Reviews with content warning for Acephobia/Arophobia - Let's Talk About Love

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Reviews tagging 'Acephobia/Arophobia'

Let's Talk About Love by Claire Kann

86 reviews

mari1532's review against another edition

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emotional funny inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing tense 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? No

4.5

#23for23 (Learn more: https://www.23for23.net/)

I checked this audiobook out of my library.

Brief Synopsis: Alice is going to have the best summer. Eating great food, working her cozy job at the library, watching television, and spending time with her girlfriend...except she doesn't have a girlfriend anymore. After Alice tells her girlfriend that she's asexual, Alice finds herself no longer in a relationship. With a broken heart, she enters the summer with no thoughts toward anything other than going to work and avoiding people. Then she meets her new coworker, Takumi, and suddenly the summer seems full of terrifying possibilities for Alice.

Thoughts: I loved the romance between Alice and Takumi throughout this book. The way that they care for each other and build a connection with one another was so heartwarming to watch and a joy to read. I also really appreciated Alice's growth within her asexuality and how Takumi and she were able to navigate the meaning of that within their romance.

I also love that the place where Alice and Takumi fall for each other is a library. It's a perfect combination of some of my favourite things romance and books.

The only thing I did not like about this book is Alice's relationship with her best friends, Feenie and Ryan, who are in a partnership with each other. I felt that Feenie and Alice's relationship was a little toxic. They had a lot of history together and I do not doubt that at some point they were very close and had a lot of love for each other. However, when Feenie is upset that Alice is forming a relationship with Takumi being jealous, rather than supportive it rubbed me the wrong way. I also felt that the resolution of that tension was not entirely satisfying.

This is a great romance with asexual representation. I would recommend this book.

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sarschr04's review

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emotional lighthearted relaxing fast-paced

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

4.5

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rafacolog's review against another edition

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emotional funny inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

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meggg508's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.75

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prufrockpreptooth's review against another edition

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After multiple tries, I have to recognize that it's not my type of books and forcing me to read it won't bring me anything. I still think there is a public for it, and it seems like a genuinely cute university romcom

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sophiesometimesreads's review against another edition

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funny inspiring lighthearted 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? Yes

4.25

This book was an emotional rollercoaster got me and I related to Alice in a lot of deep and personal ways. Some may say this is poor ace representation as it doesn't reflect their experience, and not relating to Alice's experience is valid, but this book felt like Kann took my experiences and put them down on the page, so I thought it was good. Though I do believe that, even if representation is scarce, one character of a given identity doesn't need to reflect every single individual experience with said identity, and this book reflected one of the many.

Alice was quirky, funny but imperfect, as most 19 year olds are. I feel a lot of people who said she was immature for 19 probably forgot what being 19 is like, because it's actually still quite young. She's still figuring out herself and her life, and taking comfort in the things she likes whilst doing so.

This book portrayed therapy in a positive way, which was good, and I also liked how Takumi took some time to really understand what Alice meant when she said she was asexual. He was also imperfect and I think that's realistic, as a lot of people haven't heard of asexuality before and need to take some time to understand experiences outside their own and might say the wrong thing in good faith whilst doing so.

I thought Feenie and Ryan were a bit harsh on her, though I could see their POV as I've been in a similar situation before. This could have been resolved a bit better though, without Alice taking all the blame for it, because I think her feelings and experience was also valid (they did ditch her first!).

Though I did enjoy this book overall, there were a few little things that I didn't like as much. I don't know why Takumi had to be so much older than her, it seemed irrelevant to the plot and I always find teen/mid-20s pairings a bit iffy given the mentality differences generally present between these ages and stages of life. It didn't ruin the book, but it was something I noticed. I also would've liked to see how their relationship developed a bit more after the getting together stage, and see Alice explore what that meant for her identity. The side characters could've been developed a little more, too.

In saying this, I did enjoy the book overall and thought there were a lot of good things about it. I thought the ace rep was good, the writing was engaging and easy to read, and the characters were fun. It was also able to address fairly heavy topics whilst also managing to be overall a lighthearted and fluffy read.

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