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A review by bethanyangharads
Radio Silence by Alice Oseman
5.0
My favourite aspect of this book is the friendship between the characters and LGBT+ representation.
Grace is bi-sexual, Aled is demi-sexual/androgynous, Daniel is gay, Carys is a lesbian, and others are heterosexual. All of this representation felt truly so well articulated and encompassing, it definitely didn't have the tokenistic vibe that sometimes LGBT+ can have in books. The friendships between this cast are so pure! Not in a, nothing bad happens way, but in a realistic friends fight kind of way. Grace and Aled are our main characters and it's said quite early on in the book that there is no relationship between them, which I quite appreciate. Not enough books focus purely on friendships.
Then there was how the book is set out. Aled is the creator of a YouTube podcast, so there are excerpts from that in there. The narrator is omnipotent but often focuses on different characters at a time so you get the full scope of the cast, the chapters are short, text conversations are included, it was intriguing to turn each page and see what came next. The plot itself also kept me super hooked in with there being a bit of mystery weaved throughout.
If you're someone who really enjoys different formats in a book, LGBT+ reps, and a bit of a mystery, then I think you'll like this!
Grace is bi-sexual, Aled is demi-sexual/androgynous, Daniel is gay, Carys is a lesbian, and others are heterosexual. All of this representation felt truly so well articulated and encompassing, it definitely didn't have the tokenistic vibe that sometimes LGBT+ can have in books. The friendships between this cast are so pure! Not in a, nothing bad happens way, but in a realistic friends fight kind of way. Grace and Aled are our main characters and it's said quite early on in the book that there is no relationship between them, which I quite appreciate. Not enough books focus purely on friendships.
Then there was how the book is set out. Aled is the creator of a YouTube podcast, so there are excerpts from that in there. The narrator is omnipotent but often focuses on different characters at a time so you get the full scope of the cast, the chapters are short, text conversations are included, it was intriguing to turn each page and see what came next. The plot itself also kept me super hooked in with there being a bit of mystery weaved throughout.
If you're someone who really enjoys different formats in a book, LGBT+ reps, and a bit of a mystery, then I think you'll like this!