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Blake Nolan had the perfect system. Whenever her mental health acted up, she covered it all with music. Music gave her an outlet, a way to feel. Music covered up the screaming in her head. But in the wake of her favorite artist's death, she finds she can't listen to music like she used to. A crutch that once brought peace, now only serves to highlight her pain.
Falling apart as the voices in her head claw at her and her broken life becomes more unbareable by the day, she has to learn to deal with her spiraling mental health and to deal with Nellie, the monstrous brainmate that screams in her head.
Treading toward mental health is a long and painful journey for Blake, but it can get easier if she could only find the right thing to listen to.
Falling apart as the voices in her head claw at her and her broken life becomes more unbareable by the day, she has to learn to deal with her spiraling mental health and to deal with Nellie, the monstrous brainmate that screams in her head.
Treading toward mental health is a long and painful journey for Blake, but it can get easier if she could only find the right thing to listen to.
- GenresFiction
297 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 1, 2023
7 people are currently reading
302 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 3, 2024
Listen isn’t just one of the most moving stories I’ve ever read, it might be the single greatest take on mental health struggles I’ve ever experienced.
The author, Marissa Beck, has managed to take a story concept—a young woman struggling with her mental health—and write a story so grounded and so realistic that it almost comes off as a biography. If this book had been sold as a biography, it could rank up there in quality with Angela’s Ashes.
The problem with most fictitious takes on mental health stories is that they often have easy (or at least simplified) roads to improvement. You don’t get the finer details of how hard it is to search for a therapist, or barely scraping together enough money while working a job that’s killing your soul, or putting on a big smile when all you want is to crawl into a corner and bawl your eyes out. Beck not only includes these details, but writes them so eloquently that you immediately empathize with the main character.
The protagonist, Blake, is like a sad golden retriever. She should be happy and living good life, but she isn’t, and you want to fix that, but you can’t. You just have to sit on the sidelines, helplessly cheering her on as she’s barely keeping it together. She doesn’t even ask for much. She doesn’t dream of becoming a politician or a famous singer, or changing the world. She just wants to have enough to get by. She wants to be able to talk to friends without feeling like a burden. She wants parents that don’t dismiss her. She wants a job that doesn’t destroy her every time she clocks in. These are not big asks. These are what most people would consider bare minimum. But Blake is humble and quiet, constantly assaulted by the slings and arrows of life. She doesn’t deserve the life she’s been dealt, and worse, she doesn’t know how to navigate herself out of her compounding problems. I think almost everyone can relate—at least in part—to that.
We’re now in a world where people will quickly churn out books with no heart in them in the hopes of making a quick buck. Beck instead poured her soul into this book, down to even the finest details. You can feel that on every page.
This is an author to pay attention to, because if she can put this much dedication into a debut novel, imagine what she can do with even more experience and time.
The author, Marissa Beck, has managed to take a story concept—a young woman struggling with her mental health—and write a story so grounded and so realistic that it almost comes off as a biography. If this book had been sold as a biography, it could rank up there in quality with Angela’s Ashes.
The problem with most fictitious takes on mental health stories is that they often have easy (or at least simplified) roads to improvement. You don’t get the finer details of how hard it is to search for a therapist, or barely scraping together enough money while working a job that’s killing your soul, or putting on a big smile when all you want is to crawl into a corner and bawl your eyes out. Beck not only includes these details, but writes them so eloquently that you immediately empathize with the main character.
The protagonist, Blake, is like a sad golden retriever. She should be happy and living good life, but she isn’t, and you want to fix that, but you can’t. You just have to sit on the sidelines, helplessly cheering her on as she’s barely keeping it together. She doesn’t even ask for much. She doesn’t dream of becoming a politician or a famous singer, or changing the world. She just wants to have enough to get by. She wants to be able to talk to friends without feeling like a burden. She wants parents that don’t dismiss her. She wants a job that doesn’t destroy her every time she clocks in. These are not big asks. These are what most people would consider bare minimum. But Blake is humble and quiet, constantly assaulted by the slings and arrows of life. She doesn’t deserve the life she’s been dealt, and worse, she doesn’t know how to navigate herself out of her compounding problems. I think almost everyone can relate—at least in part—to that.
