Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Rain Is Not My Indian Name by Cynthia Leitich Smith

6 reviews

readingwithkaitlyn's review against another edition

reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief and Racism

Moderate: Classism, Death, Pregnancy, Misogyny, and Child death

Minor: Addiction, Medical content, Death of parent, Sexual content, Alcoholism, Alcohol, War, and Car accident

nicolefrailedits's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief, Death of parent, Racism, Pregnancy, and Child death

Minor: Alcoholism

maple_dove's review against another edition

lighthearted relaxing sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This book is quite relaxing and most certainly oriented towards middle schoolers, which is maybe why I didn't enjoy it all that much.

Rain is an American Indian who picks up photography again after her friend and crush, Galen, dies to due to a car collision.

I really appreciated the character development in Rain. She matures by the end of the book and realizes her feelings sometimes blinds her to the truth.

This book also comments on anti-Indigenous racism as well as other forms of bigotry (briefly), like antisemitism and anti-Black racism.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism

Moderate: Grief and Child death

Minor: Pregnancy, Colonisation, Death of parent, and Antisemitism

Car collision (minor)

andrewhatesham's review against another edition

lighthearted medium-paced

2.75

Sadly, this was a bit of a disappointment. I didn't think the plot or writing was very good. I can't tell if it's meant to be YA or Middlegrade (on TSG it's marked as children's and YA?) because the writing style and pacing feels very juvenile, but the main character is a 14/15yo, and there are a few things in it that I felt push the boundaries of a middlegrade book. Yet the overall plot felt immature.

Another thing that confused me is the time period, it felt like historical fiction (90s), but then they mention phones and texting. There's an author's note at the end and it turns out, the book was originally released in 2001, but this is a new version with tweaks to make it more modern. It says you wouldn't notice even if you've read the original, but it still felt a little off to me, as a new reader.

That being said, I wouldn't NOT recommend this. It just didn't click with me. If my expectations were set in a different way, I might have liked it more. But it happened that I fully expected it to be a book for a much younger audience and I was wrong.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death

Minor: Death of parent, Alcohol, Antisemitism, Car accident, Grief, Pregnancy, and Racism

mezzythedragon's review against another edition

hopeful reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief and Death

Minor: Pregnancy and Racism

katharina90's review against another edition

1.0

I found this slow, boring and quite problematic. The anti-Blackness is appalling.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief, Racism, and Death