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A review by stuckinafictionaluniverse
Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta
5.0
Saving Francesca is the first book I read in 2014, and it sure set the bar high.
Nearly 90 books later, and it remains my favorite of the year. So in honor of the Christmas spirit, I'm finally reviewing it. And boy, is it difficult to explain my feelings on this book.
I don't know how she does it. I don't know how Melina Marchetta can create stories with such amazing characters and write so beautifully; strike me with tragic and heartbreakingly real moments, so I can grin like an idiot because of a ridiculous joke the next minute.
Saving Francesca has the same depth and incredible realism as her Printz-award winning novel; the author takes a plot that appears to be relatively simple and turns it into something unbelievable.
I read my first Marchetta book about three years ago and still - after trying several other contemporary YA books - I've never read anything quite like her work.
It all starts when Francesca’s do-it-all mother Mia doesn’t get out of bed one day. The same thing happens the next day, and the next and the one after that.
Francesca and her family are used to her mother taking care of everything, and now have to learn to work together and try to help her. But how do you help someone who is so close, yet so far away?
They’re helpless and lost without Mia Spinelli.
Saving Francesca portrays mental illness with great honesty without becoming too heavy or sentimental.
The depression belongs to all of us. I think of the family down the road whose mother was having a baby and they went around the neighborhood saying, "We're pregnant." I want to go around the neighborhood saying, "We're depressed." If my mum can't get out of bed in the morning, all of us feel the same. Her silence has become ours, and it's eating us alive.
None of the characters are one-dimensional. They all have their issues, the traits that would normally make you hate them, as well as the things that make them lovable.
I have yet to meet someone like them in real life, but at the same time I feel like it wouldn't be necessary. Because when reading this book, I knew them. I felt them as if they were sitting right beside me, and I loved them to pieces.
Francesca is a stunning narrator. She is a realistic teenager who doesn't know where she's standing in life, and she has to figure this out during the course of the novel. Her voice is strong and relatable.
Francesca's group of friends are an unlikely mix, and lovely all the same. Their jokes, silliness and ultimately their silent understanding really lifted the book for me.
The one flaw I can think of is the love interest, who wasn't as fleshed out as the other characters. And Will may not be the best, but he has his charming moments.
“Do you think people have noticed that I'm around?”
“I notice when you're not. Does that count?”
The prose is beautiful, with a sad tone that made me want to cry, mixed with reminders of the small things in life that keep us going here and there. I want to quote this book all day. This next one might be my favorite:
It's a weird smile, but it reaches his eyes and I bottle it. And I put it in my ammo pack that's kept right next to my soul and Justine's spirit and Siobhan's hope and Tara's passions. Because if I'm going to wake up one morning and not be able to get out of bed, I'm going to need everything I've got to fight this disease that could be sleeping inside of me.
I've always preferred when a novel is at least 300 pages long. It takes me 300 pages to truly get to know the characters - to be able to feel for them, forgive them for the mistakes they've made, to understand them.
Now I've come to find out that this is not the case with some books. Truly talented authors make you attached to these personalities, then slowly you start to understand them.
In just 200 pages, Saving Francesca affected me immensely. Melina Marchetta is one of those writers who can make their characters come alive on the page.
When you close the book, they linger. And you feel a little less lonely than you were when starting the book. I want to put these people in my pocket and carry them around, so Justine Kalinsky can play saxophone for me; Siobhan rant about feminism; Jimmy Hailler and I could discuss fantasy books and Tom Mackee would jam out to some great music.
Final verdict:
This book brought me so much joy and sadness, laughter and heartbreak. I go back and read short passages from it, both when I'm feeling down and when I'm bursting with happiness. I love it fiercely.
P.S: Tomas Mackee. That boy is everything, everything.
Nearly 90 books later, and it remains my favorite of the year. So in honor of the Christmas spirit, I'm finally reviewing it. And boy, is it difficult to explain my feelings on this book.
I don't know how she does it. I don't know how Melina Marchetta can create stories with such amazing characters and write so beautifully; strike me with tragic and heartbreakingly real moments, so I can grin like an idiot because of a ridiculous joke the next minute.
Saving Francesca has the same depth and incredible realism as her Printz-award winning novel; the author takes a plot that appears to be relatively simple and turns it into something unbelievable.
I read my first Marchetta book about three years ago and still - after trying several other contemporary YA books - I've never read anything quite like her work.
It all starts when Francesca’s do-it-all mother Mia doesn’t get out of bed one day. The same thing happens the next day, and the next and the one after that.
Francesca and her family are used to her mother taking care of everything, and now have to learn to work together and try to help her. But how do you help someone who is so close, yet so far away?
They’re helpless and lost without Mia Spinelli.
Saving Francesca portrays mental illness with great honesty without becoming too heavy or sentimental.
The depression belongs to all of us. I think of the family down the road whose mother was having a baby and they went around the neighborhood saying, "We're pregnant." I want to go around the neighborhood saying, "We're depressed." If my mum can't get out of bed in the morning, all of us feel the same. Her silence has become ours, and it's eating us alive.
None of the characters are one-dimensional. They all have their issues, the traits that would normally make you hate them, as well as the things that make them lovable.
I have yet to meet someone like them in real life, but at the same time I feel like it wouldn't be necessary. Because when reading this book, I knew them. I felt them as if they were sitting right beside me, and I loved them to pieces.
Francesca is a stunning narrator. She is a realistic teenager who doesn't know where she's standing in life, and she has to figure this out during the course of the novel. Her voice is strong and relatable.
Francesca's group of friends are an unlikely mix, and lovely all the same. Their jokes, silliness and ultimately their silent understanding really lifted the book for me.
The one flaw I can think of is the love interest, who wasn't as fleshed out as the other characters. And Will may not be the best, but he has his charming moments.
“Do you think people have noticed that I'm around?”
“I notice when you're not. Does that count?”
The prose is beautiful, with a sad tone that made me want to cry, mixed with reminders of the small things in life that keep us going here and there. I want to quote this book all day. This next one might be my favorite:
It's a weird smile, but it reaches his eyes and I bottle it. And I put it in my ammo pack that's kept right next to my soul and Justine's spirit and Siobhan's hope and Tara's passions. Because if I'm going to wake up one morning and not be able to get out of bed, I'm going to need everything I've got to fight this disease that could be sleeping inside of me.
I've always preferred when a novel is at least 300 pages long. It takes me 300 pages to truly get to know the characters - to be able to feel for them, forgive them for the mistakes they've made, to understand them.
Now I've come to find out that this is not the case with some books. Truly talented authors make you attached to these personalities, then slowly you start to understand them.
In just 200 pages, Saving Francesca affected me immensely. Melina Marchetta is one of those writers who can make their characters come alive on the page.
When you close the book, they linger. And you feel a little less lonely than you were when starting the book. I want to put these people in my pocket and carry them around, so Justine Kalinsky can play saxophone for me; Siobhan rant about feminism; Jimmy Hailler and I could discuss fantasy books and Tom Mackee would jam out to some great music.
Final verdict:
This book brought me so much joy and sadness, laughter and heartbreak. I go back and read short passages from it, both when I'm feeling down and when I'm bursting with happiness. I love it fiercely.
P.S: Tomas Mackee. That boy is everything, everything.