As a high school librarian, I am always looking for books that will hook my students. A Danger to Herself and Others fit the bill completely. An unreliable narrator. Plenty of suspense. A mystery that slowly unravels. I appreciated the uniqueness of this novel and liked how Sheinmel told a story that deals with contemporary issues (mental health issues) with timeless YA themes. Thank you for allowing me to review this. I apologize that I did not post this online (my current blog was not active at the time, so I was reviewing exclusively for my school library).

I flew thru a majority of this book and really enjoyed it. I was surprised a few times, but there were a couple things that were predictable. I feel like the story fell kind of flat at the end.

Here's the thing - I received this as an ARC but for some reason it got lost until recently. I'm also kind bias since I work in the mental health field.  This being said I think A Danger to Herself and Others was a good representation of mental illness.  The book had a nice flow but I was able to predict a lot of things. This may also be due to my history with working with individuals with mental illness. The only negative I have is the ending was really dismal and kind of terrible. Overall though, I think Sheinmel covered this topic well and provided a great opening for discussions regarding mental health.

This was a deeply moving mental health focused thriller that really kept me engaged and kept me guessing throughout the entire thing!

I found the main character Hannah, to be highly relatable, as I struggle with mental health issues of my own, and I even shed a tear or two upon finishing this novel.

That being said, although this really is a interesting read with excellent twists, it can also be a tough read at times due to the heavy and dark subject matter involved.

Overall an excellent read that is both emotional and thrilling, and will keep you guessing and turning pages until you reach the end!

**Triggering Warnings for: eating disorders (bulimia, anorexia,), suicide, mental health issues, neglect, abandonment

This is your typical YA read involving mental health issues. But very enjoyable. In high school this was my favorite topic to read about and had this come out while I was in high school it probably would have been 5 stars but as an adult it's a solid 3 star read. Would reccomend!

Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this book. I really enjoyed the writing and voice in this book. It was a thrilling ride!

I am so happy to have more mainstream and YA books addressing difficult issues, especially around mental health. This book was quite raw and candid when it came to the topics of disordered eating and mental health issues which I was appreciative of as a doctoral student. It's communicated in a way that is eye-opening, but also digestible and has the opportunity to be relatable to a lot of young readers. The books is pretty fast paced and although Hannah can be a little all over the place, it was a uniquely emotional and enjoyable experience that I had visceral responses to.

This book freaked me out so badly! I first read an excerpt forever ago and I was HOOKED, so I was so happy to see it available on NetGalley. Truly terrifying and compelling, I found that the psychological questions posed were the most interesting, as I mulled them over day and night.

This book was highly engaging and deeply moving! It handles tough subject matter in a very realistic and tasteful way. I highly recommend!

As soon as I read the synopsis for this book I was hooked and I wanted to read it. Sadly A Danger to Herself and Others didn’t end up being what I hoped it would be, I ended up being very disappointed in it. The main character, Hannah, is a very unreliable narrator which is something I don’t enjoy reading about.

There were some great discussions about mental health in this book. Also, huge trigger warnings for eating disorders. There were many scenes that I found hard to read because of the content and the rawness. While this is something other people might enjoy reading about, I didn’t. (Due to things relating to my own mental health.) I also felt that there were things brought up in therapy that were never really unpacked, by any of the therapists and they should have been.

Overall, I didn’t have a good time reading A Danger to Herself and Others. This book just wasn’t for me, but I can see a lot of other people liking it. Not being a fan of unreliable narrators does not make me the target audience of this book. I would recommend you this book if you like unreliable narrators and stories about mental health.

Holy Moly this book has one of the most unreliable narrators, that I’ve ever read about. If you’re not a fan of that, them this book is definitely not going to be for you.

Im not going to much into detailes because that would spoile the story. But this book is about Hannah who is institutionalized because she is a danger to herself and others. This story had many twists and it got very dark and mysterious at times.


TW: Bulimia, anorexia, mental health issues, abandonment and neglect, suicide.

I'm usually a big fan of unreliable narrators... but only when they are done well. And unfortunately, this one just wasn't done well.

I received a copy from Netgalley.

