ellaellaellaetc's Reviews (494)

 yay!! I have finally read all the sally rooney's published books!!!! ngl, at the start, I wasn't a big fan of this. like I was just very indifferent and thought I would just rate it like 3 stars and move on. but by the end. I mean. a lot of people criticise sally rooney's writing because she just uses her characters as mouthpieces for her own thoughts but like???? I don't see a problem with that??? I like reading people having conversations and sharing opinions and changing each other's minds and disagreeing??? like this is clearly what she set out to do I don't know why people are upset about it. anyway, if you are one of those people who doesn't like her writing because of that, DEFINITELY do not read this book lmao. it's literally just the characters writing emails and having conversations about various topics. and I loved it. this book is truly just about how at the end of the day, humans just love each other. they love talking, they love hanging out, they love their friends, they love their partners, and sometimes, you don't need a reason to do something or waste time, you can just do it because you want to, joy is okay! peace is okay! beauty is okay! that's enough!!!!! I think I wouldn't have enjoyed this if I read this before my trip, this trip has definitely taught me that relaxation, fun and being stress-free is GOOD. I don't need to be doing things all the time, I can just enjoy life, I don't think I would have resonated with this book as much if I hadn't reached this point. however, wasn't a big fan of the ending/almost epilogue???? didn't need to bring up the pandemic especially cause it's mentioned so off hand at the very end, would have been better without it. plus the slow start but I think it's necessary for the book but also boring. anyway, 4.5 stars 

 this was a really odd book!!!!! like just odd. but was rockin wit the odd weird girl vibes until the end where it seemed like the author was trying to give a message with the story and j wasn't really interested in that and j didn't really understand it, I kind just wanted the weird vibes but okay. still quite enjoyable 3.5 stars 

dnf-ing at 59% of the way through this (isn't that amazing that I don't feel that I have to force my way through books that Idon't want to finish anymore??? slay!) this was just quite a depressing story that kind of jumped all over the place and I didn't really feel hooked, only had two days left on my library loan and not really something I'm interest in finsihing that badly, not a bad book though and I might have finished it if I read it at a different point in my life but idrc right now

You seriously cannot write a series with lots of time skips if you're not going to have the characters mature AT ALL. cause this is the 3rd book I can't really review it without going into spoilers so I will just say that this book made me hate all of these characters. while their childish drama was fun in the first book, the characters have aged almost 4 years since the summer I turned pretty however belly is still just as self righteous and self important as ever and her flip flopping between jeremiah and conrad got very old and isn't very compelling, it began very hard to root for her as a protagonist when the stakes were that high. also, the not like other girls-ness managed to persist! how lovely 🙄🙄 I honestly could not take "TAYLOR LOVES MAKEUP ugh, couldn't be me, I hate that stuff, but ig I'll let her d it for me because she insists, I hate it though 🥰🥰" fucking hell. I hate it when girls in fiction have to hate the idea of all things feminine but then get make-overed or are forced to wear nice or "slutty" clothes so that the reader can enjoy seeing the self-insert main character in a pretty dress without wanting it so that THEY don't feel like one of those bitchy girlie girls who have the audacity to care about their appearance.you should only look pretty against your will. UGH jenny han I've had enough!!

WHAT THE FUCK😭😭😭😭 jeremiah sleeping with someone else when then we're "on a break" was a dick move, especially since he didn't tell her about it and belly had a right to be upset but wtf??? I thought him proposing to say sorry (ig that's what that was??) was going to be proof that Jeremiah is not right for belly and doesn't understand her needs but no???? this is the whole plot of the story??? what???? her mum says that they're too young to marry and then belly gets upset like an actual child.

