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A review by justforqueerbooks
Darkhearts by James L. Sutter
3.0
This was one of my quickest reads of 2022. It was short, sweet and read like a fanfic, which is something I loved most about it!
I have to admit, I gave this 3.5 stars. Although I enjoyed the fic aspects of it, there was a lot of growth that these characters needed to go through that they ultimately didn’t. It’s YA, so it’s messy, its dramatic and filled with angst, which I adore about YA. In this particular book, however, I feel like I just kept reading the same issues over and over again.
The two main characters didn’t hash their feelings out until about 3/4 of the way through and kept having issues because of that. They didn’t talk about their individual struggles with themselves or each other and kept it in until it all blew up. Again, this is YA, so that’s understandable and I actually liked how everything was cleaned back up after the initial falling out. But, again, I wish there was a conflict in here that made sense. Because all I got was that one of them was mad because he felt abandoned and the other was upset because he felt like all his friend cared about was fame.
I also didn’t like the sterotypical “straight best friend who’s a girl” that they did in this book. She honestly felt like she was just tossed in there as an afterthought and didn’t contribute much, if anything to the storyline. She could’ve been a bystander and it would’ve made more sense, but overall, I think having her here was a little unnecessary.
So, once again, I wish there was something that forced them to look at each other and hash things out to start with and then a different conflict to get through the rest of the book.
Aside from that, however, the rest of this book was pretty well done. The characters, collectively, were interesting. One of the main characters was also written as being "built like a football player" and "having a little pudge" which I think is something that really needs to be shown more. There's a lot more body diversity written for women/feminine people, but not nearly as much for men/masculine people and I really liked the fact that it was written into this book.
Merged review:
This was one of my quickest reads of 2022. It was short, sweet and read like a fanfic, which is something I loved most about it!
I have to admit, I gave this 3.5 stars. Although I enjoyed the fic aspects of it, there was a lot of growth that these characters needed to go through that they ultimately didn’t. It’s YA, so it’s messy, its dramatic and filled with angst, which I adore about YA. In this particular book, however, I feel like I just kept reading the same issues over and over again.
The two main characters didn’t hash their feelings out until about 3/4 of the way through and kept having issues because of that. They didn’t talk about their individual struggles with themselves or each other and kept it in until it all blew up. Again, this is YA, so that’s understandable and I actually liked how everything was cleaned back up after the initial falling out. But, again, I wish there was a conflict in here that made sense. Because all I got was that one of them was mad because he felt abandoned and the other was upset because he felt like all his friend cared about was fame.
I also didn’t like the sterotypical “straight best friend who’s a girl” that they did in this book. She honestly felt like she was just tossed in there as an afterthought and didn’t contribute much, if anything to the storyline. She could’ve been a bystander and it would’ve made more sense, but overall, I think having her here was a little unnecessary.
So, once again, I wish there was something that forced them to look at each other and hash things out to start with and then a different conflict to get through the rest of the book.
Aside from that, however, the rest of this book was pretty well done. The characters, collectively, were interesting. One of the main characters was also written as being "built like a football player" and "having a little pudge" which I think is something that really needs to be shown more. There's a lot more body diversity written for women/feminine people, but not nearly as much for men/masculine people and I really liked the fact that it was written into this book.
I have to admit, I gave this 3.5 stars. Although I enjoyed the fic aspects of it, there was a lot of growth that these characters needed to go through that they ultimately didn’t. It’s YA, so it’s messy, its dramatic and filled with angst, which I adore about YA. In this particular book, however, I feel like I just kept reading the same issues over and over again.
The two main characters didn’t hash their feelings out until about 3/4 of the way through and kept having issues because of that. They didn’t talk about their individual struggles with themselves or each other and kept it in until it all blew up. Again, this is YA, so that’s understandable and I actually liked how everything was cleaned back up after the initial falling out. But, again, I wish there was a conflict in here that made sense. Because all I got was that one of them was mad because he felt abandoned and the other was upset because he felt like all his friend cared about was fame.
I also didn’t like the sterotypical “straight best friend who’s a girl” that they did in this book. She honestly felt like she was just tossed in there as an afterthought and didn’t contribute much, if anything to the storyline. She could’ve been a bystander and it would’ve made more sense, but overall, I think having her here was a little unnecessary.
So, once again, I wish there was something that forced them to look at each other and hash things out to start with and then a different conflict to get through the rest of the book.
Aside from that, however, the rest of this book was pretty well done. The characters, collectively, were interesting. One of the main characters was also written as being "built like a football player" and "having a little pudge" which I think is something that really needs to be shown more. There's a lot more body diversity written for women/feminine people, but not nearly as much for men/masculine people and I really liked the fact that it was written into this book.
Merged review:
This was one of my quickest reads of 2022. It was short, sweet and read like a fanfic, which is something I loved most about it!
I have to admit, I gave this 3.5 stars. Although I enjoyed the fic aspects of it, there was a lot of growth that these characters needed to go through that they ultimately didn’t. It’s YA, so it’s messy, its dramatic and filled with angst, which I adore about YA. In this particular book, however, I feel like I just kept reading the same issues over and over again.
The two main characters didn’t hash their feelings out until about 3/4 of the way through and kept having issues because of that. They didn’t talk about their individual struggles with themselves or each other and kept it in until it all blew up. Again, this is YA, so that’s understandable and I actually liked how everything was cleaned back up after the initial falling out. But, again, I wish there was a conflict in here that made sense. Because all I got was that one of them was mad because he felt abandoned and the other was upset because he felt like all his friend cared about was fame.
I also didn’t like the sterotypical “straight best friend who’s a girl” that they did in this book. She honestly felt like she was just tossed in there as an afterthought and didn’t contribute much, if anything to the storyline. She could’ve been a bystander and it would’ve made more sense, but overall, I think having her here was a little unnecessary.
So, once again, I wish there was something that forced them to look at each other and hash things out to start with and then a different conflict to get through the rest of the book.
Aside from that, however, the rest of this book was pretty well done. The characters, collectively, were interesting. One of the main characters was also written as being "built like a football player" and "having a little pudge" which I think is something that really needs to be shown more. There's a lot more body diversity written for women/feminine people, but not nearly as much for men/masculine people and I really liked the fact that it was written into this book.