Reviews tagging 'Body shaming'

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

18 reviews

wooblatoober's review

challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.75

i really enjoyed zevin’s ability to portray characters with generosity & portray ever-changing relationships, even with rifts, and just overall make everything feel real.

i’m obsessed with marx’s fruit tree motif. he’s ever-giving, and he’s beautiful, and he’s soft. the love he gives freely is so beautiful and bountiful and juicy and sweet, but not too much so, like a fuyu persimmon. for now, maybe because of my own experiences, i’m more hung up on marx’s death than sam & sadie’s stories and relationship.

zevin does an AMAZING job of showing how people and their relationships change over time. it’s crazy how much my opinions on the characters changed over time, waxing and waning and flipping between them.

specifically, i loved sadie at the beginning and felt sorry for how she was being manipulated, then disliked her toward the end, which isn’t even how every reader might feel about her, since she seems like such a real person, and real people have some people that like them and some people that don’t. conversely, i was a bit annoyed by sam for the beginning, thinking he seemed like any other toxic smart guy who thinks he’s smarter than everybody else, until i started LOVING him toward the middle, then i was a bit annoyed by him again by the end for his lack of communication, though i was proud of his growth and baby steps in communication.

this book reads like creative nonfiction. it’s remarkable. my only small complaint is a major spoiler (everything i’ve marked “spoiler” is a major spoiler though), and that’s basically the end of the book. tl;dr for the spoiler, i felt like the ending was just over the line of a little bit too late in the back-and-forth of the story to feel satisfied by it. i felt empty at the end like i do out of all the best books, but that emptiness came from events that happened before the ending of the book, and the ending was overshadowed by that and felt too little too late.

by sadie and sam’s happy ending, which implies that they’ll fight again in the future but will work to be better to themselves and each other, i was kinda over it. overshadowed by marx’s death, i had become done with sadie’s paralysis and easy-to-anger attitude as well as her ability to hold a grudge that outshines teen sam’s, and done with sam’s refusal to communicate, even if they had experiences or mental illnesses that facilitated those actions (or lack thereof).

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Racism, Gore, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Gun violence, Mental illness, Pregnancy, Chronic illness, Death of parent, Murder, Violence, Cursing, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Blood, Body horror, Car accident, Death, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Cancer, Toxic relationship, Sexual content, Drug use, Hate crime, Sexual assault, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Ableism, Cultural appropriation, Antisemitism, and Body shaming

sas_lk's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

It was a decent book, but I would not say it blew me away. I can't say whether that is because of my high expectations, or because of the book itself though.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Death, Gun violence, Mass/school shootings, Hate crime, Murder, Toxic relationship, Violence, Emotional abuse, Grief, Gaslighting, and Suicide

Moderate: Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Sexual violence

Minor: Blood, Body shaming, Gore, Cancer, Drug use, Racism, Homophobia, Terminal illness, Car accident, and Cultural appropriation

opallight's review

challenging emotional reflective sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Body shaming, Toxic relationship, Sexual content, Medical trauma, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual violence, Toxic friendship, and Racism

Minor: Infidelity

scmiller's review

dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Mass/school shootings, Suicide, Grief, Murder, Gun violence, Car accident, Death, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Blood, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Infidelity, Car accident, Gun violence, Murder, Cancer, Injury/Injury detail, and Mass/school shootings

Minor: Alcohol, Gaslighting, Violence, Fatphobia, Medical content, Racism, Classism, Cultural appropriation, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Religious bigotry, Racial slurs, Infidelity, Antisemitism, Homophobia, Hate crime, Abortion, Vomit, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Pregnancy, and Body shaming

qrschulte's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative 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

5.0

The first two chapters were a bit rough, and I didn’t love the style of the language, but I kept reading because I was intrigued. And then I read the third chapter and was hooked. By the end, I was in love. 

I didn’t find Sadie and Sam particularly likable, but I completely understood their motivations and their choices were believable. 

This was a really ambitious book, and I think Zevin executed it really well. You can tell she put in a lot of time researching to make it realistic. It’s clearly a love letter to gaming, and I really appreciated the style of the different sections. I think it added a lot to the narrative. This is definitely a book that I will enjoy even more on a future read, though having a physical copy would make it easier to flip back to remind myself of different sections. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Misogyny, Murder, Racial slurs, Racism, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Body shaming, Car accident, Chronic illness, Death, Dysphoria, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexism, Suicide, Blood, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Cursing, Abortion, Classism, Cultural appropriation, Eating disorder, Terminal illness, Vomit, Domestic abuse, and Physical abuse

Minor: Antisemitism, Islamophobia, and War

Not a true adult/minor relationship, but the power dynamic was definitely like one. The ableism is more internalized.

olivia119's review

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense 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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Animal death, Body shaming, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Racism, Adult/minor relationship, Death, Gaslighting, Racial slurs, Self harm, Sexual violence, Ableism, Body horror, Car accident, Chronic illness, Cultural appropriation, Grief, Gun violence, Medical content, Sexism, Sexual assault, Homophobia, and Mass/school shootings

natalijamalbasic's review

emotional informative reflective relaxing sad fast-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

4.75

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic friendship, Car accident, Body shaming, Cancer, Death of parent, Death, Pregnancy, Blood, Toxic relationship, Sexual violence, and Racism

Minor: Grief, Murder, Eating disorder, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Vomit, Panic attacks/disorders, Mass/school shootings, Drug use, Gun violence, and Homophobia

squidknees's review

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-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

4.0

Like The Fault in our Stars like A Little Life like Normal People Sally Rooney

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Grief, Gun violence, and Suicide

Moderate: Cancer, Pregnancy, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Homophobia, Abandonment, Hate crime, Terminal illness, Sexual content, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual violence, Racial slurs, and Murder

Minor: Animal cruelty, Bullying, Classism, Abortion, Alcohol, Cultural appropriation, Body horror, Vomit, Fatphobia, Death of parent, Death, Cursing, Toxic friendship, Blood, Body shaming, and Toxic relationship

ashybear02's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Body shaming, Body horror, Car accident, Death of parent, Drug use, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Murder, Pregnancy, Grief, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Misogyny, Racism, and Racial slurs

elizlizabeth's review

medium-paced

• Loveable characters? No

2.0

I disliked every single character here and thus had a hard time relating or empathizing with them. The writing is so bad, half screenplay half novel it feels like someone much younger and inexperienced wrote it. Shoutout to the seven (?) asian women named Anna Lee!

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Gun violence, Sexual violence, Vomit, Adult/minor relationship, Car accident, Drug use, Grief, Body shaming, and Homophobia