sleepapneattic 's review for:

Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano

1.5

slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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As far as the writing is concerned: a lot of telling rather than showing. Way too much exposition. Plot wise: super interesting? Sure. Are the characters way too self aware? Absolutely. The internal monologue of all the characters are too self aware to be believable. The “courage” of Sylvie to choose William so soon after her sister’s departure is not courageous, it’s extremely selfish. The only person who was acting as expected to me was Julia.  I don’t respect the narrative of horrible selfish choices combined with the exposition “it’s because of who I am that I made this choice and it’ll be okay and I’m actually brave for choosing my truth” what a load of waffle. Realistically, the happy ending we received would never happen in a situation like this. Everyone just saying “it was fine and I’m not hurt or scarred by any of this everything is all love anyway” please.