peripetia's reviews
535 reviews

I'm struggling with the star rating again because I think this was a good book but it just didn't hit me personally. From an enjoyment point of view this is like a 3, but I feel that objectively it's too low, so a 3,75 it is.

I'm not a romance reader, so the concept of the book is not all that interesting to me. The thing with romance is that you know going in what you'll get out of it. That kind of lowers the stakes for me. Still, romance has become a popular genre with some great writing, so I think it makes sense to give it a chance every now and then.

When I say that I think this was good as a romance book, I mean that it's probably among the best in the genre, even if it's not a literary masterpiece. The main character as well as all the side characters have their own stories apart from the romance in the center of the book. The characters were well fleshed out and I enjoyed the dialogue.

Except for the love interest. I did not like him all that much. I did not like to hear him speak, basically.

The writer is an audiobook narrator, like the main character, and I listened to the audiobook which she narrated herself. She's a great narrator and a great actor. I did confirm my theory that I prefer to listen to first-person narration because in that case it doesn't bother me that all the characters are performed by one person. It makes sense for someone telling their own story to relay also other people's dialogue, as if they were telling the story straight to you.

I also found that I very much do not enjoy listening to sex scenes. I don't have a problem with sex scenes in general, but listening to it made me so uncomfortable I had to speed up the audio. 

This is an incredibly impactful read and definitely required reading for all aspiring revolutionaries. 

The book consists of different writings, speeches, and radio vists Abd El-Fattah has done. Some of the texts are very focused on Egypt's internal issues and can be difficult to read. You do glean useful information from them as well.

Abd El-Fattah is a living legend and, as far as I can tell, still in prison. His fight is not over, even if in his book, he is close to admitting defeat. I hope that the "international community" remembers him as they quietly gloss over Egypt's glaring human rights violations to turn a profit.

This book was absolutely terrible. I picked this up and finished it for an experiment on the most millennial books I can find. This did fulfill that purpose.

The main character is just horrible. Not a horrible person, exactly, but just so immature, self-centered, self-sabotaging, whiny overgrown infant. She does that "oh no I shouldn't be thinking about my stupid problems because some people have real problems and also climate change" and then feels bad about THAT without ever doing any real self-reflection or taking any action. Every chance for feeling empathy for the character was destroyed by her being obnoxious.

There was not enough material for a whole book. The only lesson I walked away with was "divorce really isn't that big of a deal". I think this book was written as the author's self-therapy. It does not make a good novel. I ended up finishing the audiobook at 1,5 speed because listening to her navel-gazing was sheer torture.

 

 I have been thinking about this book a lot. When I started it, I was convinced after the first few pages that this would be one of my favorite books this year. Then, as the story progressed and also didn't, I started to doubt my prediction.

Even as I was reading the book, I felt like I will have to - and I do want to - re-read it. I'm certain there were things that I missed in the layers that I just haven't uncovered. Am I smart enough to know how smart this book is? I truly don't know, but I doubt it. Maybe the book really wasn't that deep, but I find that hard to believe when the writer has a PhD in comparative literature.

Although I probably missed half of what was being said, I got enough out of it to keep me entertained. Even when this book was, well, boring, something was going on beneath the surface with something to think about or analyze.

The first part of the book was extremely funny for me, but the laugh-out-loud moments were less common later in the book, maybe because of Selin's changing mood. The observations about mundane things were still fantastic.

I think some parts could have been cut. There was maaaaybe a little bit too much meandering with no point. 

This is definitely not for everyone, but a good literary fiction novel for those who like to say "what does it all mean?" without coming up with any answers. 


P.S. Why does everyone hate Ivan? I don't get it.

Tämä menee nyt kyllä enemmän 3,5 tähden puolelle, mutta pyöristän ylöspäin koska osui niin kovaa tunteisiin ja muistoihin. Kirjana tämä ei lopulta ole minusta hirveän vahva - juonta ei juurikaan ole, vain erillisiä katkelmia. Ihan kaikkia anekdootteja ei ehkä olisi tarvinnut laittaa. Kirja myös loppui niin äkkiä, että mietin edelleenkin tuliko Ellibsin lukuohjelmaan vain joku bugi vai missä loput on. 

Kirja saa 3 tähteä jo ihan vaan siitä, että tällaisista aiheista ei Suomessa tai muuallakaan kirjoiteta, varsinkaan näin ns. sisäpiiriläisen näkökulmasta. Kirjallisuus on äärimmäisen keski- ja yläluokkainen harrastus ja ammatti. Kaikenlainen luokka-analyysi uppoaa itselleni aina.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a little bit different, even quirky, but not in an annoying way, at least to me. The book is mostly the main character's musings about life and horoscopes, which I liked in the end.

The book is slow. I spent maybe the first 1/3 of the book waiting for it to start, only to realize it had, without me noticing it. That was great.

In short, I'm happy I read this book. This is great if you like atmospheric books and interesting characters.