hsienhsien27's review
4.0
CCLaP will always be present on this blog okay? Another CCLaP book on here. I feel like most of their works are novellas, which is fine, because there are so many stories that you can stretch until the plot or the whole concept of the story becomes thin and the whole point of the novel would be a sort of overabundance of unneeded words. I feel like I might've said this before. However, that usually depends on the reader, I'm a person who isn't too bothered with a lack of plot, a concept is what usually drives a story, even if the plot hits a fork in the road and splits in half, there will still be meaning to it. That is why I rarely loan or recommend books to people, because apparently I like boring ones. OMG ,CONCEPTS AND CHARACTERS WITH TRAGIC FLAWS, I LOVE THOSE! That's basically me.
Have You Seen Me, is a novella focusing on the lives of two outcasts, young adults, who live in a narrow minded, rural area. One, named Vyv, runs away into the city and hopes that her friend comes after her, so they can live together in a world that she perceives as better. Chris, her friend and brother figure, feels a sort of isolation, the fact that he might be Gay or Bisexual and his family problems, specifically his father and grandfather, causes him to feel alienated, Vyv and another town outcast, Albert, are the only ones who make him feel somewhat less foreign.
The novella is basically a coming of age, where the front masks of people aren't always the same. The strong rebel, is vulnerable and hurt, the cynical intellectual, secretly hides a sort of hypocrisy that contradicts his own written philosophy, and the soft spoken one, who is stuck in between both wars, and decides in the end, to stay, despite one pulling from the other direction.
Nelson's writing is what really makes this novella so moving, it's golden. It's filled with the right amount of emotions, chocked full with the picture of teenage angst and confusion. She doesn't waste words and it feels as if the narrator wants to get down as much as he can, within one gasp of breath.
Nothing really gets solved, it was more like a short film of Chris reminisces of his friend and he realizes the reason for all of her quirks, insecurities, and basically her own being, the reason why she is the way she is, and her general dislike for her home and the people that surround her. Have You Seen Me is a coming of age, of accepting those for who they are, including their tragic flaws.
Rating: 4/5
Have You Seen Me, is a novella focusing on the lives of two outcasts, young adults, who live in a narrow minded, rural area. One, named Vyv, runs away into the city and hopes that her friend comes after her, so they can live together in a world that she perceives as better. Chris, her friend and brother figure, feels a sort of isolation, the fact that he might be Gay or Bisexual and his family problems, specifically his father and grandfather, causes him to feel alienated, Vyv and another town outcast, Albert, are the only ones who make him feel somewhat less foreign.
The novella is basically a coming of age, where the front masks of people aren't always the same. The strong rebel, is vulnerable and hurt, the cynical intellectual, secretly hides a sort of hypocrisy that contradicts his own written philosophy, and the soft spoken one, who is stuck in between both wars, and decides in the end, to stay, despite one pulling from the other direction.
Nelson's writing is what really makes this novella so moving, it's golden. It's filled with the right amount of emotions, chocked full with the picture of teenage angst and confusion. She doesn't waste words and it feels as if the narrator wants to get down as much as he can, within one gasp of breath.
Nothing really gets solved, it was more like a short film of Chris reminisces of his friend and he realizes the reason for all of her quirks, insecurities, and basically her own being, the reason why she is the way she is, and her general dislike for her home and the people that surround her. Have You Seen Me is a coming of age, of accepting those for who they are, including their tragic flaws.
Rating: 4/5
mscott's review
5.0
I really liked this book, plain and simple. The story was engaging and really kept you thinking until the end. I didn't know what to expect but paid to download it and was not disappointed. I probably identified with it being set in a fictional small town in Nebraska, having grown up in small town Nebraska myself. I could see another book coming from this as everything wasn't completely resolved. I highly recommend it.
daviddavidkatzman's review
5.0
I loved Have You Seen Me. Have you ever found yourself reading a book, and you think … it’s so beautifully written, there’s going to be a misstep. There’s got to be because nothing could ring so true. That thought kept popping into my head for some odd reason as I read this, but every page I turned rewarded me with more honesty, effortless storytelling, and masterful writing.
The writing in Have You Seen Me had a certain quality that was remarkable. The sentence structures and the words selected aren’t showy. They’re not elaborate and extravagant. Yet they present a poetic rhythm contained within a realistic sensibility. Most of all what struck me was how powerful the story was at a sentence level and for a while, I was baffled how Nelson did it. Eventually, I came to the realization that what brought the seemingly effortless, excellent grammar* to such a high plane was the intensity of emotion that flowed through the entire work. This intensity embodied both the unconscious needs and conscious actions of the characters, and it gave a sense of absolute necessity to everything that is said, thought, or that occurred. Nothing is superfluous. Nothing is arbitrary or gratuitous. There is no room for that when you live on the knife-edge of passion and risk—of self and life.
The story centers on a deep and tortured friendship between two queer kids (high school age) in a small town in the Midwest. Vyv and Chris are both (mostly) in the closet, Chris more so than Vyv because he would not be accepted as gay in this small town and risked severe beatings or worse. At least Vyv tends to express her difference through a punk/goth style while Chris is trying hard to fit in until he can get away to college. He’s worried if he were outed, he might even end up thrown out by his own family. Vyv experiences severe anxiety/ depression/self-hatred, unable to express her true inner self in this backwater town (as she calls it). Vyv runs away from home while Chris does not, and this story follows what happens next.
I can’t highly recommend this enough. Have You Seen Me was a double nominee in the 2012 LAMBDA AWARDS for Best Gay Fiction by a Debut Writer and Best Bisexual Fiction of the Year. So I’m not the only one who loved it. Order the ebook or the high-quality handmade print book direct from the publisher here: http://www.cclapcenter.com/haveyouseenme/
*I use the word grammar to signify not just the sentence level grammar, but also the linguistic choices from word to sentence to paragraph to metaphor to symbolism, and so on.
poultrymunitions's review
4.0
Stupendous.
Rich with hilarity as well as the kind of creeping horror some writers would kill to be able to reproduce reliably.
A moving, atmospheric tapestry of storytelling magic, with the odd paragraph or two so glitteringly beautiful and intense I simply forgot to keep breathing for a bit.
Joy. And fear. And love. All mixed-up together in a glorious stew of feelz.
Absurdly good.
Rich with hilarity as well as the kind of creeping horror some writers would kill to be able to reproduce reliably.
A moving, atmospheric tapestry of storytelling magic, with the odd paragraph or two so glitteringly beautiful and intense I simply forgot to keep breathing for a bit.
Joy. And fear. And love. All mixed-up together in a glorious stew of feelz.
Absurdly good.
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