Reviews - Life, Loss, and Puffins

110 reviews for:

Life, Loss, and Puffins

Catherine Ryan Hyde

4.02 AVERAGE

debbieg725's review

3.75

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative reflective 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

sherriz's review

5.0

I loved absolutely everything about this book!

zhelana's review

5.0

adventurous challenging emotional funny lighthearted 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: Yes

This book was so good. I love Catherine Ryan Hyde. I have to admit I was hesitant at first when introduced to a freakishly smart kid that she wouldn't be written convincingly, but throughout their adventure, you see Ru become the 13 year old child she is for the first time, and CRH does as good a job with her as she does with the majority of her child characters. This story was really emotional and had me crying in the end, and I appreciate an ending that can move me that much. The whole adventure was such a pleasure to join these two young people on, and I look forward to CRH's next book, or maybe i'll pick up one of her older ones - she certainly has enough!

perks2023's review

3.0

**advance review copy received from NetGalley in return for an honest review***
This book delivers what you assume it will from the blurb, it’s a quick fairly easy read with some slightly improbable events - however, despite that, the characters are written well enough that you can forgive how unlikely some of the adventure is. I suspect anyone who read & enjoyed books like Elinor Oliphant is Completely Fine will find a lot to like about this also.

jessica_stenstrom's review

5.0

emotional hopeful inspiring 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: No

emmather's review

3.5

adventurous hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

life_full_ofbooks's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Catherine Ryan Hyde is one of my favorite feel good authors. Her books always feature characters who have good hearts and kind souls and through her books she puts a little bit of good into the world. There are some books that are best described as “a hug for your heart” and all of the ones I’ve read by Ms. Hyde qualify as that.

Ru Evans is 13 years old and “freakishly smart” (her mother’s words. She’s so smart she’s already graduated high school and is planning on starting college 150 miles away from home. Her Mom agrees as long as Ru lives in a boarding house instead of a dorm. Ru moves in to the house and quicker becomes friends with Gabriel, the 17 year old son of the woman who runs the house. With both of them being outsiders and never having friends they quickly find solace in each other and form a close sibling like relationship. When tragedy strikes and the unthinkable is on the horizon, Ru and Gabriel decide to take off on an adventure of a lifetime, crossing state lines and the Canadian border and meeting wonderful strangers on their journey to see the aurora borealis and Atlantic puffins. This story is one of found family and learning to live life instead of just observing it and it will have you laughing, crying, and cheering on Ru and Gabriel.

While I enjoyed the bulk of this I hated the way it was narrated. It opens with Ru talking to two girls but we don’t know who her audience is and while some people might be ok with that, it set a very poor tone for me. Anytime she broke from the story to talk to her audience broke me out of the trance the rest of the story had me in and I found it to be a jarring contrast. Aside from that I loved everything else about this. Thank you to NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing for an advanced copy of this. I’m sorry it took me so long to get to it. Life, Loss, and Puffins hit the shelves on May 14th.