A review by jojireadsbooks
My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

5.0

i was almost scared to read this because i have heard so much hype about it over the years, but i think that the hype also distorted what i thought this book was going to be about. where i expected a heartwarming and touching recollection of a tender friendship, i instead found a narrative of intense competition (albeit rooted in love and admiration) between two girls amidst a background of poverty and violence. lila and elena are as much in competition with one another as they are with their circumstances growing up in the shadow of fascism and the war. i found the politics of the book really surprising but not unwelcome. i actually didn't know what to feel about lila and elena's friendship until i got to the line that lends the title of the novel and i burst into tears.

Spoiler

i had always believed lila to be the "brilliant friend" in question, seeing her so much through elena's eyes, and to read instead lila calling elena that, insisting that she continue in school? tragic. i felt so bitter about lila's supposed "ending" in the book at the wedding, trapped inside the circumstances that she hated the most--insulated by luxury created by those who cheat others--and i immediately went back to read the beginning of the novel, finding solace in that the domestic life that the novel leaves lila in does not contain her forever. lila, as always, rebels.

the beginning of the novel is definitely slow--i feel like the first two sections set up the premise for the meat of the book (adolescence). i spent 6 days getting through the first two sections and then devoured the rest of the novel in a day. an unforgettable experience, truly.