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A review by catsteaandabook
A Little Life: A Novel by Hanya Yanagihara
TW: pedophilia, rape, physical abuse, self harm, suicide
First off, don’t read this book. If you’re like me, you’ve read the reviews warning about this book, but you like sad books, so you weren’t concerned. I promise you this book isn’t worth it. It goes so far beyond sad. It’s truly torturous to read. I grew gray hairs over this book. I spent minutes dry heaving over this book. (I honestly think the only reason I didn’t puke is that it had been several hours since I last ate.) and of course, I spent hours crying over this book.
Part of me understands the hype of this novel. Most of me is appalled by it. I will admit now that A Little Life is one of the most brilliantly written books I’ve ever read. For much of this book, I thought it would for sure be five stars. For the writing and the many parts of the book that were wonderful to read, I cannot bring myself to give it one star, but I absolutely cannot give this book anything higher than that because of how harmful I believe it to be and how insulting it is to those with mental illness.
I had heard people call this book trauma porn, but people said that about My Dark Vanessa and I love that book. A Little Life, however, is absolutely trauma porn. The first ~45% was fine, excellent even. You could tell how traumatized Jude was, but other than one scene, it wasn’t overly graphic. Midway through, however, it hit. Midway through the book, Jude enters an extremely abusive relationship. The scenes of this abuse and rape are frequent and extremely graphic. After that, the flashbacks to Jude’s childhood become more and more frequent, and are pure torture to read. Any horrific thing you can imagine, Jude has experienced and more, and all of that is written in detail.
Jude’s primary coping mechanism is cutting, and it has a huge presence in the book. I used to cut myself, and while cutting was not a huge part of my depression, as I didn’t start until after the worst of it was over, and I only did it when it got really bad, not habitually like Jude, it’s strangely still one of my biggest triggers. Part of me appreciated the way cutting was portrayed, as I could relate to it, but I don’t think that accuracy is all that makes good representation. I am concerned that this book glamorized cutting. For much of my depression, I didn’t understand why people cut. I didn’t start until I spent more time with other depressed people who explained it and glamorized it for me. I am extremely grateful that I was not in a worse place while reading this book, because I have not cut in years but these scenes still tempted me at times.
The first suicide attempt I feel similarly about to the cutting. I also hate how sensationalized the suicide attempt was. It reminded me of Thirteen Reasons Why (which I also hate.) It’s so graphic it almost serves as a manual for those trying to kill themselves.
If you’re wondering why I didn’t dnf, it was my insatiable need for closure. I will give Hanya Yanagihara this, I have not been so invested in characters in a while. I love Andy and Harold and Julia and Malcolm and of course Willem and Jude so much. I absolutely adore Jude and Willem and I cannot explain how much joy their relationship brought me, especially after Jude reveals his past to Willem and they are able to move forward.
I am going to go into spoilers in the next two paragraphs, so if you still want to read the book you can skip them, but I don’t recommend it and these two paragraphs are the main reasons why.
Willem’s death honestly just pissed me off. It served absolutely no purpose other than just making Jude suffer as much as humanly possible. Honestly, if the book had ended just before Willem’s death, I might have still given it five stars, but it didn’t. Willems death changed the book for me from an admittedly very flawed but still good book about dealing with trauma, to a book that’s only point was torture porn.
As much as Willem’s death pissed me off, Jude’s pissed me off even more. Hanya Yanagihara has straight up said that Jude was too broken to ever heal, and his life only had one possible way to end, his suicide. I hope you can recognize how aggressively ableist this is. Traumatized and disabled people absolutely can achieve happy lives and deserve to. Jude literally did! And then Willem died! Ugh.
There also is the discussion to be had of Hanya writing about gay male suffering and utilizing every negative stereotype about gay men, as a straight woman. I believe that anyone can write about anything, but if you haven’t experienced what you’re writing about, you have an obligation to do your research and portray it well. Hanya Yanagihara doesn’t do that. From what I’ve heard she didn’t do any research, which is frankly appalling, and even if she had, she sent a horrible message through her portrayal.
Hanya Yanagihara is clearly an extremely talented writer. I so wish she used those talents to write books that weren’t so harmful. I frankly don’t think I will read her other books because I’ve heard similar complaints about them and I’m still incredibly insulted by her opinions on trauma and traumatized people.
