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brisingr's review against another edition
4.0
I FREAKING LOVED THIS.
The characters are absolutely all likeable. I literally love all, even secondary ones, because this book doesn't leave them at just being secondary characters, but actually acknowledges that there are stories we might not know behind every personality.
Tom is my favourite, because he's such an edgy artist who wants to educate himself constantly and change the world, and it was beautiful. I also love that he honestly has nice things to say about people he fell out with, and he's actually lovely. He loves glitter! Come on!
They are all very open minded teens and it was beautiful to see this when YA is usually filled with dumb af teenagers.
Also this book contains discussions about gender issues, calls out misogyny and sexism and explores various sexualities and relationship types. It was brilliant.
It's a short one. Make yourself the favour of reading it. Surprisingly nice. I'm not that much of a music person, but if you're into that (making of music, old bands), then this book is even more for you.
The characters are absolutely all likeable. I literally love all, even secondary ones, because this book doesn't leave them at just being secondary characters, but actually acknowledges that there are stories we might not know behind every personality.
Tom is my favourite, because he's such an edgy artist who wants to educate himself constantly and change the world, and it was beautiful. I also love that he honestly has nice things to say about people he fell out with, and he's actually lovely. He loves glitter! Come on!
They are all very open minded teens and it was beautiful to see this when YA is usually filled with dumb af teenagers.
Also this book contains discussions about gender issues, calls out misogyny and sexism and explores various sexualities and relationship types. It was brilliant.
It's a short one. Make yourself the favour of reading it. Surprisingly nice. I'm not that much of a music person, but if you're into that (making of music, old bands), then this book is even more for you.
fatimareadsbooks's review against another edition
4.0
*Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.*
Okay, so, I read the synopsis of this book and thought, "Ooh look, a book with a love triangle!" I have nothing against love triangles, in fact, if written well, most of them are right up my alley! So when I got accepted for this book on NG, let's just say... I immediately delved into it. The love triangle totally turned out to be more than what I expected, which I'll be discussing below.
I started reading this book at 11 pm and finished at 2 am even though that was a TERRIBLE decision considering the fact that I had school in three hours. Like, I didn't even notice the book go by - not once did I check which page I was on! That's how much I enjoyed this book.
Each character had such a unique & distinctive voice and the POVs alternatively switched between the three of them in a very well-paced manner. This pleased me... a lot! Also, the characters' personalities were amazing! Their evolution throughout the story was definitively something to read. Ramona was cheerful and quirky, Sam was adorable and soft-spoken, and Tom was just such a driven character!
This book turned out to be more than just a love triangle, I won't be spoiling, but there was such a positive outlook on so many things! The relationships, the experimental music...etc. There are many small and realistic life lessons hidden within the book, and many of them really resounded through me.
Part of what made this book such an enjoyable page-turner is the writing itself. The prose was beautiful and the metaphors had me rereading half the paragraphs again. The descriptions were flawless & flowed smoothly; they effortlessly allowed the reader to get an idea of what's going on without being excessive. It was just fantastic.
Overall, this was such a refreshing change from other books in the genre. This book had such a positive outlook of many things in life not usually reflected in typical YA books such as high school, relationships, and love. If you like reading atypical YA Contemporary books, then this book is for you. (Haha, that was accidental, but I'll go with it.)
Okay, so, I read the synopsis of this book and thought, "Ooh look, a book with a love triangle!" I have nothing against love triangles, in fact, if written well, most of them are right up my alley! So when I got accepted for this book on NG, let's just say... I immediately delved into it. The love triangle totally turned out to be more than what I expected, which I'll be discussing below.
I started reading this book at 11 pm and finished at 2 am even though that was a TERRIBLE decision considering the fact that I had school in three hours. Like, I didn't even notice the book go by - not once did I check which page I was on! That's how much I enjoyed this book.
Each character had such a unique & distinctive voice and the POVs alternatively switched between the three of them in a very well-paced manner. This pleased me... a lot! Also, the characters' personalities were amazing! Their evolution throughout the story was definitively something to read. Ramona was cheerful and quirky, Sam was adorable and soft-spoken, and Tom was just such a driven character!
This book turned out to be more than just a love triangle, I won't be spoiling, but there was such a positive outlook on so many things! The relationships, the experimental music...etc. There are many small and realistic life lessons hidden within the book, and many of them really resounded through me.
Part of what made this book such an enjoyable page-turner is the writing itself. The prose was beautiful and the metaphors had me rereading half the paragraphs again. The descriptions were flawless & flowed smoothly; they effortlessly allowed the reader to get an idea of what's going on without being excessive. It was just fantastic.
