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amethysthunter's reviews
381 reviews
Reel by Kennedy Ryan
- Strong character development? Yes
5.0
Stunning….Slight Black Evelyn Hugo hollywood vibes??
Stay True by Hua Hsu
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
5.0
Once in a while I stumble upon a rare book that makes me want to sink my teeth into its pages for as long as possible. Stay True elicited feelings of nostalgia and familiarity that I hadn't felt in a long time. It's at once an ode to a friend that Hsu lost to a tragic incident during his time in college, but at the same time a reflection and love letter to friendship and lessons he has learned during his youth. Its author Hua Hsu felt like an old friend who I was in conversation with, with him divulging secrets about themes like youth, grief, friendship, and the feeling of being in love with your moral compass.
Hsu, born in 1977, is a Taiwanese American kid raised in Cupertino with surprisingly open minded parents. Although Hua is shaped by his experiences attending Berkeley and existing in predominantly Asian spaces his entire life, and I was raised on the East Coast in the early 2000s and eventually went to a very white private college, our orientations towards the world felt eerily similar despite these differences.
Without forgetting that Hsu's prose is beautiful and worthy of praise in and of itself, he left me with some answers to questions I had been thinking about for a while...and some new questions. Should we offer higher education as the answer to low income communities even if it it just seeks to reproduce privilege? How do we find affiliation with those around us? What draws us to people? How do cynical people and those who remain open minded and innately good build and maintain fruitful friendship?
Hsu, born in 1977, is a Taiwanese American kid raised in Cupertino with surprisingly open minded parents. Although Hua is shaped by his experiences attending Berkeley and existing in predominantly Asian spaces his entire life, and I was raised on the East Coast in the early 2000s and eventually went to a very white private college, our orientations towards the world felt eerily similar despite these differences.
Without forgetting that Hsu's prose is beautiful and worthy of praise in and of itself, he left me with some answers to questions I had been thinking about for a while...and some new questions. Should we offer higher education as the answer to low income communities even if it it just seeks to reproduce privilege? How do we find affiliation with those around us? What draws us to people? How do cynical people and those who remain open minded and innately good build and maintain fruitful friendship?