Review: Coral by Sara Ella Rating: 3/5
"Who knew a person could drown without ever stepping foot off land?"
Coral is a lovely story about trying to live with mental illness - as a mentally ill person, and as someone who loves a mentally ill person. There are beautiful metaphors and luscious language and the ocean-side setting was idyllic even though the timeline was quite confusing.
But I found the actual mental illness representation a little frustrating. Because exposing and touching someone's self-harm scars without permission is messed up. And having one character die by suicide to inspire another to keep living is uncomfortable. Losing someone to suicide doesn't feel inspirational - it just freaking hurts.
Not quite the magical Little Mermaid retelling I was expecting but still a sweet story that does do a good job of reminding you that, no matter how bad things get, you are not nothing.
Warnings: psychiatric hospital setting, anxiety, depression, suicide, self-harm.
