A Little Life

"At nearly 800 pages, A Little Life feels like it’s telling the story of four New York friends in real time — over takeout, at parties, during dinners that end in arguments. It’s most moving when author Hanya Yanagihara lets us live long stretches with the character Jude, a survivor of child abuse. The book doesn’t shy away from those horrors or the physical and emotional pain endured to overcome them. And Yanagihara is not afraid to show how his friends love him, care for him and sometimes let him down."

"A Little Life is one of the best books I've read in a long while. It's a heartbreakingly beautiful and tragic love story. I can't shake it."

"I read A Little Life beginning to end this way, on one long flight from South Africa to the United States."

"I love books that leave me weeping inside. 'A Little Life,' by Hanya Yanagihara, 'Room,' by Emma Donoghue, 'Never Let Me Go,' by Kazuo Ishiguro, 'Beloved,' by Toni Morrison, and 'Sophie's Choice,' by William Styron, destroyed me in all the best ways."

"Also A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara."

"I know that Hanya Yanagihara's "A Little Life" was polarizing, but I loved it. And the ending broke my heart."

"Never have I had a more tortured relationship with a book. At several points I vowed I could not go on, but I did, and now I can't stop thinking about it. Which has to be a testament to its power."

""A Little Life," by Hanya Yanagihara. I came to it rather late — I'd been put off by what I'd heard about the upsetting subject matter... it is also a remarkable study of friendship, suffering and the difficulty of recovery."