HomoTEXTual

Week Six: Thunderhead

“How fortunate am I among the sentient to know my purpose?”

Thunderhead
Author: Neal Shusterman
Year: 2018
Genre: Science Fiction

Non-Spoiler Section:

Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman is a master-class in writing a sequel. Everything that made the first so good is made even better in this installment of the series.

Scythe had me gasping multiple times throughout its pages. Thunderhead had me gasping twice as much. That is exactly how a sequel should be. Scythe was already so good, but this is so much better.

The stakes are increased in an amazing, unpredictable way. The characters are much more complex than before and Shusterman introduces many more equally complex new characters.

The cliffhanger at the end of Scythe is child’s-play compared to the cliffhanger at the end of Thunderhead.

The cliffhanger that left me inconsolable at the end of Scythe was completely dwarfed by this new cliffhanger. I felt like a fanboy watching Avengers Endgame for the first time. I was jumping up and down, yelling, and saying “no…” far too much. I am usually a calm person. I keep my emotions to myself. It is rare for me to be so expressive, but Shusterman knows how to get to me. I can’t even begin to explain my thoughts on the final few chapters of this book. The final chapters have as much drama, emotion, and action as a whole normal book. Someone could slide the last 7 chapters of this book in front of me, and after reading it I’d think “Wow… that was amazing”.

This book is obviously a Five Star

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Super Special Reaction Section

This is the same special I had in the Scythe review, but this time I chose to exclude the time that it was when I was on each sections, because it was extra work that didn’t provide extra needed information. So these are just going to be my thoughts, with the page number I was on when I had that thought.

Day One

(56) Something is gonna happen to Tyger in Texas.

(62) Scythe Rand getting ahold of Tyger is bad news.

(68) Greyson seems like he’s gonna be good. I’m intrigued to explore the Nimbus Agents.

(74) Nimbus Agents secretly helping Scythe Curie and Scythe Anastasia is a very interesting prospect.

(96) Someone at Nimbus using Greyson for their dirty work is so shady…

(120) Agent Traxler is kinda annoying and I don’t care if he ends up being a good guy. I don’t like him and that’s that on that.

(121) Greyson is great. He better be LGBT, that’s all.

(139) Is Scythe Rand actually Tyger’s sugar-mama?

(148) I just now realized Scythe Rand is supposed to be dead… Rowan burned her to death… Now she’s clowning with Tyger…

(168) Greyson calling himself “Slayd” is a lot of chaotic gay energy, and I HOPE he ends up being gay. I like Greyson (or should I say Slayd?) a lot.

(172) Zax is also gay. If this isn’t canon I will make it canon. #Greyzax is gonna be a thing.

(178) Those AWFul bars seem really cool. I love that idea.

*3 seconds later*

(178) I LITERALLY KNEW IT. Greyson, or Slayd, lied about seducing the Prom Queen AND the Prom King in high school. DISASTER BI. WE HAVE A DISASTER BI.

(183) Slayd is kissing a female in this part, and that goes with my bisexual fantasy narrative I’ve created, but I’m going to need him to initiate the same act on a man.

(196) I guess Slayd and Purity are a thing, and I’m fine with that. I hope Zax wasnt just a random character only mentioned once. That would be a big bummer for us #Greyzax shippers.

(203) There’s something haunting about Rowan threatening to spank Xenocrates, like a child.

(212) The characters in this series have to figure out that when you have a plan, bad things happen. Just stop making plans. Traxler was gleaned because he had a plan.

Day Two

(216) Greyson really drew the short straw here. His life was completely changed with no input from him at all. But it will turn out all right. I trust Thunderhead.

(223) Slayd seems to be the emotional core of this book. He had a close relationship to Thunderhead and the choices of other people forced him into a situation where he couldn’t talk to Thunderhead anymore.

(273) Purity is dead, so does that mean #Greyzax can happen now??? Or…?

(302) Goddard being alive pisses me off a lot.

(303) Wait, Tyger is dead…

(437) This book is a complete firestorm of things happening. I can never have a moment of pause.

