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brinaleee's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
ralbert89's review against another edition
3.0
This is a book that really makes me wish GoodReads had a half star option for ratings, but it was easily a 3.5 star book. The writing was good on a technical level and some of the plot was very interesting, however the book really lost my interest for a long time toward the middle. I thought Linda was a great character, and in the beginning, I had to keep reminding myself that this wasn't the memoir of a real person because her "voice" seemed so real! Unfortunately, the story really dragged and became a bit confusing and boring for me when it started to jump around a bit. I was very interested by Linda's school years and especially by the ending. I seriously considered rounding my rating up to a 4, but thinking about the book as a whole, I just can't honestly say that I "really liked it," as the rating system suggests.
veganecurrywurst's review against another edition
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
An interestinglemon-pie storybrownie about growing-upbaked-beans, familymashed-potatoes-and-peas, friendshipblack-tea, trauma and an exploration of race and inter-racial relationships.
wordnerdy's review against another edition
4.0
http://wordnerdy.blogspot.com/2010/07/2010-book-171.html
risclasa's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
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? It's complicated
5.0
dreesreads's review against another edition
informative
mysterious
reflective
medium-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
3.0
Solid story about many things--synesthesia (words as taste), fitting in, friendship, family. Linda tastes words and here she discusses her struggles with school, conversations, TV. Is that why she has never quite fit in? Sh learns cigarettes and alcohol help dull the tastes that can be overwhelming. Great narration, Jennifer Ikeda handles the parentheticals very well and her narration also made the distractions of "the incomings" very believable.
caribbean_skye's review against another edition
2.0
This is not an easy book to read, not because of the language or anything like that it was just a struggle. This was not only because it seemed a little disjointed but also due to the italics which represented taste of some words in the dialogue.
I had read maybe a third of the book and I had given up and had no intention of finishing it. You know it's bad when you'd rather clean a strangers house than continue reading a book. After hearing what others had to say about it, I figured I'd read just a little bit more and take it from there. Right about the halfway point the book changed and the latter half was a LOT easier to read than the first half. The first half the story is about Linda and how she perceives life and the second half of the book takes you back to certain instances in the book, but then you get to understand a little more about the others in the book and how they affected and influenced her life and you get a completely different aspect about everything. By the time you've gotten to the last quarter of the book you're beginning to get a real understanding of why her life is the way it is.
I can say that I am happy that I finished this book and I enjoyed getting to know Linda, Baby Harper and Kelly however this is not a book I'd recommend to someone who wanted something fast, light or quick to read. In the books I read I like being able to identify with a character, incident, location, history or something and it was hard to do in this novel as you don't really get the full picture until the end. While this isn't a bad book nor a badly written book, I feel the story could be written differently which would make it more enjoyable.
I had read maybe a third of the book and I had given up and had no intention of finishing it. You know it's bad when you'd rather clean a strangers house than continue reading a book. After hearing what others had to say about it, I figured I'd read just a little bit more and take it from there. Right about the halfway point the book changed and the latter half was a LOT easier to read than the first half. The first half the story is about Linda and how she perceives life and the second half of the book takes you back to certain instances in the book, but then you get to understand a little more about the others in the book and how they affected and influenced her life and you get a completely different aspect about everything. By the time you've gotten to the last quarter of the book you're beginning to get a real understanding of why her life is the way it is.
I can say that I am happy that I finished this book and I enjoyed getting to know Linda, Baby Harper and Kelly however this is not a book I'd recommend to someone who wanted something fast, light or quick to read. In the books I read I like being able to identify with a character, incident, location, history or something and it was hard to do in this novel as you don't really get the full picture until the end. While this isn't a bad book nor a badly written book, I feel the story could be written differently which would make it more enjoyable.