First off, don’t read this book. If you’re like me, you’ve read the reviews warning about this book, but you like sad books, so you weren’t concerned. I promise you this book isn’t worth it. It goes so far beyond sad. It’s truly torturous to read. I grew gray hairs over this book. I spent minutes dry heaving over this book. (I honestly think the only reason I didn’t puke is that it had been several hours since I last ate.) and of course, I spent hours crying over this book.
Part of me understands the hype of this novel. Most of me is appalled by it. I will admit now that A Little Life is one of the most brilliantly written books I’ve ever read. For much of this book, I thought it would for sure be five stars. For the writing and the many parts of the book that were wonderful to read, I cannot bring myself to give it one star, but I absolutely cannot give this book anything higher than that because of how harmful I believe it to be and how insulting it is to those with mental illness.
I had heard people call this book trauma porn, but people said that about My Dark Vanessa and I love that book. A Little Life, however, is absolutely trauma porn. The first ~45% was fine, excellent even. You could tell how traumatized Jude was, but other than one scene, it wasn’t overly graphic. Midway through, however, it hit. Midway through the book, Jude enters an extremely abusive relationship. The scenes of this abuse and rape are frequent and extremely graphic. After that, the flashbacks to Jude’s childhood become more and more frequent, and are pure torture to read. Any horrific thing you can imagine, Jude has experienced and more, and all of that is written in detail.
Jude’s primary coping mechanism is cutting, and it has a huge presence in the book. I used to cut myself, and while cutting was not a huge part of my depression, as I didn’t start until after the worst of it was over, and I only did it when it got really bad, not habitually like Jude, it’s strangely still one of my biggest triggers. Part of me appreciated the way cutting was portrayed, as I could relate to it, but I don’t think that accuracy is all that makes good representation. I am concerned that this book glamorized cutting. For much of my depression, I didn’t understand why people cut. I didn’t start until I spent more time with other depressed people who explained it and glamorized it for me. I am extremely grateful that I was not in a worse place while reading this book, because I have not cut in years but these scenes still tempted me at times.
The first suicide attempt I feel similarly about to the cutting. I also hate how sensationalized the suicide attempt was. It reminded me of Thirteen Reasons Why (which I also hate.) It’s so graphic it almost serves as a manual for those trying to kill themselves.
If you’re wondering why I didn’t dnf, it was my insatiable need for closure. I will give Hanya Yanagihara this, I have not been so invested in characters in a while. I love Andy and Harold and Julia and Malcolm and of course Willem and Jude so much. I absolutely adore Jude and Willem and I cannot explain how much joy their relationship brought me, especially after Jude reveals his past to Willem and they are able to move forward.
I am going to go into spoilers in the next two paragraphs, so if you still want to read the book you can skip them, but I don’t recommend it and these two paragraphs are the main reasons why.
Willem’s death honestly just pissed me off. It served absolutely no purpose other than just making Jude suffer as much as humanly possible. Honestly, if the book had ended just before Willem’s death, I might have still given it five stars, but it didn’t. Willems death changed the book for me from an admittedly very flawed but still good book about dealing with trauma, to a book that’s only point was torture porn.
As much as Willem’s death pissed me off, Jude’s pissed me off even more. Hanya Yanagihara has straight up said that Jude was too broken to ever heal, and his life only had one possible way to end, his suicide. I hope you can recognize how aggressively ableist this is. Traumatized and disabled people absolutely can achieve happy lives and deserve to. Jude literally did! And then Willem died! Ugh.
There also is the discussion to be had of Hanya writing about gay male suffering and utilizing every negative stereotype about gay men, as a straight woman. I believe that anyone can write about anything, but if you haven’t experienced what you’re writing about, you have an obligation to do your research and portray it well. Hanya Yanagihara doesn’t do that. From what I’ve heard she didn’t do any research, which is frankly appalling, and even if she had, she sent a horrible message through her portrayal.
Hanya Yanagihara is clearly an extremely talented writer. I so wish she used those talents to write books that weren’t so harmful. I frankly don’t think I will read her other books because I’ve heard similar complaints about them and I’m still incredibly insulted by her opinions on trauma and traumatized people.