(466) THE VOTE BEING UNANIMOUS IN FAVOR OF CURIE WAS THE BEST MOMENT I HAD WHILE READING THIS BOOK.

(502) OH MY GOD. Thunderhead’s unrelenting wail of grief and anger, the first time he directly reacted to events in the Scythedom being the Great Resonance that the Tonist always talk about was such a life changing things to read. Chills went down my body.

(504) Greyson Tolliver (not Slayd) being the only person that isn’t an Unsavory was such a beautiful moment to read. An epic finally to the penultimate book in the series. Cannot wait for The Toll…

Discussion Section

I really thought Greyson was gonna be bisexual, and looking back at it now… I had no reason to think that. I thought Greyson and Zax was gonna be a thing and that never happened. Zax was only in one chapter, so that’s fun.

I absolutely LOVED all this Scythe Lucifer business. It was such a cool direction for Rowan to go in. I loved learning about the way Citra gleaned. Giving her victims a month to prepare for their gleaning is such a Citra thing to do.

Neal Shusterman deciding it was okay to make me like Scythe Rand is not okay. I felt so bad for Rand at the end. She had an actual connection to Tyger, but Goddard manipulated her too much. Rand is as much of a victim as Rowan is.

I loved exploring the world of the Unsavories. The AWFul clubs we really cool. The world-building was bumped up a notch and I didn’t even think that was possible. Every organization mentioned in the first book was explored even further in this book. It is obvious that Shusterman spent a lot of time in this world before he started writing this series.

Now I have to talk about the absolute STUNNER of an ending.

The Ending and Why It’s Perfect

The ending of this book worked so perfectly for so many reasons.

Everything just came together so perfectly. Every story arc in the book converged together in just a few pages. The way I saw the book was there were four main groups: The Scythes, The Thunderhead, The Tonists, and The Unsavories. The story set up one event to affect the every single one of those groups in one moment.

When Endura, the Scythe headquarters, was sabotaged by Goddard a chain reaction occured. The Scythedom was thrown completely out of whack, the Thunderhead was so emotionally destroyed by watching Endura fall that he SCREAMED through every device he was connected to. That scream was the Great Resonance the Tonists always talk about and reading that sent CHILLS DOWN MY GAY SPINE. It was just the words “It was the Great Resonance.” and I was GONE. I gasped so hard it hurt and I had to stop reading. I had 1 page left and I had to put the book down. Reading that Greyson was the last remaining Savory person was life changing. Almost everything was tied up, but left just enough for me to NEED the final book RIGHT NOW.

I finished this book on August 4th and did a quick Google to realize the third book was coming out in almost exactly a month. I cannot wait. I’m gonna read that book as quickly as possible and then do a review of that ASAP.

Hopefully my review for The Toll will be out next week (Week 7). It depends on if I scheduled everything right and I can finish the book on time.

“‘Hello, Greyson,’ said the Thunderhead, ‘We need to talk.'”

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Week Five: What If It’s Us

“I am not a New Yorker,
and I want to go home.”

What If It’s Us
Author: Adam Silvera
Year: 2018
Genre: YA, LGBT Romance

Non-Spoiler Section:

This week’s book is What If It’s Us by Adam Silvera and Becky Albertalli. I read this book because it was written by Becky Albertalli. I started reading her books with Simon Vs. The Homosapien Agenda, then I read The Upside of Unrequited, then Leah On The Offbeat, then I read this one. I am caught up on all of Albertalli’s books, and as of typing this review I only have one Silvera book (History Is All You Left Me) left to read before I’m caught up on him too.

This is (no shade) Albertalli’s best and Silvera’s worst. They are both amazing authors and they write such different styles of books. All of Albertalli’s are all purely contemporary romance, and Silvera specializes in his usual high-concept stories. This book is purely contemporary. Silvera is out of his element when he doesn’t have intense, Black Mirror-esque worlds to work with.

The strong suit of this novel is the relationship between the main characters. Arthur Seuss and Ben Alejo (#Barthur? #Arthen? #Suelejo? #Alejeuss? Finding a good ship name for these two is tragically difficult.) are the best couple I’ve ever read before. Their meet-cute was unbelievably adorable and funny; and waiting for them to finally find each other again was infuriatingly addictive. The book wasn’t anything to die for but it warmed my heart and kept me entertained during a long car ride.