We’re now in a world where people will quickly churn out books with no heart in them in the hopes of making a quick buck. Beck instead poured her soul into this book, down to even the finest details. You can feel that on every page.
This is an author to pay attention to, because if she can put this much dedication into a debut novel, imagine what she can do with even more experience and time.
November 16, 2024
Another win for KrimsonRouge recommendations!
(Blake Nolan had the perfect system. Whenever her mental health acted up, she covered it all with music. Music gave her an outlet, a way to feel. Music covered up the screaming in her head. But in the wake of her favorite artist's death, she finds she can't listen to music like she used to. A crutch that once brought peace, now only serves to highlight her pain.
Falling apart as the voices in her head claw at her and her broken life becomes more unbareable by the day, she has to learn to deal with her spiraling mental health and to deal with Nellie, the monstrous brainmate that screams in her head.
Treading toward mental health is a long and painful journey for Blake, but it can get easier if she could only find the right thing to listen to.) ~ Blurb from Goodreads
I find this novel's take on coping mechanisms quite interesting. So this novel shows that, while coping mechanisms like writing and listening to music can help make things better for people, they don't completely fix their problems and can be easy to abandon if things get bad enough. But at the same time, it also shows that just because they're not silver bullets, that doesn't mean you should abandon them outright, especially if they're healthy and legitimately helpful to you. It's a great blend of optimistic and realistic. I also think this take on coping mechanisms can be helpful to those who are struggling with their mental health and even those struggling through other hardships as well.
The way Nellie is characterized is ingenious. So Nellie is the voice in Blake's head who's always trying to put Blake down and make her feel like crap. Not only does Nellie speak in a very blunt way, but whenever she speaks, her words are in bold, trying to assert herself as the one in charge and not taking "no" for an answer. Sometimes, Nellie goes from speaking in second person to first person, as if forcing Blake to fuse with her to become one. Why does she do all this? These may be small choices, but they go a long way in showing the kind of antagonist Nellie can be. Nellie also shows that, just because something is in your head, doesn't mean it can't be a real threat.
Blake's character arc was really well done. So her character arc isn't about overcoming her issues, but rather, better managing them. She goes to therapy, tries to get back into things that made her happy, tries to look at her thoughts in a different way, and so on and so forth. Despite these efforts however, she does still struggle and it sometimes gets to the point where Much like this novel's take on coping mechanisms, it does a great job balancing optimistic with realistic. What's also cool is that her arc doesn't follow a linear path. Rather, it goes back and forth between Blake having a decent handle on things and losing control.
There's a scene in
That being said, there's a moment in the Track One chapter that got me scratching my head. So Blake says, "I’d used his music to calm myself, sang their new album all morning, too. Then… he was gone." I'm confused. Is the person she's talking about an individual man or a group of people? I feel like going with one or the other or maybe using names would've made things a bit more understandable here.
Overall, Listen was a novel that absolutely excelled at telling an emotional yet grounded story and excelled at being creative and clever.
Overall Grade: A
(Blake Nolan had the perfect system. Whenever her mental health acted up, she covered it all with music. Music gave her an outlet, a way to feel. Music covered up the screaming in her head. But in the wake of her favorite artist's death, she finds she can't listen to music like she used to. A crutch that once brought peace, now only serves to highlight her pain.
Falling apart as the voices in her head claw at her and her broken life becomes more unbareable by the day, she has to learn to deal with her spiraling mental health and to deal with Nellie, the monstrous brainmate that screams in her head.
