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mischievous_monkey's review against another edition
4.0
G. Benson created a great community of characters with thoughts, feelings and actions that rang true and right and that sucked me into their lives to an extent that I had to set the book aside for a while and then come back to it. I am so invested in the lives of these characters that, although I know they are fictional, I hope that they are doing well and are happy. Some of the subject matter in this book is tough and does not make for light reading but it is a very well told story and I'm glad I read it.
barbrokatrin's review against another edition
I have loved G. Bensons other books but even when just reading the blurb for this I knew I wouldn’t love this as much but decided to give this a go since I’ve loved her other books. But sadly I was right, I had a hard time connecting to it, I found the story boring and some times confusing. I never knew that Ollie was black, I spent a long time wondering when she broke up with her bf and wondering when I had missed that. Add to that that I knew this was a Clexa ff, I spent a lot of time figuring out who was who, and I hate that every time there’s a Clexa story hat has been turned into a book they have to give Clarke a unisex/male name.
I gave up on this around the 40% mark.
Hoping the next Benson book is better :)
I gave up on this around the 40% mark.
Hoping the next Benson book is better :)
elvang's review against another edition
4.0
Wow. Impressive YA read and I say that as a reader who avoids the majority of YA novels. I assume I will not relate to the all consuming high-drama of love affairs and bullies who haunt the school hallways. Teen angst is (generally) not my thing. Pieces has many angst filled moments but it is far from a simple teen drama.
Benson gives us unforgettable characters in Carmen and her brother Mattie. Carmen’s efforts to care for and support her younger brother are as heartfelt as they are herculean. Their survival story is one I will remember as I will the secondary characters who weave in and out of their lives. Ollie’s interest in Carmen brightens an otherwise dark and gritty read. She adds hope to Carmen’s hard life and bleak prospects for success. Well done.
4.5 stars
Benson gives us unforgettable characters in Carmen and her brother Mattie. Carmen’s efforts to care for and support her younger brother are as heartfelt as they are herculean. Their survival story is one I will remember as I will the secondary characters who weave in and out of their lives. Ollie’s interest in Carmen brightens an otherwise dark and gritty read. She adds hope to Carmen’s hard life and bleak prospects for success. Well done.
4.5 stars
jediroot's review against another edition
4.0
I received an ARC in exchange for my honest review.
It's rare for me to enjoy an YA novels, as I usually don't really relate to them that much. However, this one is one of few exceptions. I think what make this novel so enjoyable is how realistic the characters are with their flaws and how they deal with the situations they face. There are two main characters, Ollie and Carmen, and they are two completely different teenagers. One lives in poverty and face extremely difficult situations on daily basis with her younger brother. Another lives in comfort and experience typical teenager struggles except for one big change that affect her family forever.
I have to give this novel huge praise for being so diverse. Both main characters are WOC and one important side character is trans. In face, most characters are POCs than white characters, and I really appreciate the diversity being included.
I'll have to put in warning that some bits of this novel is bit dark with death, violence, drug/alcohol abuse, child neglect triggers. It's not really that dark where everything awful and nothing gets better, more of just being real about what the characters face and how they overcome the challenges. It is pretty empowering in a way actually.
I really enjoyed reading this one and G. Benson is definitely part of the "author club" where I will buy her works without worrying about quality.
It's rare for me to enjoy an YA novels, as I usually don't really relate to them that much. However, this one is one of few exceptions. I think what make this novel so enjoyable is how realistic the characters are with their flaws and how they deal with the situations they face. There are two main characters, Ollie and Carmen, and they are two completely different teenagers. One lives in poverty and face extremely difficult situations on daily basis with her younger brother. Another lives in comfort and experience typical teenager struggles except for one big change that affect her family forever.
I have to give this novel huge praise for being so diverse. Both main characters are WOC and one important side character is trans. In face, most characters are POCs than white characters, and I really appreciate the diversity being included.
I'll have to put in warning that some bits of this novel is bit dark with death, violence, drug/alcohol abuse, child neglect triggers. It's not really that dark where everything awful and nothing gets better, more of just being real about what the characters face and how they overcome the challenges. It is pretty empowering in a way actually.
I really enjoyed reading this one and G. Benson is definitely part of the "author club" where I will buy her works without worrying about quality.
cdownes's review against another edition
3.0
Not what I expected.
I thought this would be an easy YA kind of book with young characters ready to take on the world but this book depicted a tough life and beaten characters who were still resilient, supportive and capable of love.