it is so annoying to read about belly acting so petulant the entire time. the only upside was I love seeing taylor, she was an amazing friend. I don't even want to comment on the rest of the story, I hated it but I'm glad that it was short and that it was easy to read, that's genuinely all it has going for it. this did not need to be a trilogy and if she really wanted to make it three books, it would have worked out so much better for the story each book was just them going back to cousins every year. I hated this. will still definitely watch the show though! I really enjoyed all the changes they made in season one and I hope they continue with that trend lol 1.25 stars

wow wow wow!!! I would definitely recommend this book for people who would call themselves "chronically online" in the book world/publishing industry and have seen the past few years of discourse. even if this doesn't describe you, I highly recommend this!! I feel very similarly about this as I do for self care by leigh stein. I guess this makes sense as they're both satires on different industries (publishing and the other is ig self care and like, "girlbossing") in that it brought up a lot of interesting topics but those topics and themes weren't really explored that well, however, I ended up getting a lot from these two books as the things themes they discussed were a great jumping off point for conversation and critical thinking, so how good is the book actually if it didn't even do all the work😭😭 but also I got lots from it despite that so???? idk. I think this book really is a perfect and frightening look at reality however I was a bit let down by the ending. this is definitely going to be a book that really stays with me and the reading experience was definitely enhanced by going to one of RF Kuang's talks/discussions about this book and her past work. This book only came out a days ago and I am genuinely really excited to see what people have to say, I think the conversations that this book starts up will be extremely interesting and my rating of this will probably change in the future depending on the conversations I have with other people and the discourse I see online, this book is definitely one to be talked about and studied carefully!!! 4.5 stars, for now

 finished this in one sitting yesterday and wow. obviously this has been everywhere and everyone loves this but wow!! yeah I was truly floored. I feel for jennette and I'm glad that she has made it through all the things she's been through and mostly come out on the other side. not only was it an interesting story and to hear her life and how she slowly recovered from what happened, but she is also an excellent writer and I think writing and releasing this was very healing for her. This has truly set the bar for celebrity memoirs and memoirs in general, I'm very excited to see what she does next❤️ 5 stars 

veryone said that this is amazing. everyone said that this is just my thing. everyone said that I would love this. everyone said that this was a pioneer in my favourite genre of book (depressed woman does nothing for 300 pages). everyone said that this was so similar to and even maybe inspired a lot my favourite books of the past 3 years. everyone said why tf have you not read this book yet. and you know what? yes they were right. this was amazing, exactly my kind of book and yes I should have read it much earlier. but whatever, I've read it now. ugh. I'm such a basic bitch. I can't even pin point what I loved so much about this book and absolutely deplorable main character but I don't know, it really resonated with me and I'm just going to pretend that I cannot relate to her. if I think too much about this book idk if I like where my mind will take me. I'm going to rate this a tentative 4.75 stars because I got a bit bored at the end and also I wasn't that big of a fan of how it ended but in time I might raise this to a 5 star.

I found this fun to read only because I was in paris while I read this, the main character talked about being on the metro while I read this on the metro and she mentioned specific places and experiences that I recognised while I was there! that was the extent of my enjoyment though. this didn't actively offend me I just wasn't that interested by it but the final two chapters with the perfect wrap up and roll call of what happened to everyone in the end was so on the nose and annoying, wasn't a fan 2.25 stars

so so so so freaking sweet! this was an adorable read. such a love letter to teen rom coms and rom coms in general. yes I had a few issues with some of the plot points/character traits (and also just how this story took place over like two weeks???) but in all, it did amazing to capture the vibes of a teen rom com and I always have mini problems with those so tbh it worked out

 if you couldn't tell by my last few reads I've exited my intellectual era and am now exclusively reading romance and fun books cause that's the vibe we're feeling rn. this was so sweet🥺🥺 tbh I wasn't that into the romance but every other aspect I was here for!!! her relationship with her mum!! and beatrice!! her getting over her first relationship and learning how to deal with not making your gf your literal entire world and neglecting everything else! the only issue was that the story really built up to the main character dealing with her selfishness but it was never fully addressed. like there were several instances where she was dealing with smaller consequences of her being self centred but it never really came to a head (ig you could argue that that was what the trash scene was but like that was not enough for me). especially with her friendship with taylor. she only ever called taylor when she had news about her and may and she was never going out of her way to ask taylor about her life. it's worse cause it felt like the book was leading up to it as well :// also I was gonna complain that the relationship developed way too fast but ig they lesbians so that's lowkey realistic so I can't complain. anyway, this was still a really charming ya coming of age story and i found myself relating to a lot of aspects and despite my qualms I highly recommend! go in at the right expectations though, I thought this would primarily be a romcom but it was definitely more coming of age. 4.25 stars