Treading toward mental health is a long and painful journey for Blake, but it can get easier if she could only find the right thing to listen to.) ~ Blurb from Goodreads
I find this novel's take on coping mechanisms quite interesting. So this novel shows that, while coping mechanisms like writing and listening to music can help make things better for people, they don't completely fix their problems and can be easy to abandon if things get bad enough. But at the same time, it also shows that just because they're not silver bullets, that doesn't mean you should abandon them outright, especially if they're healthy and legitimately helpful to you. It's a great blend of optimistic and realistic. I also think this take on coping mechanisms can be helpful to those who are struggling with their mental health and even those struggling through other hardships as well.
The way Nellie is characterized is ingenious. So Nellie is the voice in Blake's head who's always trying to put Blake down and make her feel like crap. Not only does Nellie speak in a very blunt way, but whenever she speaks, her words are in bold, trying to assert herself as the one in charge and not taking "no" for an answer. Sometimes, Nellie goes from speaking in second person to first person, as if forcing Blake to fuse with her to become one. Why does she do all this? These may be small choices, but they go a long way in showing the kind of antagonist Nellie can be. Nellie also shows that, just because something is in your head, doesn't mean it can't be a real threat.
Blake's character arc was really well done. So her character arc isn't about overcoming her issues, but rather, better managing them. She goes to therapy, tries to get back into things that made her happy, tries to look at her thoughts in a different way, and so on and so forth. Despite these efforts however, she does still struggle and it sometimes gets to the point where Much like this novel's take on coping mechanisms, it does a great job balancing optimistic with realistic. What's also cool is that her arc doesn't follow a linear path. Rather, it goes back and forth between Blake having a decent handle on things and losing control.
There's a scene in
That being said, there's a moment in the Track One chapter that got me scratching my head. So Blake says, "I’d used his music to calm myself, sang their new album all morning, too. Then… he was gone." I'm confused. Is the person she's talking about an individual man or a group of people? I feel like going with one or the other or maybe using names would've made things a bit more understandable here.
Overall, Listen was a novel that absolutely excelled at telling an emotional yet grounded story and excelled at being creative and clever.
Overall Grade: A
May 28, 2024
I wanted to read this book for 2 reasons.
1. To see if it is as good as people claim.
2. If it is, I want to recommend it to my friends who struggle on the same journey as Blake.
I would have loved to have the flashbacks highlighted better because sometimes it was confusing where one would begin or end.
Other than that, I found this read authentic, raw, and honest. I even recognized some parts of Blake's journey as my own. I think this book is perfect to give hope to someone who struggles with mental health. Many people might think, while struggling with mental health, that it will never get better. Is easy to feel defeated. The truth is that when you start working on your problems, it gets a little worse before it gets better.
I liked that Blake's journey was not straighand forward, and I even liked how everything tied out in the end.
I've been on a rollercoaster reading this. I hope you will give this a chance. I'm glad I did.
1. To see if it is as good as people claim.
2. If it is, I want to recommend it to my friends who struggle on the same journey as Blake.
I would have loved to have the flashbacks highlighted better because sometimes it was confusing where one would begin or end.
Other than that, I found this read authentic, raw, and honest. I even recognized some parts of Blake's journey as my own. I think this book is perfect to give hope to someone who struggles with mental health. Many people might think, while struggling with mental health, that it will never get better. Is easy to feel defeated. The truth is that when you start working on your problems, it gets a little worse before it gets better.
I liked that Blake's journey was not straighand forward, and I even liked how everything tied out in the end.
I've been on a rollercoaster reading this. I hope you will give this a chance. I'm glad I did.
January 29, 2025
Wow! I really related to a lot in this book and appreciated it's approach with depression and anxiety, something I deal with a good amount, myself. The main character's struggles felt realistic and I rooted for her the whole way through and definitely gave a giant breath of relief when a certain situation was left behind (no spoilers) 😰 There's a lot of pop culture references throughout I enjoyed hearing as a nerdy kid, myself, so that made it enjoyable, too. I also love that each chapter is a song so I can make the Playlist the writer imagined with the story, that was a great idea! I do think there was a solution to a problem late in the book that was a tad convenient, but I can easily forgive it for how good I thought the rest of the book was and how important the subject matter is. It's handled with a lot of care and it's much appreciated, especially as someone who also chooses to put similar themes in his own books. If there's anyone who suffers from depression or self worth, I would definitely recommend this book and I look forward to more from this author!