Parts of the book seemed a little long but to be honest I think the pace was probably perfect. No quick resolutions, no easy answers. Very well done.
I thought this would be an easy YA kind of book with young characters ready to take on the world but this book depicted a tough life and beaten characters who were still resilient, supportive and capable of love.
Parts of the book seemed a little long but to be honest I think the pace was probably perfect. No quick resolutions, no easy answers. Very well done.
barbrokatrin's review against another edition
I have loved G. Bensons other books but even when just reading the blurb for this I knew I wouldn’t love this as much but decided to give this a go since I’ve loved her other books. But sadly I was right, I had a hard time connecting to it, I found the story boring and some times confusing. I never knew that Ollie was black, I spent a long time wondering when she broke up with her bf and wondering when I had missed that. Add to that that I knew this was a Clexa ff, I spent a lot of time figuring out who was who, and I hate that every time there’s a Clexa story hat has been turned into a book they have to give Clarke a unisex/male name.
I gave up on this around the 40% mark.
Hoping the next Benson book is better :)
I gave up on this around the 40% mark.
Hoping the next Benson book is better :)
gerd_d's review against another edition
dark
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Minor: Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, and Emotional abuse
lezreviewbooks's review against another edition
5.0
This book is in my list of recommended books of the month:
https://lezreviewbooks.wordpress.com/recommended-books-of-the-month-march-2018/
First of all, I have to say that angsty books about young adults aren't my cup of tea. However, I've read G Benson's previous books which I liked a lot and decided to read this one. I'm glad I did because it's a very good read.
Written in third person from the point of view of both characters, Ms. Benson deals with very difficult issues such as the fallouts of the foster care system, transsexualism, bisexuality, bereavement and generally the young adults struggle to grow up. The author tackles all these issues with sensitivity and realism. All the characters, including the secondary ones are realistic and multilayered. The balance between showing and telling is spot on and the dialogues and situations are realistic.
My only criticism is that despite there was such detail in the description of emotions and headspace of the main characters, I cannot understand why the author doesn't describe the sexual intimacy between the characters in more detail. Don't get me wrong, I'm not bothered with erotic descriptions for the sake of it, I just thought that it was more coherent with the book style. However, this didn't affect my overall enjoyment of the story.
Overall, a very good read even if you aren't a fan of YA books. 4.5 stars rounded to 5.
ARC provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
See all my reviews at
www.lezreviewbooks.com
https://lezreviewbooks.wordpress.com/recommended-books-of-the-month-march-2018/
First of all, I have to say that angsty books about young adults aren't my cup of tea. However, I've read G Benson's previous books which I liked a lot and decided to read this one. I'm glad I did because it's a very good read.
Written in third person from the point of view of both characters, Ms. Benson deals with very difficult issues such as the fallouts of the foster care system, transsexualism, bisexuality, bereavement and generally the young adults struggle to grow up. The author tackles all these issues with sensitivity and realism. All the characters, including the secondary ones are realistic and multilayered. The balance between showing and telling is spot on and the dialogues and situations are realistic.
My only criticism is that despite there was such detail in the description of emotions and headspace of the main characters, I cannot understand why the author doesn't describe the sexual intimacy between the characters in more detail. Don't get me wrong, I'm not bothered with erotic descriptions for the sake of it, I just thought that it was more coherent with the book style. However, this didn't affect my overall enjoyment of the story.
Overall, a very good read even if you aren't a fan of YA books. 4.5 stars rounded to 5.
ARC provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
See all my reviews at
www.lezreviewbooks.com
annfernandez's review against another edition
4.0
Honestly, where has G. Benson been all my life?
She is very easily becoming a must-read author for me, from Flinging It, which I enjoyed, to now Pieces, which I...experienced. Because this book is truly a trip and a half.
I don't know what it is about G. Benson and her writing, but every time I pick up a book of hers I feel really immersed and invested in her characters and the struggles they face. When they were shocked, I was shocked. When they were heartbroken, I was heartbroken. I could understand everything they did perfectly (which is more than I can say for a lot of other novels that come to mind) and always rooted for them.
What's mainly prohibiting me from giving this novel 5 stars is the pacing of this story at times. There is about a sixth of the novel where you aren't sure where the plot is going or how the main focus of this story (the romance, kinda) is, so the story starts to drag, especially since it does get really sad at that exact portion. However, the rest is a complete breeze to go through.
