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22.5k reviews for:

Intermezzo

Sally Rooney

4.03 AVERAGE

hopeful slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

3.5 stars.
Rooney masterfully explores the impact of their father death on his two sons Peter 33,and Ivan 23 .
The story of the two brothers, two unconventional relationships, of love and loss.
challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
emotional reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
sad tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

sorry sally, not your best. or maybe i am sick of reading about horribly dysfunctional characters who do not try to change their ways, bar the last 5 pages of the book.

personally i found peter and ivan to be completely unsympathetic and impossible relate to. honestly, every time i picked the book up i thought, are men really this awful??? is this what all men are thinking about women??? what a horrible world we live in!

i do not understand why any of the women in their lives find any interest in them. ivan can’t seem to talk about anything other than himself, and peter is a narcissist and a performative feminist who secretly shares ivan’s incel beliefs on what a woman’s place truly is.

i am VERY happy to read about characters who are flawed. in fact, i love it! however. the way this was written was so …. brash, and i truly believe i was supposed to sympathise with the brothers due to their dad dying (a sad fact of life that happens to all people who have a dad) which sorry, i didn’t. 

also was religion supposed to be a theme, because that question at the end from ivan to peter caught me off guard. sorry, but you believe in god now? Why??? Are you stupid??? 

honestly, i really don’t think this book effectively discussed grief in a meaningful way. i didn’t care when they mentioned the dad - and maybe this was because i hated him - but everytime Ivan said how great his dad was, it made me think that the dad probably sucked. 

ALSO you’re telling me ivan lasted 1 minute in bed and this 36 year old woman LIKED IT??????? dying at the thought

i don’t think peter wants to get better and neither of those women deserved him. this is such a pattern with sally rooney characters, they’re all experiencing various mental health crises and yet, and YET, none of them EVER get help (professional or otherwise), nor do they want to. BUT SOMMMMEHOOOWWWW LOVEEEE FIXXEESSS ALLLLLL 

FUCK that go to therapy omfg i’m over this

anyway i finished the book because i wanted to talk with scarlett about how much we hated it, literally no other reason. also why did margaret have a POV lol
challenging dark emotional medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
emotional reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
challenging emotional reflective tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes