A review by dejnozkova
Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf

emotional reflective relaxing sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated

3.25

From the beginning I really wanted to LOVE this book because it’s this bittersweet but wholesome story about two old people who join together to keep each other company and grow into gentle companions. I loved the conversations they would have about the heavy things they experienced earlier in life and how they learned to understand each other. I think my expectations are what kinda ruined it for me slightly though, because I was hoping for a deeper study of their characters and how their pasts affect their current behaviors and was hoping it would dive just a little deeper. But instead of a heavy, emotional character study with a deeper message it turned out to feel more like a slice-of-life piece, which is totally fine if that’s more your vibe, but I think it made it a little more boring for me once I realized it wasn’t going to delve deeper. 

I was very much enraged about the attitudes of Addie’s son towards the relationship between this elderly couple. I really hope that this attitude that older people having relationships is wrong is a rarity because it came off majorly fucked up and unfair to me. So I do appreciate that this story was able to elicit some kind of emotional response for me, but it didn’t touch my heart quite like I was hoping for it to. It had moments but otherwise it was not quite for me I don’t think 🤷🏼‍♀️