Overall, this was such a refreshing change from other books in the genre. This book had such a positive outlook of many things in life not usually reflected in typical YA books such as high school, relationships, and love. If you like reading atypical YA Contemporary books, then this book is for you. (Haha, that was accidental, but I'll go with it.)
adam_cherry's review
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
Poly rep!
maya_b's review
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
This book started to adorable, and I really fell in love with the characters instantly. Or it took me a few pages, but as soon as I saw Ramona through Sam's eyes, I just loved her and her open behaviour and I thought the three of them were so cute! I was grinning the whole time during the first half of the book, just because the three of them made me so happy, and I was really sure I'd love everything, especially after there was even some ace representation in it (really great, didn't expect it!), but sadly it kind of fell short towards the end, and only fell shorter the closer the ending came.
The ace rep made me really happy, but I didn't really like, how it was depicted as something strange. Or it felt like it was still depicted as something strange.And I really hated how after Sara reacted so horrible about this, Tom still tried to be her friend. I wanted to see her realizing she was in the wrong or him cutting her out, but this just didn't feel right. (Same for Ramona not wanting to touch Tom for a while, I wish it could have been all happy instead of just obvious that it willbe happy at some point.)
Also the ending didn't really feel right to me. I actually liked most of it(and I was really happy for all of them) , but there were just some things that didn't really work. A lot of things just feel unfinished, and like I was supposed to know more but didn't, and the last chapter was good, it was just ... I expected more, I think. It felt a little to "silent" while reading, but I can't really say why.
(And the different layouts didn't work for me either, sadly. I got the reasons behind those choices, it just felt a little random all the time (except for the part about dyslexia, I totally got why there).)
But even if I disliked a lot of things in the second half, I really loved the first, and I did like the overall story and how Tom, Sam and Ramona just worked it out. The interactions between them all or just two of them always felt great and real, and it did feel like real friendship and love, and I really loved all of that. I just wish we could have had just these friendship/love-scenes, and not the drama towards the end.
Although I will say I really appreciated how Ramona tried to work it out with Emmalyn, that was a nice choice.
In conclusion, I don't think it was a bad book, and the ideas were probably all great, it was just a little dissapointing in the execution.
The ace rep made me really happy, but I didn't really like, how it was depicted as something strange. Or it felt like it was still depicted as something strange.
Also the ending didn't really feel right to me. I actually liked most of it
(And the different layouts didn't work for me either, sadly. I got the reasons behind those choices, it just felt a little random all the time (except for the part about dyslexia, I totally got why there).)
Although I will say I really appreciated how Ramona tried to work it out with Emmalyn, that was a nice choice.
In conclusion, I don't think it was a bad book, and the ideas were probably all great, it was just a little dissapointing in the execution.
yuuto's review against another edition
2.0
I’ll say that I certainly wasn’t expecting asexual representation in this book, so that was a nice surprise! Otherwise…none of the characters were very endearing, and this could have been great polycule rep, yet it felt more like the guys were just sharing a girlfriend. And hey, maybe that’s how some polycules function, but to me, it just felt like a big meh.
thepaperreels's review
2.0
Although there are some good aspects in this book I really can't deny that this is like my worst nightmare.
This is the first novel I read about Laura Nowlin although I seen her name before and was planning to read her other book. I really like her writing, and sadly that is the only thing I can say about this novel. Oh and I appreciated the book's effort to explore asexuality although it failed miserably. The love triangle was just.. a mess.
It really dragged, it keeps readers reading because it will make you believe that there will be like a big revelation or something important will happen but sadly, that didn't happen at all. I was bored and I was just pissed because the girl is just annoying and the other guys came out as crybois instead of swoony and charming. I did not like anyone at all. Plus, this book is filled with such music snobbery that it makes me wanna throw it. Yes, things like that makes me a violent person.
sparklemaia's review against another edition
3.0
This was cute. The story was told from three perspectives -- Ramona's, Sam's, and Tom's -- and it treated them pretty equally in terms of protagonists and character development. All three had side arcs that involved their relationships with other people (parents, classmates, friends) and figuring out how to pursue their own individual interests despite others' expectations for them. Tom was insufferably pretentious at first, but he did experience a LITTLE bit of character growth, although it didn't stick as well as I'd hoped. Ramona was pretty manic pixie dream girl-esque, but I could also see a lot of myself in her, and she didn't exist exclusively to further a male protagonist's emotional growth. She was repeatedly described as "fun and funny" instead of the author just, like, SHOWING that she is those things. Sam was kind of boring. I did appreciate the representation of asexuality and polyamory, although I kind of wanted the characters to know a little more about both. Teenagers have access to the internet and are consequently often very well-informed about this stuff, and I would have liked for them to be a little more knowledgeable and confident about who they are, even if it was just represented during their internal narration.