A review by meanthumb
The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen

adventurous dark emotional hopeful 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? N/A

4.5

wonderful read. flew through this book in two days. had to stifle my sobs bc im a #childofvietnameserefugees and #lgbtq+, so reading this at work was kind of a mistake lol. some parts are a bit darker than i anticipated and i enjoyed that i think. i do feel like the overall story could have been more cohesive, but im not upset about it at all because the drawings were beautiful and the transitions from IRL to fairytale were very smooth. 

thoroughly enjoyed the ending BTS pages too. i love how the author treated the illustrations as the actual text and designed the characters and landscape of the fairytales based on how each character reading the story views the world. love the costume designs that came along with this thought process. 

adding this here bc this line impacted me the most and i want to remember it: page 112 "This little book took me eight years to earn. Was it worth the last eight years of my mother's life? And what sort of daughter does that make me?

 
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