i'm gonna be perfectly honest: i would not have finished this book if my mom and i hadn't been in the car for so long with nothing better to do. i felt frustrated with it from the beginning, with the ridiculously long and unnecessary descriptions of nature, the lack of a central plot or likable characters, and kya (the main character) herself. she was like a manic pixie marsh girl: quiet and mysterious, but beautiful and strong and somehow a genius (she learns to read when she's 14 and is awarded an honorary doctorate by the end of the book). she always quotes poetry out loud, speaks in a very soft voice, and is shown as someone who's "not like other girls" (one of my least favorite tropes in the whole world). besides the fact that i never cared what happened to kya, i also didn't care about the plot. the "twist" (which both my mom and i called from the beginning) was in the last five minutes of the audiobook (DO NOT listen to this book. the voices and accents made my ears BLEED) and was so underwhelming i didn't care about it. i was so happy when it was finally over, but felt like i wasted my time. bonus: the last sentence of the book ends with a reference to the title of the book itself. so cliche and cringey.

i never want to think about this book again, but i know it, and it's lack of awareness, tact and clarity, will haunt me for a while.