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A review by booksandladders
The Memory of Things by Gae Polisner
Did not finish book.
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
DNF @ 53%
Tbh, this was a quick read up until this point, but I stopped and I just don’t really want to go back. I have no interest in it anymore and it is because of way it was written. This one states that there are alternating points of view -- and there are, but it is regular prose for Kyle’s point of view and then purple prose in a lyrical way for the girl. And it was so jarring to go from the regular prose to this weird poem right in the middle with no warning. At first I was like “wtf is this, did they screw up the eARC” but no it was just the way it was written. Just thinking about going back to read that is blah to me.
On top of that, I thought that while Kyle was really interesting and a pretty good guy overall, I just didn’t care about him or anyone else. I didn’t care that his dad was at Ground Zero or his mom was in LA. I was so numb and apathetic while reading this one. And it was about a really terrible thing! The bombings were horrible and I can remember them happening but I just did not care. I felt as though we were told that this terrible thing happened and then immediately removed from it so I just stopped thinking about the characters in relation to that, if that makes sense.
In the same vein, I thought the world building for this was really lacking. I find that when an author includes a tragic event that has happened in our present society, they exclude details of things that they would normally include if they were writing about a fictional tragedy that they added in. And that was definitely the case here. We got some details about the ash and the bridge being closed and how loud it sounded when the building fell, but it wasn’t enough to really put me in Kyle’s shoes, to feel his fear, to understand his worry, or anything like that. It was the bare bones of the tragedy rather than getting into the gritty details, which made it hard for me to connect with Kyle that way.
I did like that it was only going to take place over the course of the immediate days following the tragedy -- and I have heard that the ending gives you hope for the future. But I just don’t care enough to go back and finish it. I wanted something a little darker with some lightness to it rather than this. Also I just couldn’t handle the girl’s POV. I couldn’t.
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DNF @ 53%
Tbh, this was a quick read up until this point, but I stopped and I just don’t really want to go back. I have no interest in it anymore and it is because of way it was written. This one states that there are alternating points of view -- and there are, but it is regular prose for Kyle’s point of view and then purple prose in a lyrical way for the girl. And it was so jarring to go from the regular prose to this weird poem right in the middle with no warning. At first I was like “wtf is this, did they screw up the eARC” but no it was just the way it was written. Just thinking about going back to read that is blah to me.
On top of that, I thought that while Kyle was really interesting and a pretty good guy overall, I just didn’t care about him or anyone else. I didn’t care that his dad was at Ground Zero or his mom was in LA. I was so numb and apathetic while reading this one. And it was about a really terrible thing! The bombings were horrible and I can remember them happening but I just did not care. I felt as though we were told that this terrible thing happened and then immediately removed from it so I just stopped thinking about the characters in relation to that, if that makes sense.
In the same vein, I thought the world building for this was really lacking. I find that when an author includes a tragic event that has happened in our present society, they exclude details of things that they would normally include if they were writing about a fictional tragedy that they added in. And that was definitely the case here. We got some details about the ash and the bridge being closed and how loud it sounded when the building fell, but it wasn’t enough to really put me in Kyle’s shoes, to feel his fear, to understand his worry, or anything like that. It was the bare bones of the tragedy rather than getting into the gritty details, which made it hard for me to connect with Kyle that way.
I did like that it was only going to take place over the course of the immediate days following the tragedy -- and I have heard that the ending gives you hope for the future. But I just don’t care enough to go back and finish it. I wanted something a little darker with some lightness to it rather than this. Also I just couldn’t handle the girl’s POV. I couldn’t.
Books and Ladders | Books Are My Fandom | Twitter | Instagram | Bloglovin'