Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton

13 reviews

rhiannonhoward's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Sexism, Alcohol, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Grief, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Abandonment, Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Torture, Toxic relationship, Toxic friendship, and Violence

cjfooks's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.25

I absolutely love books that romanticise the mundane parts about life, in a way that changes your perspective on your life, and forces you to appreciate the little things. 

Although the main character in this book has, very very far from a simple, mundane life, Trent Dalton perfectly encompasses this feeling. 

I think the only way to describe its genre, is a fictional (well…’based-on’) biography written like a thriller-poem. 

The main character’s personality, and the way he thinks about things, is so uniquely beautiful in a way that I don’t think I’ll experience again. 

There’s so much tradegy in Boy Swallows Universe, but also so much of every other emotion, and a constant reminder of how strong the human spirit is. 

It can be very very brutal in parts, and feels extremely real and too close to home, yet there are parts that feel dissociative too. 

These dissociations when at the start and towards the middle of the book, feel ornamental, and not necessarily a plot point), but as the story comes to a close, most of them circle back. And I absolutely love when a book unexpectedly and cleverly does this. 

My only fault for it would be that, although little plots are always happening one after the other (similar to a biography) , there are parts of the book where you lose sense of an overall plot and wonder where it’s taking you.

I would definitely recommend this and read it again, although I’ll stress that it’s equally a comforting book, and a hard read, sometimes strangely at the same time. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Death, Abandonment, and Death of parent

Moderate: Drug use, Grief, Kidnapping, and Violence

erebus53's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.75

I picked up this book because the name was familiar and I saw that it had been adapted for Netflix (but my eyes are bad and I didn't feel up to watching TV). I went in having no idea what it was about and wow.. what a trip.

This tells a story set in suburban Queensland, Australia in the 70s-90s (a time that coincides with my own formative years). One of the main themes is focusing on detail and the way the author depicts this childhood brings back a huge number of sense-memories for me. Stubbies shorts, Burger Rings packets, sticky vinyl car seats, heat haze on bitumen roads, eating pineapple rings from Golden Circle cans...  spelling words upside down on calculators, rats-tail haircuts, Ninja Turtles Tshirts and school bags with band names written all over them, and even the brand of cheap plastic pens and the names of the supermarkets, had my brain buzzing with resonance.... less so with the gangs and criminals, thankfully.

Apparently, according to the notes at the back, this book is semi-autobiographical. The language used is no holds barred and rich with Australian profanity. If I had a buck for every time a child swears and then is told off by a swearing adult I'd have enough to buy pizza tonight. I guess given that parts of this book are more than 40 years ago this is almost "historical fiction" which is hammered home by the complete lack of cellphones, specific cameras and torches, and the telephones are for.. yknow, calling people? Not to mention that people still rely on actual Newspapers. Old school.

As a story about growing up with unable parents and in traumatic circumstances, there are parts of the story that are delivered unreliably. The main point of view is from a traumatised boy and his older brother who is mute. There are dreams, visions and prophecies that I am always a sucker for. The story is told poetically with key lines that repeat. The action is tense and at times unhinged, telling of connection, redemption, mental illness, morality and garden variety pain.

I really enjoyed this book. It was the sort of story that I wanted to put down at times, and just sit with and think over. Lots of weird stuff happened, and the unpredictability and predictability walked hand in hand down a content warning list as long as my arm.  Parts of it were utterly grotesque and parts of it were trippy, and all up it was satisfying.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Toxic friendship, Child abuse, Classism, Alcohol, Car accident, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Abandonment, Body horror, Bullying, Panic attacks/disorders, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Grief, Gun violence, Misogyny, Sexism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Torture, Toxic relationship, Blood, Confinement, Murder, Physical abuse, Death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Vomit, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, and Violence

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Cancer, Dementia, Rape, Suicide attempt, Gaslighting, and Infidelity

Minor: Fire/Fire injury and Racism

kayleejanes's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring 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? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcohol, Cancer, Drug use, Alcoholism, Cursing, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Child abuse, Drug abuse, Violence, Car accident, Vomit, Forced institutionalization, Abandonment, Confinement, Death, Grief, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Murder, Bullying, and Torture

juju_432's review

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Boy indeed swallows universe 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Death, Violence, Death of parent, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders, Bullying, and Toxic relationship

aliengirlreads's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

5.0

the greatest book i have ever read 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Physical abuse, Addiction, Blood, Body horror, and Murder

Moderate: Gun violence, Drug abuse, Grief, Suicide attempt, Panic attacks/disorders, Alcoholism, Bullying, Death of parent, Car accident, and Medical content

Minor: Police brutality, Forced institutionalization, Terminal illness, Child abuse, and Mental illness

lottiegasp's review

dark funny inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

This is a beautifully written coming-of-age story of precocious  Eli Bell, whose parents struggle at various times with substance abuse, mental health issues, domestic abuse and financial insecurity, and as such Eli Bell is forced to grow up too soon and look after himself and his family. It demonstrates how no one is fully good or bad, but can try to make good choices. It depicts the insidiousness of substance abuse and drug dealing in the context of low income and overcriminalised communities who are unable to escape from their intergenerationally-entrenched dangerous lives.

Despite it being quite long, it was readable and compelling from start to end. It moved between some witty moments, to highly poignant and sad events, to episodes of thrilling action. I would caution readers to check the content warnings, as it is quite a depressing setting with heavy themes, however with that in mind I would say that overall the book is surprisingly uplifting.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse and Violence

Moderate: Drug abuse, Death, Alcoholism, Car accident, and Death of parent

worldthroughcurls's review

dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Drug use, Death of parent, Violence, and Murder

Minor: Drug abuse

donaldleitch's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Child abuse, Forced institutionalization, Violence, Adult/minor relationship, Drug abuse, Drug use, Death of parent, and Domestic abuse

camoo3032's review

challenging dark sad medium-paced

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

1.75

Trent Dalton doesn't shy away from showing the darker bits of Australian society that we rarely get to see. Because this perspective is rarely shown, I would consider this book worth reading. I would warn fellow readers that this makes the book continuously confronting and it is certainly not a lighthearted read.
This provides the backdrop of a story that is far-fetched with descriptive writing that is quite abstract. I am sure there are people out there that would love this book but I found it was trying to be more profound than it actually is.
I also found that the female characters weren't as fully formed or complex as the male ones which is frustrating.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse

Moderate: Car accident, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Alcohol, and Alcoholism

Minor: Blood, Bullying, Ableism, Addiction, Cursing, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Drug abuse, Excrement, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Pregnancy, Child abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Medical content, Suicide, Terminal illness, Vomit, Rape, Torture, Violence, Sexism, Cancer, Chronic illness, Gore, and Sexual assault