I wouldn’t call this book perfect, because there wasn’t enough substance for it to be considered perfect. It was a straight-forward and perfectly lovely book. I read it on a car trip while listening to the song from A Star Is Born, that Lady Gaga sings to Bradley Cooper’s character after he kills himself (spoiler, sorry), on repeat. That’s a very emotional song so listening to that while reading the emotional ending of this book made it very hard to contain my emotions. My parents were very concerned when I started sobbing in the back seat.

I could probably reread this book with a more critical eye, but that’s not what the book is for. This book was a feel-good story, and that’s about it. Experiencing these characters was so fun and falling in love with the characters was easy.

Overall, a fun read.

Three Stars for this one.

★ ★ ★

I’ve chosen to forgo a spoiler section for this books, simply because I don’t have much to say about it, spoiler-wise.

I can’t really explain why I feel that way, I just do I guess.

Give the book a read if you want to feel good for a bit.

“What if we haven’t seen the best of us yet?”

If you want to join me on my slightly dysfunctional reading adventure then you can follow this blog, follow my socials or even share my blog with others if you’re so inclined.

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August 21st Update

This update is just to discuss my book schedule and I have an announcement.

1st order of business- my book schedule. I have three out of four of my September book reviews set up and ready to go.

The first week of September will be Thunderhead, the sequel to my Week 4 book, Scythe. After that I will be reviewing final book in the Scythe series, The Toll. That review will be coming out on September 8th and will be the first time I am reviewing a NEW BOOK. The Toll will have been out for only 5 days at that point. And The third book I have for September is History Is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera.

That will be the final Adam Silvera book left before his book Infinity Son comes out.

My announcement is very exciting, or at least I think it’s exciting.

This coming October… is gonna be…

y’all better be ready…

Horror Month.

October will be 4 reviews of horror/horror-ish/ or horror related books. I have many plans to do great things in October.

Also just wanna say that my August and September Read-A-Thon is going great. I’ve read 4 books in 21 days, which is great for me, because I used to go entire two year periods without picking up a book.

Three of those four books are in my September review list, the other one was found illegally and we’re gonna pretend it didn’t happen… Anyways.

So that’s the update. Just a few new things I wanted to share. Thanks for reading, and be ready for great stuff in the near future.

If you want to join me on my slightly dysfunctional reading adventure then you can follow this blog, follow my socials or even share my blog with others if you’re so inclined.

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Week Four: Scythe

“We must, by law,
keep a record of the innocents we kill.”

This review is of Scythe by Neal Shusterman. I am reading this book for the first time. This book is the first book that I am reviewing that I haven’t read ahead of time. That means I will be doing something different for this post. Instead of a non-spoiler section and then the spoiler section, I will be doing a non-spoiler section with a “Super Special Reaction Section” where I just share the opinions I had as I was reading it. I had a lot of theories about this books while reading it and 95% of them were wrong in the end, so rereading my reactions and thoughts after finishing the book was very entertaining.

Non-Spoiler Section:

Every review I’ve done so far has mentioned world-building, because I love world-building a lot. This book is a master-class is world building. Neal Shusterman is known for writing worlds similar to ours but with one major change. We saw a similar world-building style in Shusterman’s Unwind series.

Scythe is set in a relatively near future, after humanity has conquered death, the only beings that can administer permanent death are the Scythes. The story follows Citra and Rowan as they explore the intricacies of the Scythedom.

I went in to this book blind and I am glad I did that, because I have never been more surprised by a book in my life. If you have the opportunity to go into this book blind, please do it.

The characters in this book are all so lovable and this book provided probably the most emotionally confusing villain I’ve ever read. I hated this person’s gust and I prayed every moment for a bloody death, but I held onto every moment we had with them and never let go. This villain is so well written, I don’t think anyone could have possibly written them better than Shusterman did.

