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amyreh's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Graphic: Death, Infidelity, and Pregnancy
Moderate: Homophobia, Transphobia, and Abortion
Minor: Bullying, Infertility, Miscarriage, Outing, and Gaslighting
cimmalex's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Porter was by far the most annoying character to me, and I think it’s very lazy the cheese maker is named Porter. I just have to get that out there. She is almost 40 years old and thought her high school boyfriend belonged to her and no one else (including his wife) because she “had him first”? What kind of mentality is that? Insane behavior from this one throughout the whole book. Very wild.
Graphic: Death, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Car accident, Pregnancy, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Bullying, Death, Transphobia, Violence, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, and Dysphoria
Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Infertility, Dementia, Abortion, and Outing
taraaleitz's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
A little disappointed. I really wanted to love this book because This Time Tomorrow was soooo good, but this one fell a little flat for me. I liked that there were many characters to focus in on, but the whole book was ultimately based around poor communication between characters and/or poor choices. I loved how different each of the characters lives were and that there was diversity in the ages of the characters—making it a little interesting, but it didn’t feel like there was truly any real plot. Halfway through the book, I re-read the synopsis and I felt as though I already knew everything the synopsis talked about.
There was no true “climax” and this wasn’t a book where I was eagerly anticipating the next thing. A slower read for me.
Graphic: Pregnancy
Moderate: Death, Car accident, and Death of parent
Minor: Sexual content and Abortion
beatriks's review against another edition
- 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
I would recommend not stretching out the reading of this book for too long, otherwise you might forget what happened.
My favorite characters were Porter and Cecelia.
Graphic: Death, Infidelity, Sexual content, and Pregnancy
Moderate: Homophobia, Transphobia, and Death of parent
Minor: Infertility, Abortion, and Gaslighting
thenageler's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Moderate: Infidelity and Pregnancy
Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Death, Drug use, Infertility, Miscarriage, Car accident, Abortion, and Outing
annorabrady's review against another edition
- 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
There are mentions of miscarriages and abortions, as well as plots about people being outed against their will (handled well but they still exist) so precede with caution if those are triggering to you.
My biggest problem with the story was Porter's storyline.
Graphic: Infidelity, Medical content, and Pregnancy
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Deadnaming, Death, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Car accident, Death of parent, Outing, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol
Minor: Dementia and Abortion
saskiahill's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.75
Graphic: Bullying, Death, Infidelity, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, and Pregnancy
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Infertility, Miscarriage, Abortion, Lesbophobia, and Sexual harassment
Minor: Deadnaming, Transphobia, Blood, and Outing
samantha5's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Death of parent
Minor: Deadnaming, Miscarriage, Transphobia, and Abortion
Two deaths are fairly central to the plot of the book. Transphobic comments made towards a charactermenomica's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
“And it’s not up to me, Elliot. Your life? Your choices? They don’t belong to me. Neither does this town—not any more than it belongs to any of you.”
Sometimes a lie was more like a wish, or a prayer.
I really appreciated this book because of how it talks about family dysfunction even in seemingly healthy families. The Stricks aren’t perfect, but they do very much love each other. I love how Astrid went on a journey of self-reflection and decided to be better as a person.
All of the Strick kids were unlikable in their own ways, so… good for them, I guess. The thing is though, they weren’t unlikable in a way that made it hard to read the book, but more so in the way of these characters are incredibly deeply flawed and we’re going to take the time to dissect how we got to this point. Porter’s a pick-me looser, Elliot’s a looser with an inferiority complex, and Nicky’s a semi-neglectful pothead dad. And it’s really interesting to see why they’re like that.
Now, the things I didn’t like were: Emma Straub is old and is trying to understand how middle schoolers of the 21st century act and it is very… cringey. Like hen pls don’t do that.
Also some of the takes about feminism and womanhood came off slightly terfy. To Straub’s credit, I don’t think it was intencional, per say, but some of the lines made me go… oof.
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship and Infidelity
Minor: Death, Transphobia, Grief, and Death of parent
alreadsitall's review against another edition
4.0
Graphic: Death and Transphobia
Minor: Miscarriage