jarshi's Reviews (189)

One lesbian could ruin Howl’s entire life. He such a little poser weirdo. Sophie’s too good for him.

Now I understand the extreme lows and highs of middle grade youth competitive ice skating. Seriously, I didn’t expect this book to hit me emotionally the way it did. The fact that it started off simply talking about mundane adolescent life things and just… escalated into, “Wow, your parents were kind of assholes, you were going through really tough times mentally, and you experienced some really dark, traumatic shit.” 

I hope she got therapy for real.

Bea and Lou are better than me because the minute them scary ass dudes showed up I would’ve chucked that cat out my car SO FAST!

I really wish I had read this book before The Starless Sea. I feel like I would've gotten a better handle on Morgenstern's writing style and the way they organize stories.

The separate plot lines that eventually tie back into each other were simpler, more grounded in reality, and easier to follow than the ones in TSS. There were also considerably fewer characters which I appreciated.

The main romance in this story... I don't know. You want me to like Marco when he led Isobel along for so long when he knew he really wasn't in love with her, and basically kept her around to keep an eye on Celia who he was really in love with? Yeah, no. Honestly? When Celia threw that whole mess back in his face, I legitimately screamed because SHE WAS RIGHT! How is any woman supposed to trust you, Marco?! And at the same time, I know Celia was at least a bit aware of the whole ordeal and still pursued a relationship with Marco. But, whatever. They cute or whatever.

In the end, we really don't know what happens to Isobel in the end and that bothers me.

Also, I wanted to bring up how the stories of The Night Circus and The Starless Sea aren't exactly related, but have plot beats that feel similar (the whimsy, the magical place that's not connected to time, the boy entrusted to look after it, the bright-haired girl he falls in love with who he's searching for, a love story between two characters that transcends time, etc.).

Morgenstern knows what they like and knows how to write it well.

NOW GIVE ME THE SPRINGTIME LESBIAN ROMANCE STORY YOU COWARD!

I think this collection has really solidified Tillie Walden as my new favorite graphic novel writer, and that I should probably look into nonfiction graphic novel titles.

Walden's aesthetic is so dreamy and emotional. When she explained that Studio Ghibli films heavily influence her work, it made so much sense to me.

I enjoyed every story in this collection, with my favorites being A City Inside and What It's Like to be Gay in an All-Girls Middle School. Even her work from her teenage years held a level of emotion and overall quality that really showed how much work she has been putting into her craft from a young age.

Anyways, I'm obsessed and I want to read everything she's made.

If I was invisible I too would cause problems on purpose.

 The most interesting aspect of the whole book, funnily enough, was the author’s notes at the end. It was a lot of fun to read through Nguyen’s reasonings behind his creative decisions. I thought that his explanation for the different aesthetics of the fairy tales told and how those design details connected with the narrator of each story was brilliant. Their art history background really shone through, and I felt that it really highlighted how effective graphic novels can be at conveying emotion and telling biographies or autobiographies. I know this story is neither, but the fact that my brain went there seems to be a good indication that Nguyen was effective at humanizing the characters. 

 

Overall, I thought the book was very well done. What a way to debut!

Yoko Ogawa is the novelist that Murakami wishes he was and I will stand by that statement.

My write-up for this book is going to be scattered because it has been constructed from a bunch of random thoughts and jokes that I scribbled in my journal while reading. I’m not going for peak literary criticism here. 

 

As much as I liked this book, there was something about it that was holding me back from giving it a higher personal rating. I really can’t put my finger on what it is. August and Jane’s relationship is very cute, but if I’m being very honest, I enjoyed the way Jane was written exponentially more. When all the shit went down with August’s mom and her parents and the money, I found myself not caring. At all. 

 

Less than a chapter into the book and I could tell that McQusiton not only lives in New York but has a deep understanding of the city. It got to a point where I was going to pull an armchair Sex in the City fan and say that the TRUE main character was the city of New York. And that makes me wonder where this depth of set establishment was in RWRB. 

 

McQuiston also has a very weird habit of writing all the side characters with more interesting backstories and personalities than the main character. On multiple occasions I found myself flipping through the Jane/August scenes trying to figure out when Nyla, Wes, and Niko were going to show up again. Even though Nyla was basically a mouthpiece for every meme or AAVE grammar point McQuiston thought was funny, she was still a lot of fun to read. 

 

McQuiston thinks she can get out of the “main character moves to NYC and is a journalist” rom-com trope by making August a modern-day Sherlock Holmes with a sociology degree. How very liberal arts of her. But August is basically doing journalism work with more steps, so I’m counting it. Sorry, Casey, you lose. They even made a Jessica Jones joke I CAN’T— 

 

This book really had me going on the contemporary urban fantasy… until you had two women fucking in a New York City subway car. Now Casey, bestie, I know your ass was high as a kite when you thought of that because there is NO WAY! I don’t care if they’re lesbians, diseases and infections are rated E for everyone, and you could not pay me any amount of money to get fingered on the NYC subway. 

 

Shout out to my boy Wes who made several points in this book. We always need kings like him.