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georginaflor 's review for:
Freshers
by Tom Ellen, Lucy Ivison
✨3.5 stars✨
I haven’t posted a proper review in months and this is the first book I’ve finished so far this year so I feel like a bit of a fake, but I do have a good, genuine reason: university. So it feels quite fitting that this book is my return to goodreads. This book wasn’t necessarily anything special, but it was real. It was realistic and I felt like at any point all of the events of the book could be happening to the people around me at uni and it wouldn’t be at all out of place. It definitely captured the essence of the first term of uni, and having just finished my own first term of uni, it was really comforting.
Phoebe, Negin and Frankie are adorable. I love love love their friendship and the comfortableness of them all draped in their duvets half the time just living their lives together. Their dynamic definitely helps to emphasise Luke’s more isolated experience, especially in the face of his expectations of making friends in the same way. The accuracy of the uni experience that this book conveys really made it hard for me at times to decide who was in the right and who was in the wrong. I adore moral ambiguity, and I felt sorry for both Luke and Phoebe at times when I knew that technically I should probably be judging them a little bit.
The things I enjoyed the most were actually the little details: the constant cups of tea; the weird ways in which drinks are mixed at pre’s (bathtubs, buckets and spades, washing up bowls- you name it, someone’s mixing vodka in it); Luke walking into the wrong lecture and just rolling with it. Silly things that made me giggle and say ‘yep, that sounds about right’. Luke and Phoebe study English, and so do I, so I must admit there were mentions of things that made me think ‘nooo I’m reading this for fun, please don’t remind me of the work I need to do !!!!!’ (*cough* Sir Gawain and the Green Knight *cough*), but for the most part I really enjoyed the similarities and things I could relate to regarding their course.
What I liked the most about this book is the emphasis on the fact that people are more than they appear. No matter what you think a person is like, they are still a person and have so much more under the surface than you can see from afar. I loved the fact that Phoebe realises this with Mary- whilst she is amazing once she gets to know her, it’s different than the character of her that the girls had previously created just from seeing her around. I wasn’t really a fan of the writing style I have to admit, sometimes things felt under-explained or unfinished and it meant I had to reread things at times in order for them to make sense. Despite this though I did really enjoy this book, and I want to try and read more YA books set at university because it’s not something I’ve come across that frequently. It was fun and easy to read, and it’s been on my shelf for bloody ages so I’m really happy I finally got round to reading it!!
I haven’t posted a proper review in months and this is the first book I’ve finished so far this year so I feel like a bit of a fake, but I do have a good, genuine reason: university. So it feels quite fitting that this book is my return to goodreads. This book wasn’t necessarily anything special, but it was real. It was realistic and I felt like at any point all of the events of the book could be happening to the people around me at uni and it wouldn’t be at all out of place. It definitely captured the essence of the first term of uni, and having just finished my own first term of uni, it was really comforting.
Phoebe, Negin and Frankie are adorable. I love love love their friendship and the comfortableness of them all draped in their duvets half the time just living their lives together. Their dynamic definitely helps to emphasise Luke’s more isolated experience, especially in the face of his expectations of making friends in the same way. The accuracy of the uni experience that this book conveys really made it hard for me at times to decide who was in the right and who was in the wrong. I adore moral ambiguity, and I felt sorry for both Luke and Phoebe at times when I knew that technically I should probably be judging them a little bit.
The things I enjoyed the most were actually the little details: the constant cups of tea; the weird ways in which drinks are mixed at pre’s (bathtubs, buckets and spades, washing up bowls- you name it, someone’s mixing vodka in it); Luke walking into the wrong lecture and just rolling with it. Silly things that made me giggle and say ‘yep, that sounds about right’. Luke and Phoebe study English, and so do I, so I must admit there were mentions of things that made me think ‘nooo I’m reading this for fun, please don’t remind me of the work I need to do !!!!!’ (*cough* Sir Gawain and the Green Knight *cough*), but for the most part I really enjoyed the similarities and things I could relate to regarding their course.
What I liked the most about this book is the emphasis on the fact that people are more than they appear. No matter what you think a person is like, they are still a person and have so much more under the surface than you can see from afar. I loved the fact that Phoebe realises this with Mary- whilst she is amazing once she gets to know her, it’s different than the character of her that the girls had previously created just from seeing her around. I wasn’t really a fan of the writing style I have to admit, sometimes things felt under-explained or unfinished and it meant I had to reread things at times in order for them to make sense. Despite this though I did really enjoy this book, and I want to try and read more YA books set at university because it’s not something I’ve come across that frequently. It was fun and easy to read, and it’s been on my shelf for bloody ages so I’m really happy I finally got round to reading it!!