Reviews with content warning for Suicidal thoughts - Beautiful World, Where Are You

Sally Rooney captures interpersonal relationships so well, I love reading her writing. Her books always make me wish that I communicated with my friends through email.

Felix was a great character, he was very funny and seemed to be the only one asking any sensible questions. Simon had a kinda freudian thing going on, he needs to get over that and his savior complex.

Content Warnings

writingcaia's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I’m not even sure how I’m going to review this book.

What can I say?

It lies heavily on the characters or solely, to be honest, as if by living their lives, dealing with their internal and external struggles, the way of the world, the way of people, their meetings, their encounters, their love for each other however crooked and moulded by their own fallibility and fears, they carry the plot. And, they carry it wonderfully, insightfully, painfully, sometimes - for me the also fallible and emotionally pained reader - annoyingly, but without a doubt very candidly and passionately.
Maybe this is not enough for some people, maybe you didn’t or can’t, unlike me see so much of yourself in the characters - me especially in both Alice and Eileen, with their sadness at the world and the people, Eileen with such consuming fear and self-destructiveness and Alice with such crippling anxiety.
The narrative is interesting alternating between third person, with the most beautiful writing that can really put you in there seeing everything as if it was a movie set or the real deal - you know? -, and the first person by way of emails Alice and Eileen exchange between them. Also, pretty good queer representation without being anything about it.
I understand why this author is as hyped as she is, and why, still, there are many who don’t understand that hype. But, as you can clearly imagine after this review, I’m going to devour the rest of her work.
One last note indeed proving how much this book meant to me and how much I related to it, I never mark books, but there was so much I didn’t want to forget, so much I may want to go back to, that I finally made use of those tiny post it thingies and marked the hell out of it.
That’s it folks.

Content Warnings