Reviews with content warning for Adult/minor relationship - My Brilliant Friend

This book is brilliant in a way that makes me say “This is the story of a real life,” not “omg I love this book.” Like, I don’t really feel like I read a fictional story. (I actually have no clue if it’s autobiographical or not but I won’t google it because I don’t want to spoil it). Perhaps for that reason, this book took me an incredible long time to read. Like, months on end of picking it up and loving it, but being unable to pick it up again because it was so difficult to read. I don’t even think it was actually difficult literature for me, but instead so emotionally dense and detail-heavy that I couldn’t pay anything but 100% attention while reading, otherwise I’d have to go back dozens of pages to figure out why I was confused. Also,

this is perhaps the only book or story I’ve ever known which accurately depicts how tumultuous and confusing and painful it can be to survive childhood and grow up. I absolutely loved her depiction of how the child’s mind can equally spin fantasy and horrific terror on the same coin— not simple boogieman stuff, but much scarier, finding awful and disturbing fears in/around the mundane figures of your social world and daily life, even when there’s nothing truly wrong there.

Beautiful book.

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shanz09's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.0

Starts off pretty slow but as you progress you see a lot of growth in the character and her relations with those around her. The relationships are so complex and go so deep, they draw you in and allow to realte to them in some way. Aside from the that, the emotions and feelings of the main character are written so well, and go so deep, there are times it feels as though the book is in your head which I'm sure many teenage girls reading this will be able to relate to. The book is a little hard to follow at times, with the many charger but that's also what adds character to the book and keeps from being too surface level. Overall, great read, highly recommend.

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risemini's review

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emotional reflective medium-paced

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

4.5

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dreamersmind's review

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dark emotional reflective slow-paced

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

3.25

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aysedemircan's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

4.25

I really enjoyed this novel. It made me feel so many different things — I felt tense, hopeful, sad, excited, appalled, nervous, very much a reflection of Lenu’s emotions throughout the story. Ferrante captures both the highs and lows of friendship realistically and artfully, and frames it within the larger context of life and it’s bearings on youth. I was so impressed with her writing and storytelling. However, I’m not sure I’m invested enough in the characters to continue the series. Reading this as standalone is fine, and I feel content to end the story here.

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