A review by nixiethepixie
My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

adventurous emotional reflective slow-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

4.0

read this over two chunks of time over three months (felt longer), but mostly spent time with it over the past two days gunning through half the book. i finally get it - it took me time to warm into the world, characters and vignetted storytelling, but once you're in you're certainly in, and I'm keen to adventure onto book two which i hear is even more brilliant. the narrative voice, the relationship, observations, the insights. i have no opinions which i hadn't already heard, but i just love that this exists. the things i'm most struck by in this book is the push and pull of the friendship, and the way in which both don't seem to be able to thrive at once. how we can know our friends, but never truly know anyone. and the tender and brutal unfurling of learning more about the only world you know, and how expectation can shatter with life and reality. onto the next - i'm excited!