Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by readingmissfroggy
Beautiful Broken Things by Sara Barnard
4.0
Project Contemporary 2018 #9 - September
Before reading:
This is my ninth book for my Project Contemporary 2018. I selected 12 contemporary books with the idea that I will be reading one every month so that I can truly say if this genre isn't for me (or maybe it is?!).
I know nothing about this book actually. But I have seen this one and some other books by this author floating around Booktube for a while and so I decided to add one to the list and see what I think! Based on the title... I guess it will be about a troubled girl? Maybe a bad relationship or a bad situation at home? I love the cover and I'm very intrigued!
After reading:
I listened to the audio book for a quite a bit so before I'm going to talk about the book I want to mention something about it. The narrator is Charlie Sanderson and I thought she did an amazing job. There are some emails and text messages in this book and even when the name wasn't mentioned, the voices that Charlie used were done in such a way that I always knew who had sent it. I really enjoyed her voice so I would like to recommend the audio book if you are interested in this one!
So, I was somewhat right with my prediction. This book does feature a girl with a troubled past. But it is also about so much more. It is about friendship and confidence and growing as a person and trying new things and breaking free and finding your own way. But also about asking for help when you need it, no matter how hard it is. And how difficult it can be when you really want to help someone you care for but you can't because you are just not the right person/not qualified to help them.
I really, really enjoyed this book. I enjoyed every aspect of it but my favourite part is probably the ending. It felt realistic, it was heartbreaking but in a way maybe also a little bit hopeful? The issues where never sugarcoated but it also wasn't made black and white with a: this is the bad guy and this is the good guy thing. Yes, you can definitely say that the adult man who hits a teenage girl is the bad guy. But the people around them were wrong too, in their own way. The girl was also doing wrong things, though nothing that should allow that guy to hit her. I loved how the author talked about those things, how she also showed how difficult it is to hate someone when he hits you when you also love them. Abuse is a terrible thing but it's not (always) as black and white as some books make it seem. I have been lucky and have never suffered from such abuse but from what I know of it I think that the author represented the issue very well in the way the characters reacted, talked and felt about it.
I can't give this 5 stars however. Simply because I thought that at times the book moved a bit too slow. At times I was just waiting for something to happen, for the story to really get started. So I'm giving this book 4.5 stars.
Before reading:
This is my ninth book for my Project Contemporary 2018. I selected 12 contemporary books with the idea that I will be reading one every month so that I can truly say if this genre isn't for me (or maybe it is?!).
I know nothing about this book actually. But I have seen this one and some other books by this author floating around Booktube for a while and so I decided to add one to the list and see what I think! Based on the title... I guess it will be about a troubled girl? Maybe a bad relationship or a bad situation at home? I love the cover and I'm very intrigued!
After reading:
I listened to the audio book for a quite a bit so before I'm going to talk about the book I want to mention something about it. The narrator is Charlie Sanderson and I thought she did an amazing job. There are some emails and text messages in this book and even when the name wasn't mentioned, the voices that Charlie used were done in such a way that I always knew who had sent it. I really enjoyed her voice so I would like to recommend the audio book if you are interested in this one!
So, I was somewhat right with my prediction. This book does feature a girl with a troubled past. But it is also about so much more. It is about friendship and confidence and growing as a person and trying new things and breaking free and finding your own way. But also about asking for help when you need it, no matter how hard it is. And how difficult it can be when you really want to help someone you care for but you can't because you are just not the right person/not qualified to help them.
I really, really enjoyed this book. I enjoyed every aspect of it but my favourite part is probably the ending. It felt realistic, it was heartbreaking but in a way maybe also a little bit hopeful? The issues where never sugarcoated but it also wasn't made black and white with a: this is the bad guy and this is the good guy thing. Yes, you can definitely say that the adult man who hits a teenage girl is the bad guy. But the people around them were wrong too, in their own way. The girl was also doing wrong things, though nothing that should allow that guy to hit her. I loved how the author talked about those things, how she also showed how difficult it is to hate someone when he hits you when you also love them. Abuse is a terrible thing but it's not (always) as black and white as some books make it seem. I have been lucky and have never suffered from such abuse but from what I know of it I think that the author represented the issue very well in the way the characters reacted, talked and felt about it.
I can't give this 5 stars however. Simply because I thought that at times the book moved a bit too slow. At times I was just waiting for something to happen, for the story to really get started. So I'm giving this book 4.5 stars.