June 5, 2024
My goodness...
It's hard to put into words how amazing this book is. There are many stories I've read that I say I can really relate to this character or with this story, but this one relates to the darkest and worst parts of me in the best way possible.
Reading about depression is always hard, but this book slams you in the deepest parts of your soul. As someone who has suffered from depression, it's VERY accurate. Blake uses music and writing as her escapes.... this is absolutely me.
I loved that each chapter was a song. I also loved that many of the songs used were already in my personal playlist.
If you want to understand depression more because you haven't experienced it yourself or if you want to feel like you're not alone in your suffering, I 100% recommend this book.
I also created a playlist of all the songs on Spotify for those who want to listen as you read.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5fm...
It's hard to put into words how amazing this book is. There are many stories I've read that I say I can really relate to this character or with this story, but this one relates to the darkest and worst parts of me in the best way possible.
Reading about depression is always hard, but this book slams you in the deepest parts of your soul. As someone who has suffered from depression, it's VERY accurate. Blake uses music and writing as her escapes.... this is absolutely me.
I loved that each chapter was a song. I also loved that many of the songs used were already in my personal playlist.
If you want to understand depression more because you haven't experienced it yourself or if you want to feel like you're not alone in your suffering, I 100% recommend this book.
I also created a playlist of all the songs on Spotify for those who want to listen as you read.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5fm...
April 9, 2024
It felt like I was reading about myself. So much of it felt similar to my experiences. Yes, Linkin Park got me through some of the worst crap. It'd be eerie if it wasn't so cathartic. I am not in therapy, I'm getting myself intuitively out of the darkness on my own. And reading this story helped me find the last puzzle piece: hope and faith and acceptance. Beautifully written, realistic and clever, educational and profound. Recommend 100%.
July 19, 2024
Beautiful book, it’s so powerful in the way it describes depression, especially the voice in her head that puts her down and makes her depression worse, I like how this book doesn’t just make the main character have depression, and then it’s fine all of a sudden.
No, it’s gradual, there’s bumps in the road, baby steps.
That’s what I think makes it so much more realistic, and that’s what I loved about it.
No, it’s gradual, there’s bumps in the road, baby steps.
That’s what I think makes it so much more realistic, and that’s what I loved about it.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 3, 2025
The book tackles heavy topics with an easy to follow writing style.
I'd recommend this to anyone who feels like the world is against them because seeing the protagonist experience this creates an objective view that is easy to apply on our own lives.
It has a diaristic feel as it describes recalled events, and I think this is where its weakness lies: unless I was listening to the song assigned to the chapter, it had no atmosphere.
I send all my love and a big warm hug to the author 💖🤗
I'd recommend this to anyone who feels like the world is against them because seeing the protagonist experience this creates an objective view that is easy to apply on our own lives.
It has a diaristic feel as it describes recalled events, and I think this is where its weakness lies: unless I was listening to the song assigned to the chapter, it had no atmosphere.
I send all my love and a big warm hug to the author 💖🤗
May 23, 2024
Words cannot describe how much this book hit me i usually hate mental health books because so few do it right, most of the time i cringe in how its displayed.
But Listen does it right theres so little i can critiqe about this book all i can say is i loved my time with it and im looking forward to any new books to come.
But Listen does it right theres so little i can critiqe about this book all i can say is i loved my time with it and im looking forward to any new books to come.
August 3, 2024
We follow Blake as she learns ways to deal with her traumas and the coping mechanisms that she created.
As the story goes, she has good days, bad days, awful days as she tries to understand herself better and make changes in her life.
This a touching book that feels very genuine. I'm so glad I read it and I hope Marissa is doing okay.
As the story goes, she has good days, bad days, awful days as she tries to understand herself better and make changes in her life.
This a touching book that feels very genuine. I'm so glad I read it and I hope Marissa is doing okay.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews