sandraagee's review against another edition
3.0
I maybe would have liked a little more detail about Soviet Russia, but as an entertaining romance this book works well. Liked the writing style. And I really, really appreciate the fact that this is a book about a college student - don't see too many of those.
cupcakegirly's review against another edition
3.0
http://www.yabookscentral.com/yafiction/15625-the-boy-on-the-bridge
melissapalmer404's review against another edition
4.0
Book #80 Read in 2013
The Boy on the Bridge by Natalie Standiford (YA)
Laura is on an exchange program, spending a year of college in Russia. She meets a boy named Aloysha and the two have an instant connection. As their relationship grows, Laura begins to make Aloysha her top priority, skipping classes and missing curfews. Her roommate is afraid that Laura is just being used to get a ticket to America and that Aloysha will ask Laura to marry him so she can bring him home with her. She does not believe he would do such a thing....but is she right?
This book was a good, quick read. I must have watched the movie Taken too many times because I kept waiting for Laura to get kidnapped and made into a Russian sex slave, but that did not happen. However, there were twists and turns about Aloysha and whether or not he was truly a good man.
I borrowed this book from the public library.
http://melissasbookpicks.blogspot.com
The Boy on the Bridge by Natalie Standiford (YA)
Laura is on an exchange program, spending a year of college in Russia. She meets a boy named Aloysha and the two have an instant connection. As their relationship grows, Laura begins to make Aloysha her top priority, skipping classes and missing curfews. Her roommate is afraid that Laura is just being used to get a ticket to America and that Aloysha will ask Laura to marry him so she can bring him home with her. She does not believe he would do such a thing....but is she right?
This book was a good, quick read. I must have watched the movie Taken too many times because I kept waiting for Laura to get kidnapped and made into a Russian sex slave, but that did not happen. However, there were twists and turns about Aloysha and whether or not he was truly a good man.
I borrowed this book from the public library.
http://melissasbookpicks.blogspot.com
michelefortie's review against another edition
3.0
Mixed feelings, I feel like this deserves a 3.5, really. I was initially expecting something like Anna and The French Kiss with a dash of Sarah Dessen, but this was a bit darker than that. The book was interesting more in the whole "studying abroad in Russia in the 80's" than it was for the romance plot line. Their relationship is a bit obsessive and pretty unhealthy, (she skips all her classes to make-out with this Russian guy) and I felt like the ending was weird and ambiguous and came about really suddenly. I enjoyed it for the most part, but it isn't going to be one of my favorites.
litletters's review against another edition
4.0
Before I started this book, I knew three things. One, that I had loved Standiford's earlier work, 'How to Say Goodbye in Robot'. Two, that this novel is somewhat based on the author's own experiences. And, three, that the reviews about it were mixed and somewhat indecipherable ("So should I spend $7.99 on it or what?" One review made me mutter). Many of the reviews I came across complained about the lack of realism in how quickly the main character--Laura--fell for the guy, Alyosha, and how easily she gave up her studies for him. Well in dealing with the later, that seems to be totally in character for Laura. She gave up her studies for pot-smoking, pseudo-intellectual Josh. Why not play with the GPA to spend more time with sensitive, actually-intelligent Alyosha?
In addressing the first complaint, I have to pull on my own experiences. No, I did not go to Russia during the days of the Cold War, but I did spend last summer in Ukraine. And I did meet a guy there and developed a massive crush on him in one day that has now lasted over a year, with only the kind of sustained contact social media can afford. Now I knew full well that part of his interest in me was because I am American, but that was 100% fine because part of the reason I was interested in him was because he was Ukrainian! He was passionate and smart and funny and handsome, and I was already intoxicated with poetry and politics. All it took was a few charming compliments and mild exchanges of flirtation, and one story about his involvement with the recent protests in Maidan square and I was feeling light-headed. True story. Now in America? I rarely date, and turn down heartily 9/10 offers I get. But in Ukraine? Whole other story. The intensity of the people, especially at the volatile time I was visiting at, carries you with them. Added to that I have dreamed of Russia, Ukraine, etc, my entire life, and it was only a matter of time.
That was my long (and very self-indulgent) way of saying that, based on personal experiences, it is realistic to me that things would progress the way they did in the story. And especially in that tense and fraught environment...if I had been Laura, and Alyosha had been a little more like my Ukrainian friend, I can't say I wouldn't have seriously considered marrying him just for the chance of a life; a real life, not the shell of existence afforded to bright, politically aware young students in the USSR, dreaming of more.
In addressing the first complaint, I have to pull on my own experiences. No, I did not go to Russia during the days of the Cold War, but I did spend last summer in Ukraine. And I did meet a guy there and developed a massive crush on him in one day that has now lasted over a year, with only the kind of sustained contact social media can afford. Now I knew full well that part of his interest in me was because I am American, but that was 100% fine because part of the reason I was interested in him was because he was Ukrainian! He was passionate and smart and funny and handsome, and I was already intoxicated with poetry and politics. All it took was a few charming compliments and mild exchanges of flirtation, and one story about his involvement with the recent protests in Maidan square and I was feeling light-headed. True story. Now in America? I rarely date, and turn down heartily 9/10 offers I get. But in Ukraine? Whole other story. The intensity of the people, especially at the volatile time I was visiting at, carries you with them. Added to that I have dreamed of Russia, Ukraine, etc, my entire life, and it was only a matter of time.
That was my long (and very self-indulgent) way of saying that, based on personal experiences, it is realistic to me that things would progress the way they did in the story. And especially in that tense and fraught environment...if I had been Laura, and Alyosha had been a little more like my Ukrainian friend, I can't say I wouldn't have seriously considered marrying him just for the chance of a life; a real life, not the shell of existence afforded to bright, politically aware young students in the USSR, dreaming of more.
emjrasmussen's review
Romance. I cannot think of a single YA book that does not feature at least a dash, and I can list a litany of titles that center around it. It exists in such an abundance that even the most well-written fictional relationships can swirl into all the others in my memory, blending in with the hundreds I have read before. As a result, it is vital that romance novels feature not only a realistic relationship, but a hook, something to make that relationship stand out. The Boy on the Bridge does just that, using its 1980s Soviet setting to charge its plot and tell about a romance unlike any other.
One of my favorite aspects of this novel is simply the Soviet Union itself. Natalie Standiford sprinkles details about the now-dissolved nation into her story, which forces the romance to share the stage. I loved getting a glimpse of the way USSR citizens lived—constantly pretending to believe in their country’s system to avoid arrest, going without luxuries of any kind—and I appreciated the way passages that focused on world-building kept me from getting tired of Laura’s and Alyosha’s relationship.
Standiford’s setting of choice boosts the romance in another memorable way—by adding a language barrier between Laura and Alyosha. She is learning Russian and he is learning English, but neither is fluent yet, and overcoming linguistic differences strengthens their relationship with each conversation. I do wish the author had expanded upon this conflict a bit more—Laura occasionally complains about not understanding slang terms, but she never truly struggles to express herself, even though she has to ask Alyosha to name simple vocabulary words like glove and eye. However, the small complications language does cause are delightful to read about, and I could not help falling in love with Alyosha’s endearingly fractured English.
Best of all, the setting allows an ominous, forbiding doubt to hover over the romance. Laura is warned to be wary of romantic advances from Russians because they are likely just looking for the ticket to the United States that comes with marrying an American. However, she refuses to believe that Alyosha’s love has any ulterior motive. Standiford makes it impossible to discern whether or not the protagonist is right, and readers will spend every chapter torn between cheering for the romance to last and urging Laura to escape as quickly as she can.
All of these elements culminate into a page-turning plot that is part mystery, part romance, and part travelogue. Complete with an enigmatic ending that emphasizes the secrecy that shrouded the Soviet Union, The Boy on the Bridge is another cleverly written novel from Standiford. I highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a solid love story or who has a bit of foreign fascination.