While a lot of the subjects in this book are not for the faint of heart, I do appreciate that it never felt entirely hopeless, at least not for long, and thus made this book still palatable, that there was still bits of humor injected into it to lighten the tone, and never at inappropriate times, which I appreciated.
The deep dive into the foster care system in the US was also very refreshing, since I don't remember the last book that had ever covered the subject, not this well. Learning about how due to conservation of resources a lot of kid runaways, once they hit sometime after 16, aren't really being looked for anymore because they already have so many younger kids to worry about is heartbreaking, and I apreciate that multiple characters point out how wrong this is.
This book as a whole feels very four-stars to me. It's a book I really liked and can appreciate, but it's simply not a book that stood out to me or resonated within me in any major way. Would I recommend this? Absolutely, it's a great read. However, it did not move me enough to give it a higher rating than a simple 4.
She is very easily becoming a must-read author for me, from Flinging It, which I enjoyed, to now Pieces, which I...experienced. Because this book is truly a trip and a half.
I don't know what it is about G. Benson and her writing, but every time I pick up a book of hers I feel really immersed and invested in her characters and the struggles they face. When they were shocked, I was shocked. When they were heartbroken, I was heartbroken. I could understand everything they did perfectly (which is more than I can say for a lot of other novels that come to mind) and always rooted for them.
What's mainly prohibiting me from giving this novel 5 stars is the pacing of this story at times. There is about a sixth of the novel where you aren't sure where the plot is going or how the main focus of this story (the romance, kinda) is, so the story starts to drag, especially since it does get really sad at that exact portion. However, the rest is a complete breeze to go through.
While a lot of the subjects in this book are not for the faint of heart, I do appreciate that it never felt entirely hopeless, at least not for long, and thus made this book still palatable, that there was still bits of humor injected into it to lighten the tone, and never at inappropriate times, which I appreciated.
The deep dive into the foster care system in the US was also very refreshing, since I don't remember the last book that had ever covered the subject, not this well. Learning about how due to conservation of resources a lot of kid runaways, once they hit sometime after 16, aren't really being looked for anymore because they already have so many younger kids to worry about is heartbreaking, and I apreciate that multiple characters point out how wrong this is.
This book as a whole feels very four-stars to me. It's a book I really liked and can appreciate, but it's simply not a book that stood out to me or resonated within me in any major way. Would I recommend this? Absolutely, it's a great read. However, it did not move me enough to give it a higher rating than a simple 4.
synth's review against another edition
1.0
I really appreciate this author's efforts in including and explaining a lot of diversity while not making it a ThingTM in all their books (even though the "most diverse" are always secondary characters). In this book, it means two queer (one explicitly states she's bisexual, the other never clarifies, and is never asked to) main characters of mixed ethnicity, a black trans queer girl, and a black aro ace boy.
However, it is more than obvious that the author has little to no experience with (1) the foster system, and (2) being a person of color, and especially black in the US. Not that the story or writing is especially racist or elitist, but there is no subtlety of experience anywhere in the book. The characters could have been white and nothing would have changed at all (apart from literally only one mention of the white mother of one of the main character slapping a woman for insulting her daughter). I would even argue that some things in this book would not be realistic for characters of color.
The topic of the foster system is maybe less obviously poorly handled, as it follows the very generic "almost all foster homes are awful and the system is stacked against the kids" point of view. It is again obvious the author hasn't been exposed much to that system to be able to write about it in a thoughtful nuanced way. But I think few readers have either so this will certainly not bother many.
I wouldn't say it was a bad book -the author is not bad at writing conversation that flow, and I did appreciate the lack of fake drama, but I can't say I liked it -including the lack of showing/too much telling.
However, it is more than obvious that the author has little to no experience with (1) the foster system, and (2) being a person of color, and especially black in the US. Not that the story or writing is especially racist or elitist, but there is no subtlety of experience anywhere in the book. The characters could have been white and nothing would have changed at all (apart from literally only one mention of the white mother of one of the main character slapping a woman for insulting her daughter). I would even argue that some things in this book would not be realistic for characters of color.
The topic of the foster system is maybe less obviously poorly handled, as it follows the very generic "almost all foster homes are awful and the system is stacked against the kids" point of view. It is again obvious the author hasn't been exposed much to that system to be able to write about it in a thoughtful nuanced way. But I think few readers have either so this will certainly not bother many.
I wouldn't say it was a bad book -the author is not bad at writing conversation that flow, and I did appreciate the lack of fake drama, but I can't say I liked it -including the lack of showing/too much telling.