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A review by thatbakerthatreads
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
dark
sad
tense
slow-paced
4.0
Synopsis:
The story follows the lives of 4 young men from Massachusetts who moved to New York and how they relationship stays stronger throughout the decades.
Includes:
♦Growing Pains (To Put it lightly)
♦Trauma
♦Friendship
♦Trauma
♦Found Family
♦TRAUMA
♦LGBT+ Rep
🛑Content Warning:
Language
Swearing
Mentions and descriptions of sex, sexual ab*se, child sex*al ab*se, parental abandonment, physical ab*se, abus*ve relationships, self-harm, substance ab*se, and every type of trauma and mental health issues a person can have are also included.
My Opinion:
My best friend read this book before me, and he was destroyed for months after, and since I like to read about mental health and trauma, I’ve said: I want to read it too! Yeah… I kind of regret this decision now. Welcome to my essay:
If you stop reading at the first 5%, I understand, because the first act reads like a total different story from the rest of the book. The narrative and writing are not good enough to keep you interested. But after the second act starts, you can see how amazing her writing is, how much depth she puts in the characters, and how involving the narrative gets, making you crave the development of the plot and making you care so much for the characters (except JB, he’s more useless than the Henry Youngs). This is what made us so mad, because even with a story so hard to digest, the writing is incredible. She can make every voice so unique, the timelines well-rounded, that’s not necessary an indicator of who’s talking or when it’s taking place; it’s instinctive. Also, the actor on the audiobook is amazing, because how he portrays the characters, especially Jude, Willem and Harold, really touched me and made the story even more real.
Now let’s talk about why I wouldn’t recommend this book. Even with an amazing writing, the author is sadistic with the characters and with the audience. And I don’t care saying this, because she made it very clear during the book and after, that she wanted to see the characters suffer - non-stop. Jude was born to suffer, nothing more. He’s a character that you want to be friends with, you want to take care of and stay by his side all the time. But the author doesn’t give him and us a break. At all! I can say for certain that this book was 400 pages too long. Without giving more spoilers, the suffering felt unnecessary and torturous, with the characters and with us. There was no point in all of that. I’ve read my fair share of books about mental health issues and trauma, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that this book puts all of them together and adds more to it. It’s unrealistic and unnecessary. There was a part on the 50% mark that almost made me throw up, and that never happened before. I almost gave up at that point, but I needed to see what was going to happen. And I had no sense of reward or closure after the end, because I knew what was going to happen; it was predictable at that point.
So please, save your mental health and don’t read this book.
The story follows the lives of 4 young men from Massachusetts who moved to New York and how they relationship stays stronger throughout the decades.
Includes:
♦Growing Pains (To Put it lightly)
♦Trauma
♦Friendship
♦Trauma
♦Found Family
♦TRAUMA
♦LGBT+ Rep
🛑Content Warning:
Language
Swearing
Mentions and descriptions of sex, sexual ab*se, child sex*al ab*se, parental abandonment, physical ab*se, abus*ve relationships, self-harm, substance ab*se, and every type of trauma and mental health issues a person can have are also included.
My Opinion:
My best friend read this book before me, and he was destroyed for months after, and since I like to read about mental health and trauma, I’ve said: I want to read it too! Yeah… I kind of regret this decision now. Welcome to my essay:
If you stop reading at the first 5%, I understand, because the first act reads like a total different story from the rest of the book. The narrative and writing are not good enough to keep you interested. But after the second act starts, you can see how amazing her writing is, how much depth she puts in the characters, and how involving the narrative gets, making you crave the development of the plot and making you care so much for the characters (except JB, he’s more useless than the Henry Youngs). This is what made us so mad, because even with a story so hard to digest, the writing is incredible. She can make every voice so unique, the timelines well-rounded, that’s not necessary an indicator of who’s talking or when it’s taking place; it’s instinctive. Also, the actor on the audiobook is amazing, because how he portrays the characters, especially Jude, Willem and Harold, really touched me and made the story even more real.
Now let’s talk about why I wouldn’t recommend this book. Even with an amazing writing, the author is sadistic with the characters and with the audience. And I don’t care saying this, because she made it very clear during the book and after, that she wanted to see the characters suffer - non-stop. Jude was born to suffer, nothing more. He’s a character that you want to be friends with, you want to take care of and stay by his side all the time. But the author doesn’t give him and us a break. At all! I can say for certain that this book was 400 pages too long. Without giving more spoilers, the suffering felt unnecessary and torturous, with the characters and with us. There was no point in all of that. I’ve read my fair share of books about mental health issues and trauma, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that this book puts all of them together and adds more to it. It’s unrealistic and unnecessary. There was a part on the 50% mark that almost made me throw up, and that never happened before. I almost gave up at that point, but I needed to see what was going to happen. And I had no sense of reward or closure after the end, because I knew what was going to happen; it was predictable at that point.
So please, save your mental health and don’t read this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Suicide attempt, and Abandonment