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A review by mynameisprerna
Riven by Roan Parrish
4.5
If there’s anything I know about myself as a reader, it’s that as much as I love a good cheesy romcom, I really really love an angsty romance. This one does not disappoint!
The characters are endearing, not despite their flaws but because of them. Their struggles, while so disparate from the average person’s, manage to feel relatable. I was rooting for them all along!
Caleb liveson a farm upstate, and I really liked the metaphor of farming, growing things, rooting, harvesting, etc. as he comes out of rehab.
- “And I tried hard not to write songs that used what I saw as metaphors for my own rebirth. I tried not to identify too strongly with the weak, twisted things slumbering underground, that burst into slow and glorious bloom as they awoke. Not because I didn’t hope desperately to be tickled awake gently by the sun, or because I hadn’t been a weak and twisted thing. But because I knew the danger of waiting for some outside force to bend a gentle knee and change my life. I knew that if anything was going to bring me back to life, it would have to be me.”
- “The weather-beaten old man who owned the shop watched me stumble around for a while and stare at signs without processing their meanings, then he ambled over and tucked a packet of radish seeds in my pocket. Told me that I could plant them now, and I would be able to see them grow in only three weeks. I wasn’t sure I’d ever even eaten radishes, but he had understood what I needed: to see that my actions had consequences. To see that I could support myself, sustain myself. To see that I could create something again.”
This book is full of broken people trying to put themselves back together. I appreciate that they are messy, that this isn’t avoided or glossed over, but their messiness is celebrated with these pearls of wisdom they share as they support with each other.
- ““If you’re looking for a prize, you ain’t lookin’ for love. Love isn’t a reward. It’s not something you deserve or don’t deserve.”
- “How strong the stories we told ourselves were. What power they had to shape how we saw the world, even when confronted with evidence to the contrary. Caleb told himself the story that no one could depend on him because he’d break their trust. Clearly based in some truth, it was a story he told so many times he’d finally taken it as unassailable. It hurt me to think that part of his recovery, part of taking responsibility for the very real pain he’d caused, was carving deep the groove of that story. And what stories had I told myself? That I was unlovable. That I had to earn the right to be cared for. That unless I made myself indispensable, I would be tossed away.”
The characters are endearing, not despite their flaws but because of them. Their struggles, while so disparate from the average person’s, manage to feel relatable. I was rooting for them all along!
Caleb lives
- “And I tried hard not to write songs that used what I saw as metaphors for my own rebirth. I tried not to identify too strongly with the weak, twisted things slumbering underground, that burst into slow and glorious bloom as they awoke. Not because I didn’t hope desperately to be tickled awake gently by the sun, or because I hadn’t been a weak and twisted thing. But because I knew the danger of waiting for some outside force to bend a gentle knee and change my life. I knew that if anything was going to bring me back to life, it would have to be me.”
- “The weather-beaten old man who owned the shop watched me stumble around for a while and stare at signs without processing their meanings, then he ambled over and tucked a packet of radish seeds in my pocket. Told me that I could plant them now, and I would be able to see them grow in only three weeks. I wasn’t sure I’d ever even eaten radishes, but he had understood what I needed: to see that my actions had consequences. To see that I could support myself, sustain myself. To see that I could create something again.”
This book is full of broken people trying to put themselves back together. I appreciate that they are messy, that this isn’t avoided or glossed over, but their messiness is celebrated with these pearls of wisdom they share as they support with each other.
- “How strong the stories we told ourselves were. What power they had to shape how we saw the world, even when confronted with evidence to the contrary. Caleb told himself the story that no one could depend on him because he’d break their trust. Clearly based in some truth, it was a story he told so many times he’d finally taken it as unassailable. It hurt me to think that part of his recovery, part of taking responsibility for the very real pain he’d caused, was carving deep the groove of that story. And what stories had I told myself? That I was unlovable. That I had to earn the right to be cared for. That unless I made myself indispensable, I would be tossed away.”