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A review by kdl_gadzella
When We Collided by Emery Lord
I have never felt so compelled to write a review, and I am literally sitting down to write this immediately after finishing this book so I want to preface it with four facts:
1) I can’t talk about this in the way I want to without Spoilers, so THERE BE SPOILERS COMING UP
2) I have no experience with bipolar disorder. I have briefly studied in in school but have never experienced it, nor anything similar so I feel strangely unqualified to comment on it.
3) I have also never lost a parent, so I similarly unqualified to speak to that grief. That being said, I have lost people close to me, and watched my entire family grieve and so I have a little bit more of a handle on what that looks like. Well, at least what it looked like to us.
4) I am a big old ball of emotions as I am writing this but it felt right to sit down and spew it out now, so I am going to apologize in advance for my rambling.
I feel like I need to start this with the piece that I might get a little bit of flak for. I was not as head over heels for this book as so many people seemed to be. In my opinion my favorite is still The Start of Me and You but I think that was because I connected so very much with Paige and as I have said I had a harder time connected with Vivi. That being said, I think it was a book with a story that needed to be told, and just because it wasn’t my favorite doesn’t mean that it wasn’t wonderful in its own right.
I had a hard time connecting with her, but I do feel as though this book was written in such a way that I understand her. However I just had a hard time backing so many of the decisions that she made in the book. Yes, I understand that this in turn stems from her bipolar disorder but I like in a constant state of hyper rationality. I am in such a field that I have to be able to make decisions without leaning on my emotions.
This is where my one major issue with this book comes into play. I absolutely hate the whole jealous girlfriend angle. Specifically when it comes to a girl who has been friends with her boyfriend for a long time. This hits so close to home because one of my best friends is male. We are both lucky enough to be in relationships with people who understand that it is just a friendship, and realise that if we wanted to date each other, we would have. This is why the whole issue with Ellie just bugs me. Again, I realise that this jealously stems from other things going on with Vivi, but I just think this is something that could have been avoided.
Okay, so lets move onto Jonah. Oh Jonah. His family just hit me so directly in the feels. I think that Emery Lord did a fantastic job of putting together this group of kids. I fell in love with each and every single one of them. I felt the grief from each and every one of them in their own ways, and the display of the different ways a family can deal with death. And the way sometimes a new presence can help to heal in different ways.
Jonah and Vivi were good for each other, and they were what each other needed at the time. I was not sad about the ending. You can be right for a person for a time, but not forever which I think was the case with these two. The needed each other to learn more about themselves, and to grow into the adults you could see them becoming. In my head, I don’t think that they end up together, I honestly don’t know if they ever see each other again, but they will never forget each other, and they will remember that summer as an anchor into reality.
I feel as though I had so much more to say but I cannot for coherent sentences to explain my love-hate relationship with this book. I’ll end with one final thought
I don’t think I can give this book a star rating, there are too many important things and it is an important book, but I felt a major disconnect from it just because of the life I have lived. I have tried to figure out a score out of five and I just can’t do it. I find ratings to be such a personal thing anyways, and its just even more so with this one.
I would love to hear anyones thought on this book! If you have oppinions hit me up on twitter <3
1) I can’t talk about this in the way I want to without Spoilers, so THERE BE SPOILERS COMING UP
2) I have no experience with bipolar disorder. I have briefly studied in in school but have never experienced it, nor anything similar so I feel strangely unqualified to comment on it.
3) I have also never lost a parent, so I similarly unqualified to speak to that grief. That being said, I have lost people close to me, and watched my entire family grieve and so I have a little bit more of a handle on what that looks like. Well, at least what it looked like to us.
4) I am a big old ball of emotions as I am writing this but it felt right to sit down and spew it out now, so I am going to apologize in advance for my rambling.
I feel like I need to start this with the piece that I might get a little bit of flak for. I was not as head over heels for this book as so many people seemed to be. In my opinion my favorite is still The Start of Me and You but I think that was because I connected so very much with Paige and as I have said I had a harder time connected with Vivi. That being said, I think it was a book with a story that needed to be told, and just because it wasn’t my favorite doesn’t mean that it wasn’t wonderful in its own right.
I had a hard time connecting with her, but I do feel as though this book was written in such a way that I understand her. However I just had a hard time backing so many of the decisions that she made in the book. Yes, I understand that this in turn stems from her bipolar disorder but I like in a constant state of hyper rationality. I am in such a field that I have to be able to make decisions without leaning on my emotions.
This is where my one major issue with this book comes into play. I absolutely hate the whole jealous girlfriend angle. Specifically when it comes to a girl who has been friends with her boyfriend for a long time. This hits so close to home because one of my best friends is male. We are both lucky enough to be in relationships with people who understand that it is just a friendship, and realise that if we wanted to date each other, we would have. This is why the whole issue with Ellie just bugs me. Again, I realise that this jealously stems from other things going on with Vivi, but I just think this is something that could have been avoided.
Okay, so lets move onto Jonah. Oh Jonah. His family just hit me so directly in the feels. I think that Emery Lord did a fantastic job of putting together this group of kids. I fell in love with each and every single one of them. I felt the grief from each and every one of them in their own ways, and the display of the different ways a family can deal with death. And the way sometimes a new presence can help to heal in different ways.
Jonah and Vivi were good for each other, and they were what each other needed at the time. I was not sad about the ending. You can be right for a person for a time, but not forever which I think was the case with these two. The needed each other to learn more about themselves, and to grow into the adults you could see them becoming. In my head, I don’t think that they end up together, I honestly don’t know if they ever see each other again, but they will never forget each other, and they will remember that summer as an anchor into reality.
I feel as though I had so much more to say but I cannot for coherent sentences to explain my love-hate relationship with this book. I’ll end with one final thought
I don’t think I can give this book a star rating, there are too many important things and it is an important book, but I felt a major disconnect from it just because of the life I have lived. I have tried to figure out a score out of five and I just can’t do it. I find ratings to be such a personal thing anyways, and its just even more so with this one.
I would love to hear anyones thought on this book! If you have oppinions hit me up on twitter <3