There was a twist near the end that at one point i predicted, but then the book did everything it could to steer me away from that prediction. I thought I was stupid for ever thinking that would happen, but THEN IT HAPPENED. I WAS RIGHT.

This book is easily a Five Star.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Super Special Reaction Section

In this section I’m just gonna share the thoughts, ideas, and opinions I had while reading the book.

DAY ONE

12:24 am
Page 13- I already know this world so well, and it’s only been a few pages.

1:03 am
Page 32- On page 32 a gay couple is implied to exist, and Citra didn’t see it coming at all, but everyone else did, meaning our main character has horrible gaydar. WE LOVE.

2:00 am
Page 67- Just finished part one, I’m going to sleep, but I am HOOKED. I’m curious to see how the competition between Rowan and Citra turns out. It’s strange because only one can win and both are main characters. I have a feeling that this will be like The Hunger Games, where something strange happens and both end up winning. If you can even call being a bearer of death winning.

12:35 pm
Page 71- “I regret to inform you that this entire flight has been selected for gleaning.” Is such a chilling sentence to read. I actually had to pause to check my heartbeat.

12:38 pm
Page 72- This books is really good at making the Scythes as a whole a morally ambiguous group. They aren’t seen as entirely evil or entirely forces of good. They are a complex group of characters.

12:42 pm
Page 75- I keep pausing to think over what I’ve just read. The group of scythes on the plane seem like they could be rogue scythes or even the main villains of the story. They seem to see gleaning as a jovial act. Something to take pleasure in, unlike Faraday. Faraday even said “I would not have been pleased if either of you had been eager to administer death.” On page 62.

1:17 pm
Page 94- For some reason I think Faraday is planning on making both Citra and Rowan Scythes, and having them work together. Based on the tasks he gave both of them alone. Citra was asked to clean Faraday’s blades and Rowan was asked to find the next gleaning. Both doing two parts of the same job. Is it possible for two people to work together as Scythes? The commandments don’t say otherwise.

1:26 pm
Page 97- “Well, she could learn self-control tomorrow. Today when wanted pizza.” That’s all. That’s the thought.

1:39 pm
Page 98- NO. I WAS RIGHT. THAT GROUP OF 4 SCYTHES ARE BAD AND NOW THEY ABOUT TO KILL ESME, THE PIZZA GIRL.

4:39 pm
Page 154- Scythe Goddard and his cronies make me so mad. The new added rule that only one comes out of this apprenticeship alive is just… WHY. I’m fully down for a corrupt government in a book. Sign me up. But now we have corruption in the sole sources of death… this book is gonna mess me up.

4:58 pm
Page 172- Xenocrates just said Faraday gleaned himself and I’m not down for that. Foul play is involved. Faraday would have found another way to get around the problem. Gleaning himself to end the apprenticeship is not something he would have done. He either isn’t dead or he was murdered by a Scythe,

5:02 pm
Page 175- I KNEW GODDARD WOULD BE THE SCYTHE TO STEP FORWARD TO MENTOR ONE OF THEM. I HATE HIM. On to part three. I hope this part has a happier ending, though I doubt it will.

7:11 pm
Page 222- I knew Scythe Goddard would have some kind of sick initiation for Rowan. I’ve become more and more curious about Esme with each chapter. I’m also beginning to be intrigued by the Tonist “cults”.

7:36 pm
Page 236- Citra getting to the bottom of things in a genius way is so refreshing. Too often we see main characters being fed answers instead of finding the information themselves.

8:22 pm
Page 272- For some reason I keep thinking Volta is gay, but that could just be me wanting LGBT representation in everything.

8:32 pm
Page 284- I honestly think someone other than Goddard killed Faraday. The book is making Goddard too obvious, like a red herring.

10:30 pm
Page 310- Goddards control over the High Blade is infuriating. What about Esme is so important to Xenocrates?

10:43 pm
Page 315- I knew Esme was the High Blade’s daughter. This book is much more political than I originally thought it would be. We love political intrigue.

Day Two

12:07 am
Page 321- Citra is being blamed for Faraday’s murder. Which is a bit infuriating. But that does mean they’re admitting it was murder and not a self-gleaning. This has to end well.

