A review by amrita_yadav
Normal People by Sally Rooney

emotional relaxing sad medium-paced

• 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

3.75

I don't know what to think. Normal people. Maybe I guess. Like I am someone that goes around saying that bad stuff happening to people is more common than you think so it should be more represented in books too. I guess I got a little too used to uncomplicated relationships in books with beautiful endings. You know that reel audio that goes, " She never looked beautiful. She looked like art and art isn't supposed to look nice. It is supposed to make you feel something." This book is so calm and complicated at the same time. I know some messed up stuff and this book still made me uncomfortable in places. I think I got the dose of morally grey characters for real for the first time. But they are just normal people. Like Normal people are flawed. I am trying to connect the most basic two and two together here. It was just so hard to love the characters sometimes but the thing is it was hard to love them when you saw them as they see themselves. And I think I need to process that. I loved the writing and the aesthetics. I loved the POVs. They were actually so nicely written because sometimes the POVs become so transparent that it is just the same story being told by a person of different gender or something like that. It actually showed how complicated our perceptions are as people and how that can cause miscommunications. It is really a comfort book. To turn to it on quite peaceful days will be something nice because there isn't really that peak of emotional drama that writers try to create to get that tear out of you.