sarah2438's reviews
1046 reviews

I don't see myself loving this book, and I'm really trying to have a higher average rating this year with more DNFs. I'm also looking to pare down my physical TBR. The tone feels a bit detached and I'm not excited about the magical doorways-- reviews I've read think that's a very weak component. 

Very solid 4 stars. I can see why people love it so much. I think maybe it was a little too long-- it's hard to sustain that romantic tension for 400 pages when the chapters from the past are interspersed, and having so many of those chapters from when they were kids almost made it feel a little YA, like The Summer I Turned Pretty. But the writing was still very fun and overall I had a great time.
One thing we need to talk about though:

It totally seems like Emma roofied, or at least r@ped, Elliott???

These books have gotten so predictable and repetitive. I think I'm done.

Not what I expected, and I can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing. For one, I don't know that I would classify this as horror. It certainly has some horrific elements and scenes, but the pacing is generally very slow, with absolutely no suspense, and there are times when it's borderline cozy fantasy. (That's definitely not the right genre but more accurate than horror for a good 50% of the book.) It's really just in the last hundred or so pages that the pace finally picks up, and then we're cramming a whole lot of action into every page. I'm not sure if I would recommend this because it feels like you invest a lot of time (the older writing style is hard to push through, as well as the awkwardly large format of the physical copy) and I'm still a bit dubious about the payoff.

Also, there's something so disappointing about bad people twisting someone to make them evil, and then feeling justified in believing that person was always evil. It took away the satisfaction when she started getting her revenge.

This was pretty wholesome and cute. But for some reason, probably because my brain is a lil too twisted, I kept thinking there was gonna be a murder? I 100% knew it was a cozy magical realism book. And yet...
Anyway, I feel like we also have to acknowledge that Jack would get REALLY annoying, quickly. But I salute Shaffer for writing a child that I didn't dislike- often they come off too obnoxious or cartoony, but I liked Christopher. Lucy was also a sweetheart, even if it did take me a bit to get past the awkwardness of having a thing with someone who met her when she was a child...
Also, I don't really understand the slight twist toward the end- just to play on our heartstrings? Anyway, that's enough rambling for now. Maybe I'll have more nuanced opinions in the morning...

I don't rate memoirs unless they're 5 stars because I feel uncomfortable rating someone's story, even while I try to maintain the distinction between rating HOW something is written versus WHAT is being written. But with that disclaimer aside, this book is still a stunning 5 stars. I am blown away by the way she peels back the curtains on DV in LGBT (primarily lesbian) relationships and writes about her personal experiences in a way that cannot be described as anything less than poetry. The setup is maybe a little fractured, with there being 5 parts but sections only being about 1-3 pages, but that mildly-fractured way of storytelling worked perfectly for the content. Highly, highly recommend.

Highly recommend, the only thing holding me back from 5 stars is that ending. But this is a very good novella, and I say that as someone who's generally not a fan of them.

Fun but ultimately unremarkable. It was a little disappointing how, several times, characters made less conventional choices (not wanting to date, not wanting to get married, not wanting to have kids) only to cave to cultural norms in the end. Not every single person has to be married with kids to have their happily ever after.

Wow, what an incredible disappointment.
There was so much potential in the first 150 pages or so. And then it all just torpedoed into the ground with that dumb romance. For what? For what??? All of the twists were so dumb. I would guess the twist and say "no, that's too obvious. It has to be something else." And then I'd come up with something better than the book and be disappointed. What a waste of potential here.
Realistically speaking this book is probably more mediocre than bad but the disappointment just makes it so much worse. The writing is intriguing at times but it's just not worth it.

I just can't get into her style anymore. Not for me.