12:26 am
Page 334- Onto part 4. After a brief look at the first page of this part, I believe it’s exploring the afterlife concept they hinted at the first time Citra died. *seconds later* ITS THUNDERHEAD. We stan Thunderhead in this house.

12:32 am
Page 338- Thunderhead just reveal Gerald Van Der Gans killed Faraday.

12:45 am
Page 345- Scythe Curie just said Faraday’s note was about her and not Citra, wonder why.

12:48 am
Page 346- Curie liked Faraday many many years ago, and Faraday misconstrued Curie’s love for a want to hurt him.

1:15 am
Page 368- I LITERALLY KNEW FARADAY WAS STILL ALIVE. I SAID THAT. I KNEW IT. Did Citra just ACTUALLY kill Faraday…

10:25 am
Page 396- Rowan just killed Goddard and all his cronies in one fell-swoop. There is no hope of reviving them.

10:55 am
Page 433- I knew there would be a cliffhanger. Love that. I have to read Thunderhead now.

Between finishing the book and finishing this review, I started and finished the sequel, Thunderhead. The review for Thunderhead will be out in two weeks and HOPEFULLY the review for the third book will be out the week after that.

“So Rowan did, and they sped off into the frosty Fulcrum City night.”

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Week Three: They Both Die At The End

“Hello,
I’m calling from Death-Cast”

Non-Spoiler Section:

Honestly, this book (They Both Die At The End, by Adam Silvera) was perfectly fine. I don’t want to say it was perfect, but it was in no way bad. The book was extremely entertaining and emotional. It did exactly what I needed it to.

I’d have to say the best parts of the book were the world, the romance aspect, and the killer writing. The way Silvera puts sentences together is thoroughly entertaining. He expresses the information he needs to express while also making the words, sentences, and paragraphs an entertaining experience. Telling an interesting story is hard enough as it is, but making the not only interesting to experience but also interesting to read is a challenging skill to learn, and Silvera knows how to do it.

The world of the story is so detailed and realistic. The circumstances the characters in this world find themselves in is not quite realistic, but the way the world shapes around the Death-Cast system is extremely realistic. If Death-Cast actually existed, of course there would be discounts for the dying, meet-up apps for the dying, and Make-A-Moment stations.

Silvera’s ability to create captivating ideas is unmatched. Where on Earth did Adam Silvera come up with the idea to tell a gay love story in a world where people receive calls telling them they will die at some point in the next 24 hours.

The romance in this book is heart-warming. The book takes place in a period of under 24 hours, but the romance still feels so strong, and loving, and real, even though it only had 24 hours to grow. I always love a gay romance, but I love a high-concept gay romance even more.

Adam Silvera gives us the same kind of romance that Becky Albertalli gives us (She wrote Simon Vs. The Homosapien Agenda, Aka Love Simon) but with a shot of high-concept ideas. I wanted to explore this world he created even more, but the characters didn’t see a lot in the 24 hours the book gave us. I hope the future HBO series shows us so much more of the world.

I was originally going to give it a three star, but then I reread the book and…

Four Stars from me.

★ ★ ★ ★

Spoiler Section:

This spoiler section isn’t going to be as large as the spoiler sections of the other reviews. Just because the book was fairly straight-forward and I don’t have much to say that readers won’t gather from reading it themselves.

Mateo and Rufus are amazing characters. I love the chemistry between. It’s difficult to finish an Adam Silvera and not love the characters. I love that the book kept building up other ways the characters could die, but they both died in unexpected way. I love the satisfaction that the conclusiveness of the story gave. I wasn’t wondering what the characters would be doing after the book, because they were dead.

Everything seemed concise and finished. When Victor’s chapter ended with Victor speeding his car towards Althea and Rufus’ chapter ended with him stepping into the street, not taking the time to check both sides changed my life.

I’d have to say this book has the best ending of any books I’ve read recently. I’m starting to dislike cliffhangers, I appreciate what they stand for and I know why they need to exist, but I just want a book to end and be done. This book ended, and there was no chance of continuation of the story. There could be a sequel or a spinoff, but I’m not clambering for one.

