Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
After the death of his best friend, Eric has to find ways to deal with his grief. Eric goes on a trip to Japan and meets Haru who shows him around. A year later, Eric begins to see Haru around Chicago. The thing is, no one but Eric can see him. Knowing this doesn't bother him as he begins to build a connection with him as a way to deal with his loss. As time goes on, Eric realises that not everything is real and that he needs to come back to reality. This book is about losing people close to you and how it can affect a person. With Eric, he was truly wrapped in his grief and not able to escape it. It is an emotional book but I just think Eric was too bland and didn't have a lot of depth to him as a main character. I would've liked more character development. I had questions that the book didn't answer and a lot of the characters in the book were horrible and not enjoyable to read. I just wasn't gripped by this book. It wasn't a terrible book, I just didn't love it as much as I had hoped. I didn't particularly like Eric as a character. I found him bland at times. I was aware that he had lost his best friend Daniel who he was in love with but when it came out that Jasmine his sister also died that was shocking. I do wish we learned more about Jasmine and her death as I felt that was information I wanted to know, so at the end of the book I did feel disappointed. Eric pretending that Haru and Jasmine were real and still alive was interesting as his mind used these two people to try and guide him in the right direction and get him to feel beyond his grief. I know he was trying to protect himself, but a year of bottling up your sadness must have been tough. I did like Kevin being supportive and at the end it did make a lot of sense as to why he still stuck around and wanted to make sure Eric was doing well. I did not like how easily manipulated Erin was when it came to Christian and Nick because these two men were horrible and had bad intentions yet Eric went along with it. I just wanted to scream and shake some sense into him because to me it was so obvious that they only wanted him for one thing. With this, I wasn't sure why these parts were useful in the book because they didn't add character development or anything significant to the story. The friends Eric made at his workplace were horrible to him a lot of the time. I just didn't think these people Eric surrounded himself with were good influences at all. The ending of the book where he is in New York and he gets to meet real-life Haru was good, however, I wanted a further explanation as to why Haru was even there in the first place even if they just said it was a holiday. Haru said he's been there all summer, I just wanted to know why. I just felt I had a lot of questions by the end of the book and I didn't feel completely satisfied.
