I love everyone on the island and I'm so happy without how this book handles their stories and gives them space to be happy even though things aren't perfect. The setting is lovely, the contrast between the island and the city is cartoonishly stark because it conveys how it feels to the MC to be in each of those places. The people at the agency are well-written and terribly bureaucratic, the secondary characters at each location fit their spaces well while also informing the setting.
It's about learning how to relax, to enjoy things and have fun, to be okay and be yourself, but without pretending that bad things don't happen.
Content Warnings
Minor: Ableism, Body shaming, Child abuse, Fatphobia, Homophobia
CW for ableist language, microaggressions, homophobia/queerphobia, fatphobia, bigotry, body shaming, child abuse (backstory).