“I cross the street without an arm to
hold me back.”

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August 7th Update

I have a fun update to my book list. In my previous update I outlined what my for reviews for August would be. The first review in August (Children Of Blood And Bone) is obviously already up, next review will be They Both Die At The End, coming this Sunday, but until now the review after that was a mystery even I didn’t know. But I am very excited to announce that the third August book review will be…

*drum roll*

… Scythe by Neal Shusterman. I picked up the book a while back and finally got a round to reading it, so that review will be up Sunday, the 17th, of August.

I am also excited to announce that September will be my New Book Month. I don’t mean books that are new to the world, but books new to me. I have selected four books I plan to read between now and the end of September. I have a lot of new books to read in these two months. I already read Scythe during August, I started the second book in the Scythe series (might do a review, depends on if I have enough to say about it), and I have the four unread books planned for September. Those four books will remain a mystery until I feel I want to announce them.

That will be six books read in a period of two months. I could finish all of them earlier than planned, or I could not finish all of them at all. We’ll see together.

I am going to be updating my progress on Twitter and Tumblr!

Week Two: Children Of Blood And Bone

“I try not to think of her.
But when I do, I think of rice.
When Mama was around, the hut always smelled of jollof rice.”

Non-Spoiler Section:

This week’s book is Tomi Adayemi’s debut novel, Children Of Blood and Bone. The quickest and best way to describe this novel is: An allegory for the Black Lives Matter movement, as told in a high-fantasy world purged of magic. Children Of Blood and Bone masterfully reinvents the hero’s journey we’ve seen hundreds of times and I loved every moment of it.

The world building, the character development, and the storyline are all perfectly done and work so well together. The world is steeped in African culture paired with the all too familiar political injustice of our modern day. The characters, although set in a very different world, share the struggles of modern day people of color. They story follows many familiar story beats, but holds just enough shocking moments to keep the story extremely interesting.

This book is one of those books where reading it isn’t a chore. It’s a reward. Some books I love feel like work to read, even though I LOVE them. This book, past a certain point, was impossible to put down. I dreaded the moments I had to put the book down to do something. Reading it filled me with intense joy.

I wanted the characters to succeed in their mission so bad. I was at the edge of my seat at every turn.

I enjoy that the world was creative and detailed, but still very easy to grasp and understand. The world full of fantasy creatures and settings I will never truly explore still felt real and beautiful.

Overall this book’s positive qualities far outweighed its few flaw. The few minor flaws are the predictability of some storylines (more on that in the spoiler section) and the restraint it had throughout (again, more in spoiler section).

Four Stars from me.

★ ★ ★ ★

Spoiler Section:

This book was amazing, obviously, but in this spoiler section I do want to delve into the few flaws I found.

My first notable flaw was the cliched story beats. Many of the important things of this book were things I’ve definitely seen before. Like our main character slowly falling in love with the main “villain”. There’s also the main “villain” (Inan) being the son of the actual bad guy, similar to Prince Zuko and Firelord Ozai from Avatar The Last Airbender.

I do appreciate that our two main Majis, Inan and Zelie, are two kinds of magical people usually never explored in stories focusing on this kind of magic system. We usually see people having power over water, fire, air, earth, sometimes ice, and the sort. Zelie has power over death, life and spirits. Inan has power over the mind, spirit and dreams. The uniqueness of the magic in the story is fantastic. I love that magic comes from each character’s individual connection to the Orisha.

There were also many times I thought a certain section could have been more. The story could have been taken up a notch. On the map (so beautiful, we love a book with a map) there is a large sea serpent depicted between Kaduna and Lokoja. Where was the serpent? Where were the amazing fantastical creatures? I just think there was a little more room for even better, more fantastical magical stuff.

I need to take a moment to talk about the cliffhanger. I’m angry as hell about the cliffhanger. Please tell me why this book needed a cliffhanger. The cliffhanger is absolutely genius. First no one has magic, then the Majis get their magic back, AND THEN EVERYONE HAS MAGIC. I NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

In conclusion, I need time travel to be invented so I can travel forward in time to read Children of Virtue and Vengeance.

