Reviews

Dass ich ich bin, ist genauso verrückt wie die Tatsache, dass du du bist: Ein Roman in Listen by Todd Hasak-Lowy

faithl's review against another edition

3.0

ORIGINALLY POSTED HERE

MY RATING

I had extremely high expectations before diving into this book. I had heard that it was told in list format and I was like:

But then while reading I was like:

As you can see, it wasn't as great as I had previously thought. This book was still witty and original but there came a point where everything just dragged on. This book took me a LONG time to finish; try a month. And that was with taking breaks to read other books.

This whole book surrounds Darren. He's your typical under-rated, anxious, still-trying-to-find-himself teenage boy. I gotta say; beginning of the book, I was hooked on his voice, his narration and his story. His reaction with his father's coming out was purely honest (and somewhat, homophobic) but his own character growth in coming to terms with this fact was brilliant. It was honest, realistic and it perfectly captured the shock and acceptance of something so dramatic.

What lacked throughout this big-ass novel was just excitement in general. Around quarter the way in, things slowed down and dramatic events kind of dissipated. Darren's story just became a novel of complaints in list format. Nothing really exciting happened except for his own thoughts, complaints and daydreams. This became boring to read about. I'm not saying that only big, dramatic, sword-fight-like events hook me but come on, this book just had to move along.

Honestly, there isn't a whole lot to say about this novel except its obvious originality and lack of excitement. The whole book only really revolved around Darren's acceptance of his gay father and his yearning (love?) for Zoey.
So yeah. All in all, original if not LONG read.

mikkelsonch's review against another edition

2.0

Not a page turner at all. It's 646 pages but many of the pages don't have that much text. I came to like the main character but the ending left me unsatisfied, well the whole book did.

beths0103's review against another edition

I'm really bummed I didn't like this one but honestly, the list thing just felt way too gimmicky. I wanted to read an actual story, not a more complicated, less fluent version of a story told through lists. I think there's a good story here; I just really disliked the delivery.

sbosoa's review against another edition

3.0

Even though the plot of Me Being Me Is Exactly as Insane as You Being You is not the most exciting thing in the universe, I still liked the reading experience I got out of it.
The idea of telling the story through lists worked really well and the author always put some interesting twists on it to convey different aspects of emotions and the characters' perception.
In general, it is an enjoyable, not too deep read, but definitely worth giving a try.

hall852's review against another edition

i didn't even get half way before i stopped reading this .the list idea was cool but i couldn't continue to read it

jennifermreads's review against another edition

3.0

Real rating of 3.5

Darren has had some major bombs dropped on him: his parents are getting divorced, his brother left for college, his best friend has moved. And now, he suspects another bomb is coming because his mom has announced that his dad is stopping by before school to discuss “something important.”

Why pick-up this book? Well, to me the book blurb didn’t sound all that unique … until I read that it was told in lists. An entire story told in lists? Color me there!

Initially, it was uncomfortable. I had to get used to, well, the really long titles to the lists, the lists themselves, and the sometimes rambling, incomplete sentences that had me thinking I was knocking around inside Darren’s brain as he wrote the lists. See what I mean? That extremely long sentence? It is a result of reading 640 pages of lists that soooooo sounded like a teenage boy’s musings!

Lots of issues were covered within the pages of this novel but the enjoyment comes from just melting into Darren’s brain and enjoying the ride.

vera_k's review against another edition

4.0

I couldn't put this book down. I loved the idea of the book being written entirely in lists and I thought it worked great for this book! The only real problem I had with this book is how he reacts to his dad's big news, but that might just be because I would have reacted differently.

shannonsnextchapter's review against another edition

3.0

My review can be found here https://www.instagram.com/p/BCB32I3wfkV/?taken-by=lightand_shade

ilaiza_aviles's review against another edition

3.0

I love the concept and the way the lists were done. It was an easy read, and surprisingly I knew exactly what was going on the entire time. The down fall is that I wanted more out of the story. The ending felt unfinished and rushed.

antolok's review against another edition

1.0

Ho comprato questo libro un bel pò di tempo fa, ma mi sono decisa a leggerlo solo ora e purtroppo ho deciso di non finirlo. Ho letto poco più di 200 pagine e mi sono dovuta fermare ... proprio non ce la faccio ad andare avanti a leggere questa storia sapendo di dover ancora leggere più di 400 pagine (visto che questo libro è un bel mattoncino).
L'unica nota positiva è, che avendolo letto in inglese (visto che non è stato tradotto in italiano), posso dirvi che è molto facile da leggere (quindi un livello di difficoltà della lingua basso).
Per il resto non so che dire... storia estremamente noiosa e decisamente troppo lunga: le 200 pagine che ho letto potevano benissimo essere riassunte in 30 pagine (ma forse anche meno).
Un altro aspetto negativo di questo libro è il modo in cui è scritto, infatti la storia è raccontata attraverso l'uso di elenchi: di per sé questo metodo di scrittura può essere considerato originale, se non fosse che poco tempo fa ho letto un'altro libro scritto in questo modo e l'uso degli elenchi mi ha solo portato a continuare la lettura ancora più velocemente. In questo caso invece, gli elenchi rendono la lettura scostante, visto che alcuni capitoli, essendo brevissimi, si leggono in pochi secondi mentre altri sono mediamente lunghi e quindi serve più tempo per leggerli.
Ho deciso di dare una sola stellina a questo libro, ma onestamente è fin troppo.