This review originally appeared at www.litup-review.com.
One of my favorite aspects of this novel is simply the Soviet Union itself. Natalie Standiford sprinkles details about the now-dissolved nation into her story, which forces the romance to share the stage. I loved getting a glimpse of the way USSR citizens lived—constantly pretending to believe in their country’s system to avoid arrest, going without luxuries of any kind—and I appreciated the way passages that focused on world-building kept me from getting tired of Laura’s and Alyosha’s relationship.
Standiford’s setting of choice boosts the romance in another memorable way—by adding a language barrier between Laura and Alyosha. She is learning Russian and he is learning English, but neither is fluent yet, and overcoming linguistic differences strengthens their relationship with each conversation. I do wish the author had expanded upon this conflict a bit more—Laura occasionally complains about not understanding slang terms, but she never truly struggles to express herself, even though she has to ask Alyosha to name simple vocabulary words like glove and eye. However, the small complications language does cause are delightful to read about, and I could not help falling in love with Alyosha’s endearingly fractured English.
Best of all, the setting allows an ominous, forbiding doubt to hover over the romance. Laura is warned to be wary of romantic advances from Russians because they are likely just looking for the ticket to the United States that comes with marrying an American. However, she refuses to believe that Alyosha’s love has any ulterior motive. Standiford makes it impossible to discern whether or not the protagonist is right, and readers will spend every chapter torn between cheering for the romance to last and urging Laura to escape as quickly as she can.
All of these elements culminate into a page-turning plot that is part mystery, part romance, and part travelogue. Complete with an enigmatic ending that emphasizes the secrecy that shrouded the Soviet Union, The Boy on the Bridge is another cleverly written novel from Standiford. I highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a solid love story or who has a bit of foreign fascination.
This review originally appeared at www.litup-review.com.
choosejoytoday's review against another edition
3.0
A look at the USSR in the 80s from the perspective of a 19-year-old college student spending a semester abroad in Leningrad. Laura is pretty much everything you'd expect a 19-year-old spending a semester away to be. At first content to go to class, she the architecture, and follow the rules, until Alexei(nicknamed Aloysha) enters the picture. Despite being warned by everyone in her life, Laura refuses to believe Aloysha would be seeking her attention just for a chance at a green card. Lots of manipulation going on in all of the character's lives, which I guess you might expect in the USSR in the 80s.
liralen's review against another edition
2.0
Maybe I need a 'potential not realised' shelf. I dunno.
Premise-wise, this is interesting. Laura is studying abroad in Russia in the early 1980s, when the country is still deep in communism and there's no obvious end coming to the Cold War. Laura has been fascinated by Russia for years, and this is her chance.
Except—what does she do with that chance? She meets a boy and spends the entire book either with him or thinking about him.
Now, of course, that's part of the premise: that Laura meets this boy and has to make a huge decision—whether or not to marry him—very quickly, when they haven't known each other for long. And judging by the author's website, a lot of the atmospheric details (and, for all I know, plot points) come from direct personal experience. I'm hesitant (...although not totally unwilling) to come down too harshly on what may or may not be a thinly fictionalised version of the author's own experience.
But I was so disappointed by the romanceromanceromanceANGST bent of the book. Yes, okay, it is YA fiction with two teenagers locked in a passionate gaze on the cover (which, incidentally, features a bridge not in Leningrad, where Laura is studying, but Moscow, where no bridge scene happens), so what did I expect?
Wait, actually, I can answer that: I expected Laura to care about her classes. I expected her to make at least a token effort to care about the rules. I expected a Brown student to be capable of writing an essay that does not make her sound so...petty. I love the idea of her being disillusioned by what she finds, but since she is disillusioned (...or something...) by the very first page, when she has been in Russia for all of two weeks, we missed the chance for interesting character development. I hoped that she would try to make Russian friends rather than being glued to her Russian boyfriend and whingeing about his fr—wait, no; I didn't realise that I should hope for that, but now I'm grumpy that it didn't happen.