The way combat and magic is written in the book makes me endlessly excited for the world completely full of magic that we’ll be seeing in the sequel.

“For a moment, I don’t know what to make of the sight.
Then my blood chills to ice.”

If you want to join me on my slightly dysfunctional reading adventure then you can follow this blog, follow my socials or even share my blog with others if you’re so inclined.

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July 31st Update

Not everything can be love and rainbows. Some things can be hate and rainbows.

Blog Info Update

I’ve decided on a loose schedule for my posts.

On Wednesdays I’ll post updates (like this one).

On Sundays I will post my reviews/discussions about books.

Book Review/Discussion List

I’m not entirely decided on what books I will be doing for the next few weeks. I am almost certain my Week 2 book review will be for Children Of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi.

I know I need to do They Both Die At The End at some point soon. As well as What If It’s Us because I want to get all of Adam Silvera’s books reviewed before Infinity Son comes out.

I don’t want to do multiple Adam Silvera books in a row, so I’m going to do other books in between those.

My current possible book schedule as follows:

Week Two: Children Of Blood and Bone

Week Three: They Both Die At The End

Week Four: ???

Week Five: What If It’s Us

That schedule will cover the month of August. I will figure out week four ASAP, so don’t you worry about that. I want week four to be a newly read book, but that just depends on if I have time.

I’m going to start typing my Children Of Blood And Bone review as soon as possible (spoiler alert, it’s gonna be positive).

I swear, I’m going to do a negative review at some point, I swear. Not everything can be love and rainbows. Some things can be hate and rainbows.

Week One: More Happy Than Not

“Suffering from unwanted memories?”

Non-Spoiler Section:

More Happy Than Not was one of the best reading experiences I’ve ever had. It was the third Adam Silvera book I had read, first being What If It’s Us (co-written by Becky Albertalli) and second being They Both Die At The End. I have yet to read History Is All You Left Me, but I plan to do so soon.

This book was so good that I forced myself to finish it in around twelve hours. I purchased the book at 2pm on Saturday and finished it at 3am on Sunday. At one point my mom told me I couldn’t be staying up so late, so I turned off my bedroom light, turned on my phone’s flashlight, and hid under a blanket just so I could finish it.

More Happy Than Not sets the stage in a Summer in the Bronx. The story follows sixteen-year-old Aaron Soto as he navigates his relationships with girlfriend Genevieve, new boy in town Thomas, and the shady, mysterious Leteo Institute that looms over it all.

This book engrossed me like no other. I went in knowing nothing except that I loved the author, and I’m so happy I went in blond. This book was an unexpected roller coaster and went in directions I never saw coming.

I already read What If It’s Us and They Both Die At The End by the time I read this, so I had a general idea of how Silvera’s stories worked, but this was like no other. This debut from Silvera is breathtaking, awe-inspiring, and up there with the greatest debuts of all time (Harry Potter, Children Of Blood and Bone, etc.)

Five Stars from me.

★ ★ ★ ★

Spoiler Section:

In this section I will be just mentioning certain parts of the book I loved, hated, or just wanted to mention.

If you haven’t read the book, please don’t read any of this yet. I don’t want to rob you of experiencing this book for the first time.

I will also be writing this with assumption that everyone reading this section has already read the book.

There is a late-game twist in this book that left me absolutely speechless. I was huddled up under my blanket, reading this book with my jaw dropped to the floor at 2am. I actually have screenshots of me live-tweeting my reactions on my personal twitter.

“I think I had a REVELATION like 3 seconds ago,”

As you can see my live tweeting was popular, look at how many likes it got…

Anyways. The twist in this book is comparable to the likes of Sixth Sense and Shutter Island. Clues were scattered all over the book, but I was too distracted by the Thomas and Aaron story line to pay attention to the minor details hinting to the big twist. I assumed the story would lead to Aaron getting the Leteo procedure to forget Thomas after being rejected, but when I realized that Aaron already got the procedure to forget Collin I knew it had to end with Aaron and Collin being together.

