An actual tearjerker.
Seldom do I find the time to read books this lenghty, however when I do take the time out of my hectic "college-student schedule", I like nothing more than to pick up an engaging story to read. Being a bit of a book worm myself, I thoroughly enjoy watching booktubers talk about their favorite reads of the month, so you can only imagine the amount of times I´ve heard this book being brought up. I was fully aware of the fact that I was dealing with an exceedingly polarizing book, yet I found myself itching to read it. Having never read a book of this kind and knowing that it was going to be a roller-coaster of emotions, I felt extremely out of my comfort zone. Nevertheless, with a sense of trepidation and not knowing exactly what to expect, I embarked on an emotionally draining journey.
Little disclaimer:
This review is not going to be spoiler free, but i will indicate whenever I say something that might spoil the reading experience. Please, for the love of whatever you believe in, READ THE CONTENT WARNINGS FOR THIS BOOK. You can grab a drink and some snacks because this is going to be a loooong ride, so strap yourselves in.
A Little Life is... a book. A brief introduction to the plot and characters.
Now, I know what you are going to say: "but... it IS obviously a book, wtf is she talking about?", just... bear with me for a second. Yes, I am fully aware of the fact that A Little Life is indeed a book, but we can sometimes forget that because of how attached we are to the characters so I always say this to myself as a reminder: this is a work of fiction and these characters are just that... characters. Now that we got that out of the way... what is this book exactly about? Well, my friend, it is really not that complex of a plot... or so that is what Hanya wants you to believe.
The book is set in New York City and it follows the complicated lives of four struggling college students: Jude, Willem, Malcom and JB. It is structured in seven parts, each one adding more substance to the characters; but, even though we are shown various perspectives throughout the story, the plot is centered around one main character: Jude St. Francis. It has a slow start, one that might be a big turn off for some people, but its existence is necessary to understand and to empathise (or not) with the characters in the long run. You are probably thinking to yourself: "is that the plot? just the lives of four college students? what a bore.", and honestly? I understand the sentiment, this book is certainly not for everyone but, to answer the question, I would say the plot of this book is that there is no substential plot. It is a cleverly crafted character study of a person who has to live with deep-rooted trauma every day of their life. There is no hero, there are no happy endings, there is no "getting better" or "eveything is going to be okay" because that is the whole point: trauma does not magically disappear, it stays with us forever, it shapes how we see the world, the way we percieve ourselves, the way we interact with our loved ones and that is essentially what Hanya Yanagihara wants to show with Jude´s character. This book will have you question all of your life choices while also demonstrating how truly damaging trauma and mental illness can be to someone´s mind.
-SPOILERS AHEAD-
A Little Life? More like, I need a therapist. Yanagihara´s writing and some intense plot points.
So we arrive to the non-spoiler free zone. I would like to talk a little bit about Hanya Yanigahara´s writing because good lord... that was certainly something else. I have already established that the book is divided in seven parts and that each one of them serves a different purpose to all of the characters narratives, but let me introduce you to something that this author excels at: writing well-crafted, compelling and realistic characters. She will make you care for them, only to make them go through horrific and traumatic life events (and it will make you feel like absolute crap). But isn´t that technically how things work in real life? You never truly know who the other person is or what they are going through, just like Jude´s friends and family never understood why he behaved the way he did until it was too late. I believe that is the most heart wrenching part, the ending was inevitable. We know, as readers, that he is going to do it, but it doesn´t make it any less tragic. So, why is it that we feel so sad if the ending is unavoidable? Well, Jude is not the only character in the book and Hanya Yanagihara makes an excellent job at building his relationships as metaphorical anchors around him to make us feel like he will always have a safety net if he does fall down... and then he does. The expected happens and we are sad about it, because it was inevitable and we were always aware of it but, much like the characters, we never lost hope.
(Can we please not talk about the whole Caleb thing? or the Brother? or JB being a piece of crap? thanks).
-END OF SPOILERS-
Some valid criticisms. Yes, you can love or hate a book and that is fine.
Finally, as I said at the beggining of the review, we have to adress the elephant in the room: why is this book so polarizing?. If you asked for my personal opinion —as someone who would consider this book one of my all-time-favorites— I would say that this novel is not for everyone. Now, that sounds a little stupid, of COURSE all books are not for everyone, what are you talking about? Let me rephrase it. This is a very special book, a book that will make you have an extreme reaction (whatever that may be: sadness, love, hate, trauma) and that is bound to be a problem for some people. There are millions of ways you can interpret what Hanya Yanagihara wanted to achieve with this book. Some say she wanted to traumatise people, some say she wanted to write "torture-porn", some say she wanted to tell a story about trauma and to what extent it can affect someones life (that is my take), some even say this is a gay romance novel, but nevertheless, everyone tends to have a strong opinion about it. Yes, the amout of tragic things that can happen to someone are limited. Yes, it was a little too much sometimes. Yes, it is a very long book. Yes, some characters exist with the sole purpose of inflicting pain on others. Yes, Hanya Yanagihara knew exactly what she was doing when she wrote the book.
These are all valid critisisms and everyone is allowed to have an opinion about it because, at the end of the day, it is just a book and they are just fictional characters.
This is exactly how i looked when i finished this godforsaken book.
CONTENT WARNINGS (this can contain spoilers)
Self harm, Child abuse, Rape, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Mental illness, Emotional abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Death, Chronic illness, Domestic abuse, Adult/minor relationship, Toxic relationship, Violence, Eating disorder, Blood, Ableism, Sexual content, Drug use, Drug abuse, Grief, Addiction, Torture, Panic attacks/disorders, Child death, Body shaming, Medical trauma, Kidnapping, Trafficking, Confinement, Medical content, Bullying, Terminal illness, Body horror, Vomit, Hate crime, Forced institutionalization, Religious bigotry, Cursing, Gore, Homophobia, Alcoholism, Racial slurs, Biphobia, Dementia, Car accident, Cancer, Bullying.
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