A Little Life

by Hanya Yanagihara

Hardcover, 720 pages

English language

Published Dec. 25, 2015 by Doubleday.

ISBN:: 978-0-385-53925-8
OCLC Number:: 911507167

(5 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cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity.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.

In rich and resplendent prose, Hanya Yanagihara has fashioned a tragic and …

In rich and resplendent prose, Hanya Yanagihara has fashioned a tragic and transcendent hymn to brotherly love, a masterful depiction of heartbreak, and a dark examination of the tyranny of memory and the limits of human endurance. --front flap

28 editions

Mat reviewed A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Beautiful portrayal of male friendships

4 stars

After several months listening to the 32 hours of this audiobook, with a story that spanned several decades, I feel I've been on a massive journey with all these characters, which was as beautiful as it was bleak. I've not read many books that explore male friendships in a way that go me thinking about my own, and often reminded me of the film Stand By Me.

I didn't know much about this book when I started listening to it, which perhaps was for the best as I didn't know how bleak it would become at times, and later a friend would tell me it has received much criticism for this. However, I feel very grateful for all the very tender and warm moments in the book, which were perhaps enhanced by the incredible narration from Oliver Wyman.

crabbygirl reviewed A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Review of 'A Little Life' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

so unbelievably bleak was this novel. it was a good thing I did it as a book-on-CD because I don't think I could have pushed thru all the terrible things, slowly revealed, that happened to the main character Jude. he is abandoned as a infant, taken in by monks who in turns physically or sexually abuse him. the one shining light that seems to care for him plans their escape but he turns out to be a manipulative, pimping pedophile. and when this despicable man is caught, Jude is confined to a foster home where more sexual abuse awaits him so he runs away - into the arms of a sexually depraved lunatic doctor who locks him in his basement, treats his various STDs, and ultimately runs him with down with a car after he's had his fill of him. how many terrible things can befall one person? ('more' is the answer when he takes up with an abusive partner that humiliates him, rapes him, and throws him down the stairwell)
and yet, in adult life, Jude is loved. by his college roomates, by a law professor that adopts him when he is almost 30, by a longtime friend that will forgo a sexual relationship in order to give Jude the peace and love he craves. and this is where the book falls apart for me; why did they love him?

Fredrik

rated it

Dec. 14, 2018

JesseLiberty

rated it

Oct. 22, 2020

ThePurplePimpernel

rated it

Aug. 19, 2019