Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

Beloved by Toni Morrison

52 reviews

marissasa's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-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

Beloved is deeply somber and at times painful. It's Toni Morrison's most well-known book and after reading it I can see why. It's full of tension and grief and symbolism, all reflecting to themes of how our pasts shape our present and future. It doesn't shy away from any of the harsh realities of slavery and how even for survivors of enslavement, their memories and trauma of torture will forever live within them even as they try to forge new identities as free colored people in their own communities. Sethe's past literally haunts her through the form of Beloved, a character that was fascinating in that she constantly bent the line between ghost of a dead child and reincarnation of a living child and as a reader you are left wondering which she is throughout the whole narrative. I am glad that I read this story and definitely want to continue reading Morrison's other books. The literary style and elegant writing she uses reflect her talent and free-thinking mind as an author who paved the way for Black writers and Black historical books to this day.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

coco_5's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

this book is an amazing piece of literature. a classic. a tragic story

that does end in a hopeful light

stunning writing, reads like poetry.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Cursing, Death, Genocide, Gore, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Toxic friendship

Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, and War

misscoffeereads's review against another edition

challenging dark sad slow-paced

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

3.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Racial slurs, Racism, and Slavery

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Death of parent, and Sexual harassment

orlagal's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Police brutality, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Abortion, Death of parent, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

fiveredhens's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

favorite quotes:

She shook her head from side to side, resigned to her rebellious brain. Why was there nothing it refused? No misery, no regret, no hateful picture too rotten to accept? Like a greedy child it snatched up everything. Just once, could it say, No thank you? I just ate and can’t hold another bite?

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Death, Hate crime, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual content, Terminal illness, Fire/Fire injury, and Abandonment

Minor: Ableism, Animal death, Fatphobia, Forced institutionalization, Alcohol, and War

mexigingerale's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Beloved is a hard read and one I am unlikely to reread, but incredibly satisfied to have read it. Gave me a perspective I could never gave gotten otherwise.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Racism, Slavery, Suicide attempt, and Murder

Minor: Death of parent

readingpicnic's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious sad slow-paced

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

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Child death, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Mental illness, and Death of parent

nancymking's review against another edition

emotional mysterious reflective sad slow-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? No

3.75

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Violence, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, and Pregnancy

kylieqrada's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-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

Another book that I am woefully inept to review. Toni Morrison's books are modern classics, but Beloved is... transcendent. I guess I will start by saying that I don't do ghost stories. I am at a point in my life where I know what freaks me out and I don't need to expose myself to those things. This is most certainly a ghost story (not a spoiler, it's in the synopsis). And the ghost is scary. She's not a nice ghost. No Caspers here. However, I didn't feel the need to put this book down or not read it before bed at any point. I wasn't scared by the ghost. The rest of the story on the other hand... It's almost as though Ms. Morrison was trying to contrast the horrors of slave life with the horrors of living with a violent poltergeist. And for Sethe and Denver, the horrors and consequences of slave life were so, so much worse. There were innumerable other themes and topics explored in this book, and the narrative style was very unique, in Ms. Morrison's classic way. It took me much longer than usual to read a book of this length, due to the incredible complexity of the work and the different facets to explore. I'm sure I'm missing so much, but what I did grasp, I will be thinking about and ruminating on for a long time.  

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Death, Gore, Hate crime, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, and Pregnancy

gracer's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

 Took a while for me to gather my thoughts on this one. Toni Morrison really was an excellent writer, her command of the English language was exceptional, and there are many particularly notable passages in this book. Obviously the subject matter is not pleasant, but she made it haunting. Literally haunting, as in I had bad/weird/uncomfortable/crazy dreams two nights while reading this. One of them was bloody. So we can call this book a success.

A lot of what was going on here obviously went way over my head. I really wish I had read this in school, as so many of my classmates did, because so much of it left me thinking, "I don't get it!" But I did a bunch of research, and thinking, and some text message discussions with friends who had read it in school, and came to get a better idea of it, and I really enjoy it when a book makes me do that. When it requires thinking and when I am actually invested enough to turn to the secondary sources and get some clarification, then says very good things about the book.

That said, I'm still of two minds about it. One part, the five star part, recognizes that the use of language is excellent, the story is moving beyond what one could expect (I've been hearing about this book since I was 14 and yet nothing could have prepared me for this). The other part, the three star part, is aware that this is not the type of writing that I really love. I like books that are concise, that feel edited, that contain multitudes in their limited pages. I am not a great fan of descriptive passages. (For example, (view spoiler).) I assume that the reason I encountered that perceived wordiness here was partially because I am missing something and partially because it was written in the 80s, and for some reason I think of books from that time as being a little more... "flowery" is the word, although it's so completely wrong for this book. It also took me a long time to come around to magical realism, and I still sometimes grapple with it when I come across it.

So, four stars - and anyway stars don't really mean anything - as a compromise, and with the understanding that maybe I'll read this again some day. I hope I will. Maybe after I've gotten a little more exposure to stream-of-consciousness and magical realism. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, and Murder

Moderate: Sexual violence, Medical content, and Death of parent