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carolineroche's review against another edition
5.0
An outstanding book dealing with the themes of suicide, grief and social media. The themes make it suitable for your older readers, with a trigger warning. From the moment Nathan finds his brother hanging in his bedroom, he is on a quest to uncover why he did this terrible thing. What he uncovers is a dark world of social media which lead to his brother’s final,desperate act. A book which will stay with you for a long while.
h0llyjvne's review
4.0
i have a problem with reading books about grief and then getting emotional attached because it matches my own experience lol. it was a good read! i probably would've enjoyed this a lot more if i was younger but i can't fault it. it was a quick and nice read and i enjoyed the fact the characters felt like teenagers.
fellowsjm's review against another edition
4.0
I pretty much inhaled this book. It took me a little push to get into it but the raw emotion and realness of it really captured me
f876's review
challenging
emotional
hopeful
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? It's complicated
4.5
alexander404's review against another edition
5.0
Even tho i cried near the end and it made me feel... a lot of feelings it's a 4.5 because i felt like the dialogue was too fast and the subjects changed too fast. It felt like I didn't have enough time to process what was happening and what was talked about. In my opinion it needed to be a little more detailed when there were dialogues or when emotions were described.
akiha's review against another edition
4.0
Du bon et du moins bon pour un 3,5 arrondi. Le bon, l'écriture, qui reprend un peu le langage wesh anglais et mine de rien, ça change et j'ai dû chercher plusieurs mots pour comprendre et c'était intéressant à lire comme exercice. Le moins bon, l'impression de tourner parfois un peu en rond et la double narration n'était pas forcément la meilleure décision. On a dû mal à comprendre vraiment la relation Megan/Nathan et même Al/Nathan. Du coup, c'est un peu vide par moment. Mais l'ensemble reste assez émouvant.
nikaisya_'s review
dark
hopeful
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
mandyist's review against another edition
5.0
It’s been a strange time to read And The Stars Were Burning Brightly, a book about suicide in England. While February got incrementally weirder with Brexit, Coronavirus and the tragic passing of Caroline Flack, I could be found hiding away from the world with a cup of tea and Danielle Jawando’s latest young adult novel about the suicide of a brilliant and beloved straight-A student.
Nathan’s brother Al has committed suicide. There was no warning and the only note, if you can call it that, was a drawing of Al surrounded by ominous, threatening figures while he desperately cries for help. For Al was everything to those who knew him: a talented artist, an older brother, a kind friend and a fascinated star-gazer who could tell you any one of a million factoids about space and the universe.
Yet while Al’s gaze was focused on the skies, his world was falling apart around him.
Nathan’s shock at the death of his brother knows no beginning and no end. He can’t begin to understand the reasons why but as he works through his own guilt surrounding Al’s suicide, he becomes determined to find out the reason why.
Megan was one of Al’s closest friends but you wouldn’t know it given how rarely they were seen together in public. As Megan reaches out in the wake of her grief, she finds herself in Nathan’s orbit and his search for the truth.
In a book that explores the devastation of suicide, the depths of grief, the complexity of being an LGBTIQ teen, the trickiness of social media and the ever-present scourge of bullying, there is also time for beauty and wonder as we discover Al’s writing about the universe, stars, hope and his love of art.
And The Stars Were Burning Brightly is set in Manchester, and the reader is ”proper” aware of this as Jawando has captured the local accent perfectly. I grew up not far from Manchester in Rainhill and the characters could be my cousins. While this certainly made the book feel closer to my heart, it is the source of my only (minor) complaint about the novel being the abundance of “wot” and “cos” on the pages. It’s something we see more in British YA novels than American or other countries but I definitely prefer to see proper words.
It won’t impact my rating though because I was crying big, ugly tears on a train to London as I finished this book last Saturday.
And The Stars Were Burning Brightly is a beautiful novel with lyrical writing. Despite its heavy subject matter, Jawando has captured perfectly that moment when the clouds begin to part on grief and we let life back in. It definitely made me want to grab all my loved ones and hold them close to my heart because you never know when tragedy is around the corner.
I give And The Stars Were Burning Brightly a superb five out of five stars and recommend to fans of superior British young adult fiction.
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Nathan’s brother Al has committed suicide. There was no warning and the only note, if you can call it that, was a drawing of Al surrounded by ominous, threatening figures while he desperately cries for help. For Al was everything to those who knew him: a talented artist, an older brother, a kind friend and a fascinated star-gazer who could tell you any one of a million factoids about space and the universe.
Yet while Al’s gaze was focused on the skies, his world was falling apart around him.
Nathan’s shock at the death of his brother knows no beginning and no end. He can’t begin to understand the reasons why but as he works through his own guilt surrounding Al’s suicide, he becomes determined to find out the reason why.
Megan was one of Al’s closest friends but you wouldn’t know it given how rarely they were seen together in public. As Megan reaches out in the wake of her grief, she finds herself in Nathan’s orbit and his search for the truth.
In a book that explores the devastation of suicide, the depths of grief, the complexity of being an LGBTIQ teen, the trickiness of social media and the ever-present scourge of bullying, there is also time for beauty and wonder as we discover Al’s writing about the universe, stars, hope and his love of art.
And The Stars Were Burning Brightly is set in Manchester, and the reader is ”proper” aware of this as Jawando has captured the local accent perfectly. I grew up not far from Manchester in Rainhill and the characters could be my cousins. While this certainly made the book feel closer to my heart, it is the source of my only (minor) complaint about the novel being the abundance of “wot” and “cos” on the pages. It’s something we see more in British YA novels than American or other countries but I definitely prefer to see proper words.
It won’t impact my rating though because I was crying big, ugly tears on a train to London as I finished this book last Saturday.
And The Stars Were Burning Brightly is a beautiful novel with lyrical writing. Despite its heavy subject matter, Jawando has captured perfectly that moment when the clouds begin to part on grief and we let life back in. It definitely made me want to grab all my loved ones and hold them close to my heart because you never know when tragedy is around the corner.
I give And The Stars Were Burning Brightly a superb five out of five stars and recommend to fans of superior British young adult fiction.
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lizz_ann_o7's review
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0