The thing is that I really love the premise, the idea that she is in a rather doomed relationship—one in which she has a certain, tremendous power but also a lot to lose—and has to decide how hard to fight for that relationship, and what she is willing to do to keep it. That she has to decide whether or not to trust her boyfriend's motives. I would have loved loved loved to see this go darker—Laura making the decision to marry him, then going back to the U.S. and dealing with the reality of what that meant. (Or: Laura saying 'Yes, I'll marry you, but I'll stay in Russia!' and seeing how he reacted to that.) To be fair, that would have made it a very, very different book, and presumably the author was going more for the unrequited-love angle, so...
So, yeah. So much potential here. It's supposed to be somewhat unclear, I think, whether the Boy's intentions are really pure, although Laura pretty much refuses to entertain the notion that they might not be (despite all evidence to the contrary and everyone around her telling her to open her eyes—oh, yeah, did I mention that I'm skeptical?). It's just, if she had opened her eyes, it could have been the much more complex question of haves and have-nots, of this-is-an-unequal-situation-and-what-do-I-do-given-all-that. (Odd comparison point: in [b:Blue Clay People|17596|Blue Clay People Seasons on Africa's Fragile Edge|William Powers|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1316638415s/17596.jpg|19150], the author talks about a similar situation—being in a relationship with a Liberian woman who has a lot to gain by marrying him, and having to decide whether feelings could triumph over an inherently imbalanced relationship.) But instead she's just all 'la la la looooove!'
And yes, I'm being grumpy, and no, I didn't realise I felt quite so strongly about this, but I don't take all that well to 'la la la looooove!'
Premise-wise, this is interesting. Laura is studying abroad in Russia in the early 1980s, when the country is still deep in communism and there's no obvious end coming to the Cold War. Laura has been fascinated by Russia for years, and this is her chance.
Except—what does she do with that chance? She meets a boy and spends the entire book either with him or thinking about him.
Now, of course, that's part of the premise: that Laura meets this boy and has to make a huge decision—whether or not to marry him—very quickly, when they haven't known each other for long. And judging by the author's website, a lot of the atmospheric details (and, for all I know, plot points) come from direct personal experience. I'm hesitant (...although not totally unwilling) to come down too harshly on what may or may not be a thinly fictionalised version of the author's own experience.
But I was so disappointed by the romanceromanceromanceANGST bent of the book. Yes, okay, it is YA fiction with two teenagers locked in a passionate gaze on the cover (which, incidentally, features a bridge not in Leningrad, where Laura is studying, but Moscow, where no bridge scene happens), so what did I expect?
Wait, actually, I can answer that: I expected Laura to care about her classes. I expected her to make at least a token effort to care about the rules. I expected a Brown student to be capable of writing an essay that does not make her sound so...petty. I love the idea of her being disillusioned by what she finds, but since she is disillusioned (...or something...) by the very first page, when she has been in Russia for all of two weeks, we missed the chance for interesting character development. I hoped that she would try to make Russian friends rather than being glued to her Russian boyfriend and whingeing about his fr—wait, no; I didn't realise that I should hope for that, but now I'm grumpy that it didn't happen.
The thing is that I really love the premise, the idea that she is in a rather doomed relationship—one in which she has a certain, tremendous power but also a lot to lose—and has to decide how hard to fight for that relationship, and what she is willing to do to keep it. That she has to decide whether or not to trust her boyfriend's motives. I would have loved loved loved to see this go darker—Laura making the decision to marry him, then going back to the U.S. and dealing with the reality of what that meant. (Or: Laura saying 'Yes, I'll marry you, but I'll stay in Russia!' and seeing how he reacted to that.) To be fair, that would have made it a very, very different book, and presumably the author was going more for the unrequited-love angle, so...
