lespetitesdents's reviews
59 reviews

Few voices have touched me the way that Ocean Vuong’s has with this incredibly beautiful book. What a brilliant body of poetic prose. Thank you.

I found this to be a quick and enjoyable read. Although it was a little “cringey” at times, and could have been a little more refined, it was an interesting experience overall and the novel accomplished what it seems to have set out to accomplish. Those who are complaining the story has been left unresolved are very clearly missing the point.

This novel made me viscerally angry at times and was difficult to get through. I approached it with inaccurate expectations and felt a little confused by the way it unfolded. I started out hating the protagonist, her selfish and reckless behaviour and complete lack of regard for the people in her life. As I arrived at the meat of the story I realized why and how she got to be so intolerable. From there, I somewhat enjoyed it up until the last third when it became excruciatingly unbearable. I grew extremely tired of reading about unhealthy obsession after unhealthy obsession, it was painful to read. I understand that this shows the nature of addiction and proclivity to relapse but it was just so tired and extremely dull to get through.

As someone with a mother and background somewhat similar to this protagonist’s, I understand the impact that this has on one’s life and mental health, but I could not relate in the slightest to her behaviour, decisions, or way of thinking. She reminded me of a toxic friend who had an extremely negative impact on my life and well-being, who destroys and disregards everyone around her, and it was quite triggering. The character made no significant development by the end of it, one line of text indicating she had is not at all the type of epiphany this painfully chaotic story required to indicate growth. Without real growth, the whole story is just trainwreck porn and not anything worth reading.