Reviews with content warning for Racism - Felix Ever After

Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender

118 reviews

danny_fox's review against another edition

adventurous hopeful informative reflective 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

4.25

Alright, I'm finally done with another book and I have completed my reading goal for this year. Awesome, right?

This book was definitely a rollercoaster and although I wish I could give it a higher rating, it's gonna be 4.25 stars from me. Here are things I liked and didn't liked:

What I liked:

- I learned a lot from this book.
While reading this book, there have been a couple of times where it made me think of my own gender identity and/or sexuality. It made me realize some things about myself, as well as understand more on the topic of gender, LGBT, etc. I'm glad I read it, as I have learned quite a couple of things.

- The characters are nicely written.
I'm not a big fan of YA novels because I feel like the characters tend to be pretty simple, generic and boring in these types of books. But, this book had pretty decent characters. They were not perfect and were flawed, made mistakes and some even realized what they have done. I like that! The character development was also okay (sometimes, more on that later)!!

- Some tiny details and throwbacks.
Finding out why the title of this book is "Felix Ever After" in the very last chapter, or the times when a character or a thing from way back from the start of the story would show up, even for a brief second, almost near the end of the book, was amazing. I really love it when writers do that, so that was super enjoyable.

What I didn't like..

- A bit too specific at times.
Telling the reader that the characters are listening to *insert the title of the song here* song while going to *insert the name of the place/city here* by taking the *insert the name of the train here* bothered me a lot. I know it's a very nitpicky thing, but when you don't know the song or have never been to America so all these titles and names mean nothing to you, you feel like you are missing out on something, left out, I supposed. Why does it need to be so specific?

- The resolution to the big mystery was meh (in my opinion)
I don't want to touch on this too much so I wouldn't spoil anything, but if you read the book a little bit or at least read the description, you will know that in the story there is someone being extremely transphobic towards MC and does some fucked up shit to him, like sharing pictures of him before he transitioned, etc. but they are anonymous. Finding out who it was and why they did this left me kinda disappointed and unsatisfied? If that makes sense? I just didn't care about this character (and low-key completely forgot about them) enough to be upset or shocked, and plus their explanation for doing so was kinda weird and didn't really make much sense to me. I was really unhappy about this plot twist.

- The ending..
Like, the last 5 or so chapters of the book made me kinda upset. It felt rushed and I was not big fan of it. I guess I am kinda biased, cause a character I liked didn't get the ending I was hoping for would get, but at the same time, many things just left me disappointed. Felix's character development felt rushed and sudden, and him realizing who he loves and some other things, again, felt too sudden in my opinion. Like, there was not enough build up to him realizing some of this stuff. Again, I won't go too into it to avoid spoilers, but I was really not happy with the ending, and I would have preferred it if the book was even 200 pages longer than it is now if it meant that there would be more build up to the ending and that some things didn't feel as rushed, like the resolution to the love triangle (which bothered me a lot cause I felt like it has been resolved kinda poorly) and Felix suddenly gaining so much
confidence out of nowhere.

Final thoughts:
In conclusion,
the book is worth reading. I would suggest it to anyone who wishes to learn more about this topic and/or is questioning their own identity. The romance could have been done better and story as it is is okay, but I think it's worth the read cause you get to learn some new things and the middle part of the book was pretty enjoyable. I did have fun reading it, and as I said, the characters are really great, which is always a major plus for me. Just wish the ending was done a bit better..

Content Warnings

radiodarkblue's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful inspiring tense fast-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

‘The issue is that we’ve never really gotten to see our own stories,’ Declan tells me. ‘We have to make those stories ourselves. Even if the creators made a character to be straight, they put those characters out into the world, right? So those characters are mine now. And I say that Steve and Bucky are gay as hell.’

At the beginning I was scared that I wasn’t going to like the book. Felix is a teen, confused and pressured by so many people, and I expected him to be perfect? The more I read the book, the more I understood Felix. All the mistakes he makes, all the times he messes up with people he cares deeply about. I was and still am making mistakes. I overreact when something huge happens and I don’t know what to do. And so does Felix. Creating a flawed character such as Felix is probably the best representation of a teenager navigating through life.

‘It’s weird,’ I tell him, ‘because I thought I’d already had it all figured out, you know?’

‘But that’s normal, right?’ he says. ‘When I started questioning whether I was into guys or not, I drove myself crazy for a while, going back and forth and trying to figure out if I’m into guys or girls or both or neither, and it felt like the answer kept changing every week. I was going insane.’

This story isn’t easy at times. There’s a lot of transphobia and I want you to be prepared because it can be hard to handle. Though this book is so damn queer and I understand when Mason Deaver wrote that this book ‘is going to change lives,’ because this story is so precious and important and opens so many conversations that are so needed, whether it’s about sexuality, gender identity, the queer community, love, self love. Being a teen is so hard, especially when you don’t fit in the boxes, and so I’m so glad that this story exists, because questioning yourself even when you thought you had it all figured out is so damn fine, and so I hope as many teens as possible can find Felix’s story to know that they aren’t alone and that they are worthy of love.

I realise, suddenly, that since Bex is non binary, any of the people in this café could be, too. Maybe I shouldn’t assume anyone’s gender as I draw them. There’s someone with wrinkles, a blazer, an infectious laugh; someone closer to my age with green hair and a nose ring, showing their braces when they give their friend a wide smile. The longer I sit here and sketch, the better my art become — it helps to look at the people around me, really look at them, instead of seeing who I assume them to be.

For any queer person reading this, if you haven’t read it yet, you should definitely give it a go. It’s a love letter to queerness and we all need to read it.

Content Warnings

prongs_little_king's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective fast-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

5.0

Content Warnings

sharontriestoread's review against another edition

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challenging emotional inspiring mysterious reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

kayden__reads's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted tense fast-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

Content Warnings

emilo's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective sad 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

4.0

big ezra stan, i liked how he stood by felix pretty much all the time. i think also this book gave a real sense of the characters as real people and i liked all the development. excellent stuff. and my copy had splayed edges!!!!

Content Warnings