I think this book was incredibly well done, I was just not the target audience. I found myself getting bored with the detailed descriptions brain surgery and medical procedures. But I did think it was really well written and a very worthwhile read. I especially appreciated how the neurosurgery was described in a way that made it easy to understand and follow, even for people with no experience in the field (outside of McDreamy from Grey's Anatomy).

I would highly recommend this to anyone with even a passing curiosity about brain surgery, but perhaps not the people like me who are just looking for an interesting memoir about someone's life.

I was hoping this was going to be a fun drama, but it tried to deal with a lot of sensitive issues and didn't necessarily deal with them all particularly well. The book needed to be a lot more nuanced to handle adult/teen relationships, mental disorders, abuse, and of course antisemitism well. The easiest example of this is Gretchen starting the book literally believing that Jews are subhuman (her words) and then recanting on this the first time a Jew is actually present in the story. I just needed more for those parts of the story to work.

I would have preferred this more as a fun drama that didn't deal with sensitive topics. But I did wind up having a good time while reading this and appreciated that the romance wasn't instalove (even if it wasn't my favorite). And I liked the historical accuracy surrounding Eva Braun and Angela Raubal.

I will be picking up the sequel and I'm looking forward to it, but I don't think this is a book I'd be recommending, although I can see how some people would really enjoy it.

I will admit this was probably my favorite book after the first one, but that's still a very low bar. I don't like this series. I wish I wasn't such a completionist so I didn't feel the urge to keep going, but I'm relieved that it's the last for now, even though it ended on a cliffhanger with the implication of more. And I will say that under David Lagercrantz's writing, Lisbeth and Blomkvist are different characters. You can definitely see a difference in their personalities under a new author.

I don't like the writing. There's rampant sexism (that's unintentional, not the intentional discussion on sexism I know these books include). Fetishization of violence against women. Flat characters. Convoluted plots. Illogical jumps. I am not a fan.

But there must be something in these books other people like, so maybe I'm just missing what makes them so great.

This is just one of those books that's so lovely I can't imagine anyone not enjoying it. I've reread it at least three times since I first read it for a dystopian unit in high school, and I will probably reread it some more in the future. It's a simplistic, beautiful children's story and for the first time I'm going to read the entire series.

Highly, highly recommend this book to anyone who has managed to avoid it thus far.

The white savior trope was strong in this book. And it was even called out by one of the characters and the main character got pissed about being called racist (no one called him racist). But not in a self aware way. This very much came across as self insert hero fantasy. Also the pacing was really bad. Dramatic events would happen but only get a few sentences of description, and it happened enough that it was really irritating. And speaking of irritating, I couldn't stand the main character. I don't understand why he was the main character. He didn't really do anything. His role could have been condensed into thirty pages and used the extra space to expand upon the previously mentioned dramatic events that didn't get enough time.

I really didn't enjoy this, and after looking up Corban Addison's other books, they all appear to heavily feature the white savior trope, so I won't be checking them out.

My thoughts on this are pretty similar to the previous book, Prisoner of Night and Fog. It doesn't feel like it has the depth to tackle some of the issues it tries to (antisemitism, politics, mental illness), but it's an enjoyable ride. I do think that the first book was stronger and I was much more invested in that story. The mystery and plot of this felt a little shoehorned in. But I still gave it three stars and I think if you like the first one, you'll enjoy this as well. Very glad I read both of these.

This is a reread.

I can't even articulate why I love this book so much. It didn't make me cry, but I was literally on the verge of tears for the entire book, from about page three until the end. Ruby is such a realistic teenager. It reminds me a lot of The Princess Diaries in terms of voice and even plot, only I feel like this holds up for adults. There's a realness and down to earth-ness that makes this charming and utteraly heart wrenching. It's so small in scale that it's hard not to be touched because it feels real. Like a real girl whose mother has just died and has to go meet her father for the first time, and I just utterly adore it.

It's written in verse almost like diary entries, so this book isn't for everyone. You need to be able to enjoy realistic teen angst, although I do think this book is more self aware than something like The Princess Diaries. It's happy and sad and funny and real, and I just love it so much.

I really love this book. Every time I read it I just cry my eyes out. But honestly, it's not well written. I actually think it's pretty poorly written. It feels so flatly melodramatic. The characters feel like caricatures more than real people and half the time the dialogue is just absurd. So I can see why people would hate this. I just can't. I enjoy it so much. The story gets to me every single time. I thought about giving this three stars, but I genuinely spent two thirds of this book crying and I couldn't justify rating it lower than four stars when it hit me that hard emotionally. It's all the little things, like when she says she put on Gerry's robe but it's lost his smell or when she's half asleep and rolls over to ask him to turn off the light. Bawled my eyes out and will probably continue rereading this every few years.

I was torn between giving this book three or four stars, but ultimately it was a three star read for me. I was incredibly surprised by how easy of a read this was, and I think it's accessibility is one of the best aspects of this. I'd highly recommend this to anyone who wants to learn a bit more about the Middle East, refugees, or really just wants to try getting into nonfiction.

However, I did wind up thinking that the writing was not particularly great (although not terrible either) and the story lacked a certain amount of depth that I appreciate in memoirs. It was descriptive without being very analytical, and I did wind up wanting more from it. Overall, a worthwhile read, but I don't think one that will be sticking with me.

Honestly, I didn't love this. I thought was a fine book, but not really much more than that. I never really clicked with the writing style and it just felt too young. I've read books narrated by children before where there's somewhat of an adult theme behind the childish voice, but I didn't get that so much with this. I almost wish it had been written for nine year olds because I think I might have liked it more. I just wound up feeling kind of disappointed. It wasn't bad, but not for me.

I can see how this story might have worked better in a movie format and I'm really excited to eventually see the movie.