It took me 5 MONTHS to read this meaning there’s 5 months worth of tear stains in the majority of the pages erm….I understand why Jack Edward’s said this should be a classic, with the human condition, depression and suicide, love, and relationships. I swear it’s so good. [This part is my Goodreads review]: It took me 5 months to finish this book, and it’ll take me 5 months to get over this book. I know I’ve said I’ve resonated with a character, but I’ve never felt that I was striped bare—blood, bones, guts, and all—the way I have reading A Little Life. Hanya wrote more than what people on social media talk about: this book is love, art, grief, assault, depression, pain, anguish, desperation, life and death itself. What it means to love someone, that feeling that might be hard to describe: Hanya captured in 814 pages. The fear of losing creativity, fear of missing out, fear of fear itself. The fear I felt myself, in which I felt seen. I understand Jude, and I understand Willem, Malcom, JB, Harold, Julia, Andy. I myself or my friends have been in similar predicaments, we just try to keep on. I cried throughout, yet the end broke me. One thing I’d like to point out is that this book, though heart-wrenching, has beautiful commentary on art, on being a creative and togetherness: companionship and teamwork. These elements, my most favourite elements, are topics most people reading / reviewing this book tend to leave out and only focus on the heartbreaking moments. I just want people to know that in the dark, there is light, no matter how hard or how long it takes. It is the end that will dictate how I treat others, as well as myself: “And so I try to be kind to everything I see, and in everything I see, I see him.”