anjh's reviews
69 reviews

How to Make Friends with the Dark by Kathleen Glasgow

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 16%.
too sad for me rn
The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

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challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective tense fast-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

5.0

oh my god wow. this book shocked me. it was a real page turner, one of the quickest books i’ve read this year. it was one of those books where you are kept on your feet and kept guessing thinking “is it this person?” “no it can’t be”, until one possiblity is ruled out and you form another theory but all the time there is a hidden clue (that the book is written to make you miss) and there is a plot twist and ahshdhdhhd

i think too there were some pretty interesting themes in this book - such as not only the devastating and shocking effects of untreated trauma and what it can do to people but also when this is combined with the power of love in the strongest of relationships the lengths people will go to to make things seemingly “right”. honestly this all probably makes no sense unless you read the book but ahhh it’s so good and just,,, thrilling
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You're Welcome, Universe by Whitney Gardner

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adventurous challenging funny hopeful sad tense medium-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

3.5

this book was good but not amazing. to be very honest i thought i would like it more than i did but that’s okay- it was still good. i think the thing i appreciated most about this book other than the Deaf main character is the graffiti artworks- they were genuinely amazing. i tend to enjoy more the books that i relate to the main characters and share their thoughts and personalities and just felt like i couldn’t really with Julia. i did very much like her response to fatph*bia tho, that was very cool. 
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The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science by Norman Doidge

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dark emotional informative lighthearted slow-paced

3.5

at first i was slightly nervous about starting this as its quite thick and non fiction which for me are two things that don’t go well together. it turns out tho that like 20% of the book is the index and references lmao
anyway, this was actually really interesting. it’s very obvious that the entire theme of the book is around neural plasticity and how this brain process has occurred in various instances of patients. 

i learned a lot of new things from this while also reading about things that i already knew and arguably information that is out of date though to be fair this was published in 2007 so idk how much i can really complain. 

def recommend for anyone interested in psychology and plasticity in particular
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Let Me Go: Abused and Afraid, She Has Nothing to Live for by Casey Watson

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challenging dark emotional informative inspiring sad tense fast-paced

5.0

i want to start off this review by saying, if you’re thinking of reading this book, *MAJOR* trigger warning for s**cide, SI, s3lf h*rm, mental illness and @b*se. 

this book was incredibly dark and sad but very gripping. i think the reason i found it so “easy” to keep reading is the fact that to some small extent i relate to Harley in ways i won’t go into but i do know what it’s like to be a mentally ill teenager convinced they are hopeless and could very much empathise with her not wanting Casey to worry about her. often mental illness really feels like another person who is there but isn’t really you.

i think this book did a great job at showing the awful reality of 28-day placement in foster care (not that i would have any experience) and how hard that can be for both foster carer and child. i really think more work still needs to be done in the system to ensure better outcomes for these poor children who have often been through so much.

i forgot a few times that this was based on a true story through how horrific the story actually was but unfortunately this is the reality for some children and the foster system. 

again, if you’re thinking of reading, please check trigger/content warnings. 
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Loveless by Alice Oseman

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

this book was very good. very well written. i related a lot to Georgia’s descriptions of asexuality but also very much appreciated the aro rep too. i think Alice Oseman’s writing really conveyed the feeling of the process of figuring out your LGBTQIA+ identity through confusion, self hatred, denial and sadness. 
i also really loved how the book showed that love isn’t just a romantic thing, but can also absolutely and very much be a platonic thing which is just as strong and just as meaningful, if not more so. it also showed the importance of friendships and how romance can get in the way of these. 
this book was also v gay which i appreciated, very much recommended for anyone questioning/figuring out their identity or already identifying as queer (tho please read the content warnings as always!!)
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The Cellar by Natasha Preston

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 45%.
i felt so uncomfortable and dirty reading this, as if i was there with the girls. Clover is completely utterly revolting and disgusting and everything he thinks and says just shows how sick of a person he is. the book was so gripping but i just didn’t want to subject myself to the harm of continuing
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Future Girl by Asphyxia

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

wow. this book was amazing not just conceptually but also visually, Asphyxia’s artworks are absolutely stunning and really contribute to the sensory experience of reading the book. i love that Asphyxia has thought about accessibility in this book when publishing it by including her artworks so both younger and older readers can experience it and you don’t need to fully be able to read the words to be able to understand what’s going on (for example if someone is dyslexic, it would still be enjoyable to read visually).

not only are there beautiful artworks and colours on each page but there are also informative illustrations such as an AusLan fingerspelling guide, a diagram of how to set up a mandala garden and an outline for compost!!! you can really see how thought out this story is and how much effort has gone into both the writing and the artwork. 

i just loved how much representation was given to the d/Deaf community in this book, and as a hearing person i learned so many things i didn’t know before that i will definitely use when i want to communicate more clearly. 

i debated so many times whether to give this 4.75 or 5 stars but to be honest i found the storyline a bit hard to keep up with at first being a dystopian fiction set in future Melbourne, but it became easier to grasp after a while. it’s not my favourite book ever but it is really really good and i would definitely recommend it for d/Deaf / HoH folks in particular but also for literally anyone who is looking for books with diverse characters and wanting to learn more about the d/Deaf community. 
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My Nonidentical Twin: What I'd like you to know about living with Tourette's by Evie Meg - This Trippy Hippie

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted relaxing sad medium-paced

5.0

this book is both so aesthetically beautiful and written so beautifully. it was both interesting, relatable (in parts) and heartbreaking to read about evie’s multitude of conditions that have made life harder for her for years that we now know are caused by an autoimmune condition causing inflammation of the brain called PANDAS/BGE. the book was really immersive, especially with the diary entries, photos and mandala colouring pages that evie drew herself! (which were beautiful btw, i coloured them in the bi and ace colours :D)

thank you for writing such a beautiful book, evie. you’ve done so much work in raising awareness for TS and PANDAS/BGE and should be so proud of yourself 💜
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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

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adventurous funny lighthearted mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0