The twist re-contextualized the entire book in seconds. I genuinely got goosebumps. I went from seeing the father as a troubled man struggling with depression to seeing him as the villain of the story. Not only did the father not accept his gay son, but he took the selfish and cowardly way out, by killing himself, filling his already struggling son with the extreme guilt of knowing he was the reason his father killed himself.

I love that the twist and the reprocussions of the twist are ingrained so deeply into the story, yet I never even saw it there until page 181.

Before I got to the twist I would have given this book 4 stars, but that expertly crafted twist bumped it up to perfection, because all of the flaws I saw were perfectly explained by the twist.

I thought Silver didn’t do enough to characterize Thomas, the presumed would-be love interest, but that’s because he wasn’t the love interest, it was Collin.

I was always turned off by the random, seemingly useless scenes that didn’t really lead anywhere, until the twist made those scenes integral to the story. Like the time Aaron tried to talk to Collin in the comic place, or when Aaron’s brother gave him a strange look after asking how to have sex (because his brother knew Aaron had already had sex before, and with a man, but Aaron didn’t know that.) All those small moments became my favorite parts.

My hands-down favorite moment has to be when the cashier told Aaron he didn’t have anymore money on the gift card. Aaron thought he had more money because he doesn’t remember any of the money he spent while he was with Collin, and I’m certain Genevieve made a big deal about paying for it because she knew that. It’s a perfect small detail that makes this book perfect.

The entire “Part Zero: Unhappiness” section was heart-wrenching, especially the early paragraphs, where Aaron is young and reminiscing on all the things he did that made him different and not knowing why it was wrong at the time. It brought me back to my youth. A youth filled with picking the female character in Pokemon games, looking at the other boys my age (never the girls), and pretending to look at the girls my age.

That part perfectly captured what I felt like growing up different and not having the luxury to understand why people didn’t like me. I didn’t know I was different, I just thought the female Pokemon trainer in Pokemon Ruby looked cooler, I just thought Michael was cuter than Samantha. I always chose Princess Peach in Mario Kart Wii. My favorite part of the Sinnoh Pokemon games was the Contest Hall. My favorite Wizards Of Waverly Place character was Justin, because we wore tight pants a lot. My childhood was very similar to Aaron’s and reading that part was very emotional for me.

He perfectly expressed the childhood innocence and lack of understanding that growing up gay or different always holds.

“I’m more happy than not. Don’t forget me.”

I don’t want this to be too long, so I’m ending it here. If you want to ask me questions or discuss the book further you can message me on Twitter (link below) or comment on this post.

If you want to join me on my slightly dysfunctional reading adventure then you can follow this blog, follow my socials or even share my blog with others if you’re so inclined.

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HomoTEXTualBlog

Follow me on Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/homotextualblog

Game Plan

I just started this blog a few hours ago, and I am already getting followers, which is very exciting to me. I want this post to be a quick explanation of my game plan.

I need this blog to be both a blog and a way to keep me reading, because I’ve been falling behind in the reading department. This is why I believe I should give myself a schedule to stick to. I want to write and publish one review/discussion a week, and if that’s too much too fast, then I can do once every two weeks.

I’m going to start with a book I’ve already read (More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera or They Both Die At The End by Adam Silvera (I really want to discuss Adam Silvera)) just so I can get into the groove easier. From there I plan to start doing books I just finished. I have many unread books, so finding a new book to read for the first time shouldn’t be hard.

I’m going to try to (finally) finish A Primate’s Memoir by Robert M. Sapolsky (a relative unknown, but highly recommend) so it can be my second discussion/review, but if I don’t finish reading that in time I will most likely talk about Children Of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi (actual instant classic. It was iconic before it was even released) for my week two.

So now I’m going to start organizing my thoughts on the Adam Silvera book I’m going to discuss, continue reading A Primate’s Memoir, and try to succeed in the book world.

If you want to join me on my slightly dysfunctional reading adventure then you can follow this blog, follow my socials (listed at the bottom of this post) or even share my blog with others if you’re so inclined.

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HomoTEXTualBlog

Follow me on Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/homotextualblog

I promise to get more active on the socials. That will be where I post updates, announcements and personal looks into my life, perhaps.