A review by softpastelpages
The Hottest State by Ethan Hawke

3.5

Admittedly I read this to feed my Ethan Hawke obsession, as someone who loves his movies I was interested to see what his writing was like. I found his writing to be surprisingly good for an actor. I was hoping this book would be like the Before trilogy that he starred in and although I could definitely see some similarities this had a darker, less hopeful tone to it.

We follow William who falls in love with Sarah and we begin to see how all consuming first love can be and all the complicated feelings that come with it. I found William to be a hopeless romantic but also deeply narcissistic, I’m not sure if he was meant to be that way but that’s how I viewed him throughout most of the book. The relationship between the two characters wasn’t healthy despite how much William romanticised Sarah which made it feel like a true, relatable romance story.

I am looking forward to reading more by Ethan Hawke!