So, yeah. So much potential here. It's supposed to be somewhat unclear, I think, whether the Boy's intentions are really pure, although Laura pretty much refuses to entertain the notion that they might not be (despite all evidence to the contrary and everyone around her telling her to open her eyes—oh, yeah, did I mention that I'm skeptical?). It's just, if she had opened her eyes, it could have been the much more complex question of haves and have-nots, of this-is-an-unequal-situation-and-what-do-I-do-given-all-that. (Odd comparison point: in [b:Blue Clay People|17596|Blue Clay People Seasons on Africa's Fragile Edge|William Powers|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1316638415s/17596.jpg|19150], the author talks about a similar situation—being in a relationship with a Liberian woman who has a lot to gain by marrying him, and having to decide whether feelings could triumph over an inherently imbalanced relationship.) But instead she's just all 'la la la looooove!'
And yes, I'm being grumpy, and no, I didn't realise I felt quite so strongly about this, but I don't take all that well to 'la la la looooove!'
sreddous's review against another edition
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
This book might have been a bit too short for how complicated the topics it's exploring are. The political tension is interesting and feels high-stakes, and I liked feeling like I didn't know whether I could trust Alyosha or his friends. The fast-paced nature of the way the main romantic relationship grew I think made enough sense in the context of it "having an end date because the semester ended," so it didn't feel too crazily like insta-love to me, since "I fell in love with someone while traveling" I think is a pretty natural framing for "love happens quickly".
Honestly, the thing that didn't really work for me is the main character and her goals/her motivation. I kept thinking, constantly, "lol, if you don't like it here, why'd you choose to study here?" The book jacket blurb says: "When Laura decides to spend a semester in Russia, it is for many reasons. She wants to learn the language. See the culture. Walk through the wintery streets. Escape all the confusion back home." But I don't really see any of that! Laura seems constantly grumpy to be in Russia and seems...ungrateful? and only perks up when she gets a crush on a boy. I wish more of that "confusion back home" was explored, because if she was only here because her parents forced her to be here, or something like that, it'd make more sense that she "wasn't excited to be here until she found love." But that's not the case, and it makes her hard to relate to sometimes. It made me think, "wait, you WANT to be here, right??" every time she made an irresponsible decision. I think her behavior would be a lot more compelling if she DID NOT like Russia, never wanted to be here, but that's really not how this is framed.
Also, the "g" word for Romani people shows up a ton, which was annoying, but this takes place in the 80s and was published in 2013, so maybe that's "how it was." Doesn't make it GOOD or right, but just pointing that out in case anyone doesn't want to read a book that uses that word a whole lot.
Overall, I think this book is well-built-up enough given the time, location, and ages of the characters involved. But it could really benefit from I think 75 or so more pages that build up more of Laura's backstory and interests, so that her goals and reasons for doing things are easier to identify with.
Honestly, the thing that didn't really work for me is the main character and her goals/her motivation. I kept thinking, constantly, "lol, if you don't like it here, why'd you choose to study here?" The book jacket blurb says: "When Laura decides to spend a semester in Russia, it is for many reasons. She wants to learn the language. See the culture. Walk through the wintery streets. Escape all the confusion back home." But I don't really see any of that! Laura seems constantly grumpy to be in Russia and seems...ungrateful? and only perks up when she gets a crush on a boy. I wish more of that "confusion back home" was explored, because if she was only here because her parents forced her to be here, or something like that, it'd make more sense that she "wasn't excited to be here until she found love." But that's not the case, and it makes her hard to relate to sometimes. It made me think, "wait, you WANT to be here, right??" every time she made an irresponsible decision. I think her behavior would be a lot more compelling if she DID NOT like Russia, never wanted to be here, but that's really not how this is framed.
Also, the "g" word for Romani people shows up a ton, which was annoying, but this takes place in the 80s and was published in 2013, so maybe that's "how it was." Doesn't make it GOOD or right, but just pointing that out in case anyone doesn't want to read a book that uses that word a whole lot.
Overall, I think this book is well-built-up enough given the time, location, and ages of the characters involved. But it could really benefit from I think 75 or so more pages that build up more of Laura's backstory and interests, so that her goals and reasons for doing things are easier to identify with.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racial slurs