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4.16 AVERAGE
4.16 AVERAGE
emotional
relaxing
sad
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:
Complicated
emotional
reflective
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
beautifully beautifully written in a way that feels like palatable poetry. you can really feel the character's yearning and pain. the story itself was a bit slow for my liking and some sections were definitely more engaging than others. i'm sure this would resonate with me more at a different time in my life.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Racism, Police brutality
Moderate: Mental illness, Violence, Grief
Minor: Drug use, Sexual content, Alcohol
reflective
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
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
some gorgeous retelling of how gorgeous falling in love slowly can be however the book falls down as the love interest is never fully fleshed out and as is the case in so many love stories she is simply a plot device for the mmc to develop
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
this is a challenging book to rate for me. there are many things to appreciate and i can understand a lot of effort and thought went into this. at the same time i didn’t enjoy it. most of the sentences on each page came across as overwritten to me and i really struggled to understand the way time was moving. i craved more specific detail.
usually i’m not one to say that a book isn’t for me, because i don’t believe in that so much—if a book is good, it “should be” for everyone. but i get how this is a current trend and that i’m just not a fan of that trend: vague characters, very limited detail story-wise, not much meat in the plot. i don’t feel like this book will really change me emotionally in the long term even if it is useful to me in other ways. i’m aware i can’t just write this one off and be like, well it sucked, even though originally i wanted to (and then Lillian and i talked and they said smart things like they always do). so it’s instructive to me in how to think/not to think, how to write/not to write.
there are good moments and some turns of phrase i underlined but for the most part i was disinterested. i just think the experiment Nelson was trying out here was not successful. so 3 stars for all of that.
usually i’m not one to say that a book isn’t for me, because i don’t believe in that so much—if a book is good, it “should be” for everyone. but i get how this is a current trend and that i’m just not a fan of that trend: vague characters, very limited detail story-wise, not much meat in the plot. i don’t feel like this book will really change me emotionally in the long term even if it is useful to me in other ways. i’m aware i can’t just write this one off and be like, well it sucked, even though originally i wanted to (and then Lillian and i talked and they said smart things like they always do). so it’s instructive to me in how to think/not to think, how to write/not to write.
there are good moments and some turns of phrase i underlined but for the most part i was disinterested. i just think the experiment Nelson was trying out here was not successful. so 3 stars for all of that.
challenging
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Started off Really Strong. I was speeding through the pages, but by the midpoint, it felt a whole lot repetitive, and I had lost grip of the point. Dare I say that this novel was trying to tackle something big but was unfortunately limited by the tiredness that the characters are written with. There is complexity in the prose but not in the characterization, to me.
Something I can't get a hold of is the connection between the lovers. I understand how much he loves her, but I don't quite understand why he does nor am I shown any concrete evidence of their connection beyond what he is thinking. They don't really converse enough for me to believe that this is real. Our main character comes off as delusional rather than romantic. Or maybe I've just never known love like this.
Something I can't get a hold of is the connection between the lovers. I understand how much he loves her, but I don't quite understand why he does nor am I shown any concrete evidence of their connection beyond what he is thinking. They don't really converse enough for me to believe that this is real. Our main character comes off as delusional rather than romantic. Or maybe I've just never known love like this.
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
4.5 stars! The way I was tabbing this book…. Every page or so I would come about an especially beautiful passage and I knew I needed to mark it so I could go back often and read them again. What a phenomenal and poignant story. As a nonBlack POC, I know this book wasn’t specifically written for me, however I still took so much away from this. We are often saying how minority groups need to be given the microphone, but it is also our job to listen. This short book packed a lot of punch. I will be thinking about the last 30 pages for a long while.
This book transcends literature and is pure art. Emotions roll raw and real through every page and somehow perfectly describes the feeling of falling into love and grappling with it's complexities. It will leave me thinking for sure.