Reviews with content warning for Pedophilia - All This Could Be Different

The writing is beautiful. The beginning and end went quick but it got really slow in the middle and I had to force myself to keep reading. I found the main character really unlikeable- deserving of empathy, but not someone I enjoyed.

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kc_onmybookshelf's review

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4.0

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bluedilly's review against another edition

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emotional sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

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agustinayloslibros's review

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emotional funny hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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huckheck's review

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dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

Flayed my heart open with such magnificent precision

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lenny002's review

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emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

This book is an insane ride through the mind and the relationships of the protagonist. It's a story of a twenty-something Indian immigrant trying to make herself a life in the foreign land of America. The book discusses the politics of being an immigrant, a queer person, a person of color, etc trying to deal with internalized racism and homophobia, and make a space for herself in the so-called "land of the free".
I did not like the protagonist in the beginning because she was a bit of a bitch and was not very open-minded about the variety of gender and sexual queerness people experience. But she starts to learn to be a better friend and a better person and I really like the development she goes through. She's not very politically active, her main goal is the safety of herself and the ones she loves, and I think that's a very true experience amongst groups who have been colonized and continue to be marginalized. And as a young person of color with a desire to change the world, that was a very valid experience for me to learn about without shaming or patronizing the protagonist for being politically passive.
It has a very interesting ending, which I liked best about this book. It's neither happy nor sad; the ending hints that endings aren't really endings, rather the story is a continuous process of dealing with the present and the past and the uncertainty of the future. I really liked that the protagonist is one hot mess in denial of her wounds and her flaws until shit explodes in her face. She has managed to build herself a small community of friends-turned-family who help her clean up after herself.

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caseythecanadianlesbrarian's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny hopeful reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I am at a loss for words with this book, which is truly a masterpiece, an incredible success in so many ways it's hard to know where to start. It's one of the best books I've ever read, one of the only books I've read that felt so viscerally real but at the same time so brilliantly crafted as a work of fiction. The sentences frequently stunned me with their sharp insight, exquisite beauty.

It's an intimate, generous, and honest portrait of Sneha, a woman in her early 20s. Sneha is an aloof, emotionally cautious woman making her way in that daunting post-college period in an American recession as an immigrant from India. Her parents have returned to India, the reason why a slow unfolding as the story inches forward.

The novel focuses as much on friendship, work, and the practical details of life as it does on Sneha's first major romantic relationship, with a New Jersey dancer named Marina. Her evolving friendship with Tig – a fellow queer person of colour Sneha originally meets on a dating app – is a highlight. Her racist, passive aggressive property manager sent chills down my spine and brought back harsh memories of the brutalities of renting.

There's an ample amount of food and sex in this book, described so lusciously it almost hurt to read. The constant bearing down of capitalism, the small (and not so small) indignities Sneha endures at work are difficult to endure, painful to read in an entirely different way. I've never read such a millennial book, one that felt written by and for our generation, one that felt so recognizably like my own and my friends' lives. What a gift.

If you only read one contemporary / lit fic book this year, All This Could Be Different should be it. If you read audiobooks, I definitely recommend that format, majestically performed by Reena Dutt.

Read Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya's review at Autostraddle for a much more eloquent take on why this novel is so amazing: https://www.autostraddle.com/all-this-could-be-different-review/.

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