A review by maggers94
Happiness Falls by Angie Kim

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.75

I’m conflicted on how I feel about this book. The story itself I felt was pretty slow, but the overall plot I enjoyed. Eugene’s story in particular I found very compelling, and I somewhat wish it had been written from his perspective. I didn’t particularly like Mia as a narrator. She refers often to one of her flaws being that she talks too much and that was definitely conveyed. I just felt she had a lot of tangents and extraneous thoughts that slowed down the story way too much. I also hated the use of footnotes for this reason. Every footnote was a long tangent that felt like a chore to read and completely disrupted the narrative. There just was a lot of extra info that made it difficult for me to stay engaged at times. I would have rather heard from Eugene directly and have him express his frustration at not being able to communicate. Overall, the content and overall depiction of how the world treats the nonverbal, even within their own family, is compelling, but I just wish it had been executed slightly differently.