You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
4.45 AVERAGE
4.45 AVERAGE
Ugh, this one will fully break your heart. The main storyline is set in Chicago in 1985 and centers around Yale Tishman and his group of friends as the AIDS epidemic is devastating their community. Early on we meet Fiona, the little sister of his friend Nico, and her storyline jumps ahead 30 years. We also get to reminisce about past loves and the Paris art scene in the 1920s. There are estranged family members, a cult, and a cat named Roscoe. This one gets a highly recommended from me!
“Left to his own devices, he’d have been listening to The Smiths, which wouldn’t have helped a thing; and if it turned out he only had a few years to live, shouldn’t he be listening to Beethoven?”
“Stupid men and their stupid violence, tearing apart everything good that was ever built. Why couldn’t you ever just go after your life without tripping over some idiot’s dick?”
“It’s always a matter, isn’t it, of waiting for the world to come unraveled? When things hold together, it’s always only temporary.”
“And was friendship that different in the end from love? You took the possibility of sex out of it, and it was all about the moment anyway. Being here, right now, in someone’s life. Making room for someone in yours.”
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ & a half
2025 📖 Read #12/Book #45
“Left to his own devices, he’d have been listening to The Smiths, which wouldn’t have helped a thing; and if it turned out he only had a few years to live, shouldn’t he be listening to Beethoven?”
“Stupid men and their stupid violence, tearing apart everything good that was ever built. Why couldn’t you ever just go after your life without tripping over some idiot’s dick?”
“It’s always a matter, isn’t it, of waiting for the world to come unraveled? When things hold together, it’s always only temporary.”
“And was friendship that different in the end from love? You took the possibility of sex out of it, and it was all about the moment anyway. Being here, right now, in someone’s life. Making room for someone in yours.”
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ & a half
2025 📖 Read #12/Book #45
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
fast-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
This is an epic, arresting novel that follows two stories - one in the 1980s in Chicago and the other in the 2010s in Paris. The first depicts the brutal onset of the AIDS epidemic through a group of friends - primarily young men. The second follows the sister of one of those men, 30 years later as she searches for her estranged adult daughter. Makkai does a masterful job of making her characters so human - making me care a great deal what happens to each. While I was most invested in the 1980s story, which simultaneously educates and emotes, the Paris timeline grew on me in its contrast of the aftermath (though not even, with AIDS still killing millions) - how crisis can blunt the ability to love, the skill needed to connect with others. This was a long novel that felt short about a serious, tragic topic that somehow centers love and humanity. Highly recommend.
Popsugar 2025 Reading Challenge - a book centering LGBTQ+ characters that isn’t about coming out
Popsugar 2025 Reading Challenge - a book centering LGBTQ+ characters that isn’t about coming out
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
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:
Complicated
challenging
emotional
informative
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
a story of personal tragedy and trauma at scale, whole communities ripped apart, and individuals left to pick up the pieces, to heal without hurting others excessively, failures, triumphs, and just giving a fuck
hopeful
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
At first, I was riveted. I lived in both Paris and Chicago where the story takes place, first in the mid-80s and later in 2015. I was in college when AIDS was wreaking heartbreaking havoc on the world. I remember the loss and the fear, the not knowing what would become of so many people. But the characters stayed the same for too long and every time we moved from one time frame to the other it became repetitive to the point where I started skimming.