Reviews tagging 'Forced institutionalization'

The Pisces by Melissa Broder

5 reviews

feralbookwife's review against another edition

dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad fast-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

3.75

A very weird book that I very much enjoyed. If you wanted to like the Midnight Library but didn’t, this is a cheeky look at the Void and what we do to cope. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Vomit, Toxic relationship, Animal death, Drug use, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Self harm, Toxic friendship, Forced institutionalization, Addiction, Suicide attempt, Alcoholism, Grief, Infidelity, Drug abuse, and Mental illness

lyshbish's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny sad tense slow-paced

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

1.5

started getting more and more furious as it became evident that

the dog was going to die...

Lucy is by far the most unlikable protagonist I've ever read. I think that was the point, but it was still grating that she never seemed to learn from any of her mistakes. I wish she

drowned

at the end

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Excrement, Toxic friendship, Forced institutionalization, Infidelity, Mental illness, Sexual content, Vomit, Animal cruelty, Drug abuse, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Adult/minor relationship and Death of parent

micahp's review against another edition

emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

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

2.0

This book had an interesting concept, but the overall themes and development of the main character and surrounding cast were disappointing. The main character's entire personality and experience revolved around her obsession with love, which made for a repetitive story with little development. The tragedy of the ending <death of the dog she was caring for> was sad and unnecessary to the plot. The trigger warnings of this book needs to be lengthy.  
This was disappointing to read after Broder's Milkfed, with the plot and characters needing more fleshing out and significantly more editing.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Mental illness, Self harm, Addiction, Infidelity, Animal cruelty, Forced institutionalization, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Pregnancy, Death of parent, and Miscarriage

bree_klass's review

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

a beautiful mess of a book

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Content Warnings

Minor: Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Self harm, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, Stalking, Sexual content, Panic attacks/disorders, Mental illness, Forced institutionalization, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Addiction

cheye13's review

dark reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

Sigmund Freud and Judith Butler would go to town on this. And the ensuing debate would be more interesting than this novel. This was a boring Rachel Bloom's Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and a bland Zaina Arafat's You Exist Too Much.

Unlike many earlier readers, I didn't pick this up for hot mermaid sex; I picked this up because those earlier readers said it was a wild ride. It disappoints on both fronts: first of all, the merman sex, while indeed hot, doesn't happen until a full halfway through the book, and is preceeded by quite a bit of terrible human sex. Second, it was more realism than it was ridiculous.

This novel did help me narrow down my ennui of millennial literary fiction. So much of that niche relies on "shock" fiction, but the "shock" is through explicit realism, which isn't shocking at all when you've lived it. Tragic public bathroom hookups, terrible first-anal-attempt stories, graphic discussion of suicide – I can accidentally overhear all that in a nightclub line on a weeknight.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Sexual content, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Addiction, Excrement, Forced institutionalization, Suicide attempt, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Abortion, Medical content, Self harm, and Vomit