Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson

60 reviews

acesiever's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-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

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Addiction, Blood, Alcohol, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Physical abuse, Violence, Child abuse, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Sexual violence, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic relationship

greta_reads's review

dark emotional funny hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense slow-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? Yes

2.5

(sorry, english isn’t my first language) Wow. I really did not know what to rate this book. Because throughout most of it I really, really hated it. But I did not dislike it because of the way it was written or the story itself, but purely because of the fact that it had me in such a depressed and tense mood. The style that the story was written in wasn’t my favorite, but it felt authentic, even though I found it very hard to love the characters even if they were very relatable in part. So overall I‘m very torn, weather to recommend this book or not. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Alcohol, Emotional abuse, Suicide, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Blood, Child death, Death, Rape, Abandonment, Pandemic/Epidemic, Domestic abuse, Addiction, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Suicide attempt, Body shaming, Bullying, Dementia, Dysphoria, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, and War

Moderate: Drug use and Drug abuse

Minor: Fire/Fire injury

louisallama's review against another edition

emotional reflective medium-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

3.0

In theory this sounds like the kind of book I'd eat right up but unfortunately it wasn't. My two main issues are that I didn't connect with the characters, and that I wasn't satisfied with the way the book handled the world ending in 144 days. This book was by no means bad, it just wasn't for me. 
I think I found it very hard to connect with Henry is because the book felt quite juvenile. Usually I'm fine with YA but for whatever reason it really didn't work for me this time. I'm not sure why but I was just completely uninvested in Henry's life and emotions. He has multiple very big and real problems that are poinient even to adults, and yet he never got past feeling like a whiny teenager to me. 
The other problem is that there are a whole slew of deep, existential questions that could come of finding out that aliens have given you the choice to stop the world from ending in 144 days and this book explores basically none of them. I understand that it was more used as a vehicle for Henry deciding whether he wanted to live, without the trauma of making an actively suicidal main character for the whole book, but he ends up being very blasé about it. The closest we got to Henry asking these questions of himself, was him asking the extremely obvious, "am I going to push the button" throughout the book, as well as asking every character what they would do if they knew the world was going to end but they could stop it, both of which are resolved every time within a paragraph or two. I would think that this is something that I would agonise over, especially if I wasn't fully swayed one direction or the other. And while Henry's life truly is a steaming pile of garbage, linking this back with not feeling connected to him, I never actually felt like he was suicidal at any point, or ever had any conviction to press or not press the button.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Death, Dementia, Physical abuse, Abandonment, Bullying, Grief, and Suicide

Moderate: Self harm, Miscarriage, Cursing, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, and Pregnancy

teaselkie's review against another edition

challenging emotional sad slow-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? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Bullying, Suicide, Toxic relationship, and Mental illness

Moderate: Rape, Pregnancy, Miscarriage, Injury/Injury detail, and Dementia

mary_jinxedit's review

dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Mental illness, Grief, Toxic relationship, Suicidal thoughts, Bullying, Emotional abuse, and Suicide

Moderate: Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, and Suicide attempt

vicixyz's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Outing, Grief, Homophobia, and Suicide

Moderate: Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Rape, Alcoholism, and Mental illness

juliaisnotalright's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes

4.0

Boy gets abducted by aliens and has the choice to stop the apocalypses.
But this book is so much more than science fiction, actually,

the aliens are just a metaphor for depression

It’s a book about mental health, dealing with depression, suicide and death in general. 
The beginning was interesting but towards the middle it got a tiny bit boring but the ending was great but kinda predictable just like some of the plot.
IMO it’s kinda a mix of the perks of being a wallflower and Aristotle and Dante discover the secrets of the universe.
Would recommend to every teenager but check the trigger warnings !

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Death, Dementia, Rape, Addiction, Violence, Bullying, Drug use, Grief, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Suicide attempt, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

good_names_dont_exist's review

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Mental illness, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide

Moderate: Miscarriage and Toxic relationship

morganmmw's review

dark emotional funny reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Rape, Suicide, Grief, Sexual assault, and Mental illness

Moderate: Miscarriage, Dementia, and Injury/Injury detail

aspen_suxs's review

challenging emotional funny reflective sad medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Toxic relationship, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Mental illness, and Suicide

Moderate: Abandonment, Self harm, and Alcohol

Minor: Child abuse, Rape, and Miscarriage