Reviews

On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong

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booksbea's review against another edition

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5.0

Heartbreakingly beautiful

outsider's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

frozenheartv's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

5 stars
🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕

“Because freedom, i am told, is nothing but the distance between the hunter and its prey” - Little Dog

🧠 My thoughts
I have read a book using the same stream-of-consciousness narrative technique and I just hated it. However, this book just completely changed my point of view of this technique. The technique fitted so well with the book that I couldn’t think of any other ones that would work better. It raised so much emotions in me from start to finish. Within less than 300 pages, the author managed to tell the story in detail without being wordy and that was impressive. A good book doesn’t have to be lengthy.

👍 What I like

Touching, heartbreaking, and meaningful story
Stream of consciousness is an excellent narrative technique in this case
Raises many important and impactful topics related to refugee and sexuality

👎 What I don't like

Nothing to complain about, this book is perfect in its own way

Content Warnings

jenna_bookworm_5822's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

paochavezgt's review against another edition

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dark emotional 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

4.5

askatknits's review against another edition

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4.0

They say nothing lasts forever but they're just scared it will last longer than they can love it.

Haunting, poignant writing. I listened to the author read his story, and I think that helped me stay engaged with this, at times, very painful story. If you have read Vuong's poetry, his writing will be very familiar. This felt more like poetry than it did a novel, and that is not a negative statement... the writing was just so beautiful.