A review by gadicohen93
At Swim, Two Boys by Jamie O'Neill

4.0

I hesitated to give this book four stars. For one, parts of it were incredibly hard to get through: The Irish dialect shaped the syntax and the diction in every way imaginable, and O'Neil seemed to want to investigate every character in a sometimes long-winded manner. I also felt uncomfortable when characters did or said things that pushed the boundary, that seemed uncharacteristic, that confused me. I also felt like Jim was a little boring as protagonist--sort of like Harry Potter, an aimless, hesitant, bland character, though brave. (That's not to say that his development as a person wasn't fascinating, because it was--the way he grew to accept himself was realistic and beautiful.) The sex scenes also seemed weird to me, probably because I've never encountered gay sex in literature before.

I loved Jim's relationship with Doyler. I loved the way O'Neil handled sexuality. I loved the language and I loved the characters.

The ending was what pushed me over the edge from three to four. So hard-hitting.