Review by crufts - Nick and Charlie

crufts 's review for:

Nick and Charlie by Alice Oseman

4.25

dark emotional hopeful sad tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

A short story in the Solitaire/Heartstopper/etc universe. Occurs roughly three years after the Heartstopper comic series begins, or two years after This Winter and Solitaire, but ends before the conclusion of Radio Silence.

For two years, Nick Nelson and Charlie Spring have been the quintessential highschool couple.

Once upon a time, Charlie was the weird gay kid in school, Nick had just figured out that he was bisexual, and both were afraid for anyone to know that they were dating. But things have changed. Charlie has become Head Boy of the junior year, Nick is finishing his senior year and is excited to go to university, and everyone at school knows they're a couple.
It should be perfect. Charlie should be happy for Nick, going away to university and studying what he wants to study. And yet...

Like the other short story (This Winter), there is only one main conflict, but it's an interesting one and was explored well: When one half of a couple moves away, is it inevitable that they break up?
The novel had a good sense of pacing and change, hit all the important highs and lows of a short-story structure, and carried my attention to the very end. I never felt like the story dragged or was waffling through filler.

Also similar to This Winter was the alternating change of viewpoint between Charlie and Nick. I especially liked seeing Nick's viewpoint because he's not the author's average protagonist: he's kind of blokey, he likes sports, he doesn't care for social media, and he's more likely to get angry than sad.
I think you can tell when an author loves a character, and when you read Nick's first-person narration, I can see that the author loves him just as much as Charlie even if he's not her typical style of protagonist.

Another treat in this novel was the illustrations, which are drawn in the same style as the Heartstopper webcomic. It's always a delight to see a scene the way the author visualizes it.

I also liked how Charlie's distaste towards university was expressed. I was previously frustrated with this theme in Radio Silence (review linked here) because I couldn't relate. But the way it was expressed here felt a lot more reasonable, as Charlie explains why he hates the idea of university so much:

I hate hearing Nick talk about university. I'm a horrible person ... But lately he's been talking about it all the time. And every single time he mentions it, it just reminds me that ... I'm getting left behind.

Finally, the ending scene was so sweet it made me cry, and the illustrations elevated it further. Curse, you Alice Oseman! How dare you write such a touching story!

It's hard to find anything to complain about in Nick and Charlie. But near the conclusion of this ending scene where Nick and Charlie are

looking at photos together

, several actions are vaguely told, instead of being explicitly shown.
For example:

Occasionally we get to one [photo] that reminds us of an old day out and we stop and talk about it and remember, remember the silly dates we've been on and the terrible ones and the great ones, the repetitive days we spend indoors and outdoors, at school and at home.

Since this was the climactic ending scene, I felt this was a real waste: instead of continuing the beautiful cinematic descriptions and seeing the characters clearly, we suddenly get this vaguer, blurrier part which isn't explicitly described.
Even so, this was a very minor complaint and I still thought it was an excellent novel overall.

I would definitely recommend this book to people who enjoyed Heartstopper, Solitaire, or the other short story This Winter. (See my review of This Winter here.)

Content Warnings