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A review by princessgonchar
Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
This book has a lot of potential in the beginning and in the end, but I feel like everything around it was a bit meh for me.
I had three major issues:
1) The Miguel storyline was clearly the MOST interesting part of the book, and it takes up maybe 15% of it. Like, if this book had leaned more into being a mystery, it would have been incredible, and I think there was an attempt (maybe?) at it feeling like a mystery, but not enough time is spent on the real mystery for me to care about it. In fact, for most of the middle, there was no talk about it at all, and at like 60% it seems like everyone forgets about it because Yadriel's problems are solved so they don't need to find him anymore. I was like hold on something clearly is going on here? The reveal made me audibly gasp - it is the sole reason the rating is as high as it is - but if the build-up had been there, I would have been more satisfied.
2) The pacing. This book takes place over, like, 3 days? And Julien and Yadriel fall so deeply in love that Julien is literally refusing to turn Yadriel's body over to his family at the end of the book ??? This romance is TOO FAST. And it felt like some moments would take absolutely forever to get through and then we would time jump a couple of hours. Their time crunch at the end to release Julien's body before midnight is completely arbitrary. And the ending! Oh goodness, THE ENDING. It felt like it took FOREVER to get through the ending of this book. Like everything after Yadriel (arguably makes the wrong decision and) uses the amulet on himself to save Julien, Miguel, and the others is based entirely on miscommunication, people not listening to each other, and Julien being annoying like he was for 90% of the book. I was dragging myself across the finish line on this one.
3) The repetition. I think part of the pacing problem is that it felt like we were reliving the same beats just in different settings. The number of times an argument was ended by Julien throwing a hissy fit and being a terrible spirit drove me insane. And a running joke (?) is that Yadriel can't lie to save his life, but it was getting real frustrating to just read him stutter for like 5 pages and then have someone else entirely swoop in and save him from himself. And it just kept happening. I was bored.
I know this sounds like I don't like the book at all. I did really enjoy some parts too. Like I said, the Miguel mystery stuff was fantastically executed. And there are moments between Yadriel and Julien where they are really truly adorable. For example The yearbook, the beach, the ofrenda. All great moments between the two of them. And I think the concept of this book was really strong and really interesting. There were just parts of it's execution that I wasn't the biggest fan of.
I had three major issues:
1) The Miguel storyline was clearly the MOST interesting part of the book, and it takes up maybe 15% of it. Like, if this book had leaned more into being a mystery, it would have been incredible, and I think there was an attempt (maybe?) at it feeling like a mystery, but not enough time is spent on the real mystery for me to care about it. In fact, for most of the middle, there was no talk about it at all, and at like 60% it seems like everyone forgets about it because Yadriel's problems are solved so they don't need to find him anymore. I was like hold on something clearly is going on here? The reveal made me audibly gasp - it is the sole reason the rating is as high as it is - but if the build-up had been there, I would have been more satisfied.
2) The pacing. This book takes place over, like, 3 days? And Julien and Yadriel
3) The repetition. I think part of the pacing problem is that it felt like we were reliving the same beats just in different settings. The number of times an argument was ended by Julien throwing a hissy fit and being a terrible spirit drove me insane. And a running joke (?) is that Yadriel can't lie to save his life, but it was getting real frustrating to just read him stutter for like 5 pages and then have someone else entirely swoop in and save him from himself. And it just kept happening. I was bored.
I know this sounds like I don't like the book at all. I did really enjoy some parts too. Like I said, the Miguel mystery stuff was fantastically executed. And there are moments between Yadriel and Julien where they are really truly adorable. For example The yearbook, the beach, the ofrenda. All great moments between the two of them. And I think the concept of this book was really strong and really interesting. There were just parts of it's execution that I wasn't the biggest fan of.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief
Moderate: Blood, Death of parent, and Death
Minor: Animal cruelty, Car accident, and Deadnaming