WHERE SHOULD I BEGIN?

when i first started this, i knew that it's going to do something within me, i knew it's going to touch emotions that my lack of will and intelligence could never be able to construct in words. i'm not really good at it. just by the first chapters, as they were talking about authority and how it's always serves as a distortion and a guide to know and learn things--it's sold.

okay, this review is in shambles and i'm writing the moment i finished it so this sort of like whatever-the-hell review, but whatever, let's talk about paul. GODDAMN PABLO, MY PAVEL, my sensitive and genius child. there's a part of me that did not really trust him, like, there were times when i was asking myself if he's sane enough to be in contact with his reality, or if i was going insane with him. i felt his seething rage. his hatred and spite and numbness towards everything. it felt as though he was stuck within two extremes, he feels everything and burns with it, and he thinks (ruminates lol) too much that he perceives his anger to be objectively right--as if the world owed him that much. i wasn't sure if what he needs is a hug or a slap to wake him out of his misery. also, what really broke my heart is that he knew how ruined he is, how much shattering the world continues to give him. there is no sort of release to unleash it, or there is but he doesn't know how. there is no available trajectory to follow, or a map to go with. it's hell, no? to be aware about how destroyed you are, and how much you're in need of salvation but not really knowing how or where to even get it. a dead end. everything feels ironic. it doesn't matter how many times you try, or how much you try harder, there's never going to be a way to escape your head. that's just tragic in a million little ways i could only dare to ponder. i'm not a genius enough to know it, i'm not in the right position to understand it, but i can only see it in a way i can--and IT'S JUST SO HARD. it's like if his pain within his own words cannot be addressed to someone or to something, it will always choose to torture itself. projecting. maybe his beauty is something he cannot know how to keep, and so he relentlessly finds a way to kill it.

now with julian, TO BE HONEST I WANT TO SCREAM BECAUSE I REALLY AM FRUSTRATED. i also did not trust him, actually. like, both of them are just friggin destructive as F in a different and twisted way. julian is someone who sees too much but is not really seen. who yearns to be something but hides in a tangled knot of irreverence. he's a giver. a generous, lover-pleasing, gentleman with a kind heart. his ostentatiousness is deep within his bones he does not how to come out of it. his willingness to just give whatever-the-hell stuff or thing (I REALLY DON'T HAVE THE WORDS FOR IT) to appease and assuage the cracks and inevitable ends they are about to face pained me so friggin much. he's in dire need of affection. paul is aware of his fault lines, i don't think the same could be said with julian. i think he's adamant to question and face it--especially how he tries to cling onto him at the very end. he reminds me so much of personal experiences i've heard and witnessed with my loved ones. truly, i just want to hug him and tell him it's not healthy.

clearly both of them are intelligent gentlemen but so, so, so, foolish on how to handle each other's sharp edges. i relate more with paul. the way his family see him as an outsider, a foreign kid, an outlander in an ancient land full of sick traditions. i felt his loneliness, his desire to be something beautiful and perennial. his silence is so beautifully written i needed a moment to comprehend it. as someone who has occasionally perceived as a weird lady, stuck between books and research, i could just feel how damning it is, knowing no one, even if you try to explain, is sympathetic enough to care.

i've met several pauls, julians, and encountered families similar to their families to not grasp it the way i saw fit. it's just spoke to me in different levels, aside from its plot. it's just so good.

i don't know what else to say. i so effing love the writing. I LOVED IT. SO. MUCH.

god, what did this to me?