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transparent_tea 's review for:

Run Away with Me by Brian Selznick
3.0
adventurous lighthearted reflective fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Is it reading if a third of the book is illustrations? (This makes sense once you get to June 11, 1986, titled "The Empty City".)

As the synopsis stated, the reader follows a boy who's in Rome for the summer (along with his mother, because of an important gig she picked up) and falls in love for the first time with a complete stranger, another boy who's about the same age as him. This boy, we get to know him as Danny. This stranger, Angelo, apparently knows the city like the back of his hand and gives Danny a trip he'll never forget.

What I did enjoy was how many parallel same-sex relationships made an appearance in this novel. They weren't written as a parallel, star-crossed lovers between Danny/Angelo, but highlighting that a male/male relationship isn't as uncommon as you think. (I mean, having the Monda brothers be the main story feels like an echo of American censorship of Sailor Uranus/Neptune being cousins.)

The story gives a sense of live the moment while you can, and there's always a happy ending. Even though the ending stopped right before Danny leaves back to America, the sketches afterwards could imply that they will meet again in the near future and continue what they created during this summer.