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elleherrera 's review for:
A Little Life
by Hanya Yanagihara
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
Oh my gods. This book is painful and beautiful and haunting and powerful all rolled together. Yanahihara is a beautiful writer and the way she writes is effortlessly sublime. This book shows the worst of people and the best of others, tracking the way that extreme trauma and abuse can change the very fabric of how one views themselves. Despite good looks, money, friends, success, and deeply profound love—trauma and the ghosts left behind persevere. The story clearly depicts how, even at its most annoying, frustrating, and infuriating someone’s lack of faith in themself can be, so often it’s the result of something beyond reason. I really loved the way the story unfolded, from different perspective and back and forth between time.
I LOVED the importance this book gave friendship.
“Why wasn’t friendship as good as a relationship? Why wasn’t it even better? It was people who remained together, day after day, bound not by sex or physical attraction or money or children or property, but only by the shared agreement to keep going, the mutual dedication to a union that could never be codified. Friendship was witnessing another’s slow drip of miseries, and long bouts of boredom, and occasional triumphs. It was feeling honored by the privilege of getting to be present for another person’s most dismal moments, and knowing that you could be dismal around him in return..”
Only knocked off 0.25 because I felt it didn’t need to be quite so long. And because I felt like Jude didn’t need quite so much trauma.
I LOVED the importance this book gave friendship.
“Why wasn’t friendship as good as a relationship? Why wasn’t it even better? It was people who remained together, day after day, bound not by sex or physical attraction or money or children or property, but only by the shared agreement to keep going, the mutual dedication to a union that could never be codified. Friendship was witnessing another’s slow drip of miseries, and long bouts of boredom, and occasional triumphs. It was feeling honored by the privilege of getting to be present for another person’s most dismal moments, and knowing that you could be dismal around him in return..”
Only knocked off 0.25 because I felt it didn’t need to be quite so long. And because I felt like Jude didn’t need quite so much trauma.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Self harm, Suicide attempt
Moderate: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Death of parent