Unreliable narrators aren’t usually my thing. They make me uncomfortable. The whole premise of this book made me uncomfortable.

A perfect daughter of psychologists institutionalised for a crime. She’s convinced she did no wrong (even though it’s obvious from the start she did.) Her logic is flawed and frightening but also…in a weird way vey plausible. Which makes it all the more frightening.

Hannah is a very intelligent girl who has a habit of latching onto people and calling herself the perfect best friend. She’s not cruel or violent or anything. She’s manipulative without even realising what she’s doing. She’s doing a summer programme at a college and something terrible happens to her roommate.

Police are called and they all think Hannah is responsible. She’s labelled “a danger to herself and other” and put in a hospital for evaluation until the trial. Despite how uncomfortable this book made me as a reader, it’s extraordinarily well written. It’s compelling and page turning and you just have to know what’s going on. What happened with the roommate, what makes Hannah the way she is? Is she faking it and a very good actress – or is she really just nuts and doing a good job of covering it up and trying to convince everyone she’s normal and no threat to anyone?

It’s a harrowing experience following Hannah as she wakes up in the hospital and goes through talking to the doctors and learning how things work and what she has to do to convince everyone what happened was an accident.

Slowly, we learn what really happened. The truth about Hannah’s involvement and what might happen next. What makes it all the more believable is there’s no black and white right and wrong way to handle the outcome. It’s not a fair outcome, really but it’s a realistic one and something that highlights the tough decisions that justice systems sometimes have to make.

It’s a difficult book to get through but a really good one.

Thank you to Netgalley and SOURCEBOOKS Fire for approving my request to view the title.

Interesting look at mental illness from the point of view of an evolving patient.It is clear from the beginning that the narrator is unreliable, but the journey she takes might be a surprise.

To be honest the whole "You can't trust your narrator" - trope gets a bit boring for me. Back when I started Gillian Flynns Books it was something new and impressing. Even "Girl on the train" had something surprising for me and I think the idea of "A Danger for Herself and Others" is a great one, but I wasn't really interested.

I was torn between having pity with Hannah and knowing she lies all the time and isn't in custody for nothing. The reader just KNEW from the beginning on that the narrator was lying, and I think that's what destroyed it a bit for me. That I thought from the beginning on, that Hannah is a liar. Still the book had some surprised, some twists and turns and even some deeper pits of humankind, but in the end it wasn't exciting enough for me, sadly.

Anyone who knows me well, they know I’m very particular in how I read. Quiet, no distractions, laying in bed. Not with A Danger to Herself and Others!

Oh, no. I was reading this everywhere I got the chance, even while fixing dinner! I finished it in one day, which is something that rarely happens for me.

It was that good!

We have Hannah as an unreliable narrator. We have Lucy who has her own story to tell. Everything in between is a nail biting rollercoaster of drama and finding oneself.

What I can say is we follow Hannah’s experience of being institutionalized for a misunderstanding that happened at a summer retreat. Hannah fights for her innocence in a hospital that she doesn’t belong in, with little interaction.

There’s a lot about this book that I can’t even talk about because of spoilers, and that makes it hard to write a proper review. Just know you’ll find yourself on the edge of your seat, discovering things you didn’t expect, and a complete “what the . . .” when you finish.

This had such potential! I was so intrigued by this. Just the title alone hooked me in. Unfortunately, it was not for me. I wanted to stop reading this so many times, but also really wanted to get through it. I just really didn't enjoy this at all.

I would rate this book 2.5 out of 5 stars

I really struggled to understand the point of this novel. On the surface it appears to be a mystery novel, but they story is incredibly predictable. On another level it appears to be a mental health novel but the author herself acknowledges the mental health facility is not accurately represented. In addition, the reader is never told specifically what mental illness the character is dealing with so it is unclear exactly what the author is attempting to represent.

The book was fairly enjoyable but it didn't quite gel with me.

Unreliable narrator of the best kind because Hannah actually convinced me half the time that everyone else is wrong and she is telling the truth.

This books got a lot of elements that I love in my thrillers. It was a quick and easy read but a bit predictable.