Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - Yerba Buena

Reviews tagging 'Sexual content'

Yerba Buena by Nina LaCour

86 reviews

alouette's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective 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

4.0

the author has a beautiful way of writing prose that clicks with me, and finds a way to bring mundane plots to life. while the side characters fell kind of flat, the main romance was still very sweet- though, i do wish it started earlier in the novel so we actually got to see more scenes of them together! the ending was also kind of inconclusive and not super satisfying, but i really liked emilie and was glad to see her having finally found the starts of an identity and passion carved out for herself.

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falltumn's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.25

objectively not a bad book! just too heavy for me to really enjoy. HEAVILY encourage looking into the warnings before reading, it loads a lot at the beginning but it's still prevalent throughout the whole book.

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florecita_lectora's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful sad 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

2.75

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dominic_t's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-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

3.5

This book was really good, but the author made some structural choices that made the book less enjoyable to read.

I knew that trauma was involved with Sara's backstory, but I was not expecting the emotional impact of the opening of the book.

Sara's first love (Annie) is found dead in the river, and her dad told Sara that Annie would be found there. Sara ran away after that. I certainly don't blame her.

The book switches between Sara's and Emilie's perspectives. I really liked seeing the world through their alternating perspectives. However, it was really uneven. We would get really long stretches of hearing from only one character, and then there were parts of the book that quickly alternated between the two of them. I would have liked to see the viewpoints switch more often.

I did like the long stretch of Sara's viewpoint when she was traveling back to her hometown after her father's death. That really highlighted how alone she felt. But other than that, I think alternating more frequently would have made the book stronger.

I loved seeing Sara and Emilie together, but the way their relationship started was a bit strange.

They lock eyes and are attracted to each other, but Emilie is involved with someone else. They have no further interactions until they see each other again a year later after Emilie dumps the previous partner. And the flame immediately ignites! I would have liked more of a buildup. It would have made sense for them to interact occasionally at the restaurant. And I also found it weird that Sara didn't care that Emilie was having an affair with a married man. That wouldn't raise any questions about her character? They just never discussed it. And while we're on the subject of the married boyfriend...I could have done with a lot less of the extramarital affair portion of the book. I would have preferred to see some of those pages dedicated to Emilie and Sara interacting.

I also thought the ending was strange, and I am actually fine with ambiguous endings.

The ending basically talks about Emilie being afraid that she and Sara are trapped in this cycle of Sara leaving when her pain overwhelms her and then Emilie taking her back. Except that the second example of Sara "leaving" was when she went back home to deal with her father's estate after he died? And then she moved without giving Sara her address? So who is really the unreliable person here? She left this really needy voice-mail on Sara's phone after Sara left, and then moved away and left no forwarding address. That is a super shitty way to treat someone you supposedly love when they are dealing with really complicated grief. Typing all this out actually made me mad enough to knock this down half a point.

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delz's review against another edition

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dark emotional fast-paced

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

3.5

There are two main characters, Sara and Emilie. We start out with their backstories. Both live in California, one from a good family,Emilie. Sara’s family is questionable but the way it’s written was confusing to me. That led to more confusion later in the book. Also when the two women finally meet it’s a love at first sight no build up to the relationship which would have been better than all the pages of Emilie’s relationship as “the other woman.”

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kellis821's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced

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

4.0

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glmarie0428's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

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

4.5

This book felt natural and surreal in a way that makes it fit more into the fiction genre than romance, which is different for me.

It all starts off really dark with a young girl who needs to leave town because she has watched her girlfriend be lifted out of a river dead and then proceeds to leave home ASAP by sleeping with someone for money and taking off with a guy that she barely knows. Both women do not have great home lives or experiences with love, so it interesting to watch how they interact with different people whether or not they are in a romantic sense. I would love to reread this novel to better understand the symbolism of the Yerba Buena, but it is constantly reoccurring. The connection between the two women at the end is worth all of it in the end, as their connection is tender, genuine, but also understandingly hesitant.

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pawprintedpages's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective sad tense fast-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

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raphynette's review against another edition

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dark emotional hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

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

3.0

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preciouslittleingenue's review against another edition

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dark emotional inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

One of my new favorite sapphic stories. A beautiful example of a story that isn’t ABOUT being queer, but has queerness seamlessly woven throughout the same way straightness traditionally can be with no effort. This was a coming of age story for both women, and they just happened to be queer.

Sara’s plight gutted me. In the beginning, the whole “the only solution is to run away” baffled me, but I’ve come to notice this is a recurring theme in La Cour’s work (We Are Okay comes to mind first, which I also read and loved but have not reviewed yet). And the more Sara’s character was constructed, the more it made sense for her. I have a little brother that I was old enough to help raise (albeit with two parents) and the thought of losing him so young is enough to kill me. So I get Sara, I do. Their reunion was so complicated. It just kept hurting.

Emilie is almost seemingly less pitiable, but that would be superficial to say wouldn’t it? Being manipulated by an older married man fucks you up big time. I didn’t think I would feel for her as much but god I did. And then I felt like an asshole for judging her as a home wrecker when she was receiving trauma the whole time. I loved the weaving in of her New Orleans culture, loved the rekindling of love between sisters.

And Sara and Emilie together. I ship it so hard. I know Sara is a mess, and I was so worried all the while that this would be the “I’m too fucked up to be in a relationship” trope but La Cour didn’t disappoint. I know they lived happily ever after. I know they had a sick gay wedding. I love them so much.

EDIT: do agree with other reviewers, though, that it isn’t a romance. Notice how above I said “new favorite sapphic story” not “sapphic romance.” Because I kind of felt that it was more than a romance before I even read other reviews. It’s really about these women growing, healing, and finding themselves, and the last step to that just happens to include each other. Which I happen to find incredibly romantic. I love it.

Definitely my favorite of La Cour’s work. Her prose and language is the most beautiful in this one too. Her work always flows beautifully as it’s read to me (I’m an audiobook girlie) but this one was just exceptionally so. Cannot recommend enough. Gorgeous in every way.

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