A Little Life

A Little Life

Hanya Yanagihara

Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

26 ratings • 12 reviews

When four classmates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they're broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity. Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome—but that will define his life forever.


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  • Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

    have we ever considered that perhaps this writer might be sick in the head?

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  • Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

    Such a heart wrenching, well-written book. I would recommend, but not for the weak-hearted. TW: Self-harm, ED, mental illness, some ableism, some anti-Blackness imo.

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  • Enjoyment: Quality: Characters: Plot:

    I have to process for a bit...but I can already say that this recalibrates stars. For this to be 5 stars means that most other books could reach 3 at best. Wow wow wow

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