A review by ttfa
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
5.0
Although I've only read a few books so far this year, this is the one where I was so invested and sped my way through it in a day.
It's one of those books that really manages to capture the voice of a teenager without sounding cringy. In a way it reminds me of Radio Silence by Alice Oseman, as this also mentioned emails and tumblr and threaded it in so it felt like a natural part of Simon's life and not 'gimmicky'.
Simon is so wonderfully snarky at times and also flawed - but it's great that he points these out in hindsight. The relationship with his family was given a good amount of depth as well. I'm glad it also shows his interactions with his friends and that messy, emotionally-strung drama that comes with teenage years. And the romance was just...so wonderfully warm :'). It's so important that a book like this has a happy ending.
One thing I was really glad to see was that wasn't redeemed (or at least, left ambiguous). I'm glad Simon was allowed to be (rightfully) angry and the narrative showed the weight of that action,
My only minor issue was that it felt quite short - I would have loved it to be a little longer and maybe flesh out the romance outside of the emails a bit more. But overall, I'm really glad I read this book - a wonderful example of YA at it's finest.
It's one of those books that really manages to capture the voice of a teenager without sounding cringy. In a way it reminds me of Radio Silence by Alice Oseman, as this also mentioned emails and tumblr and threaded it in so it felt like a natural part of Simon's life and not 'gimmicky'.
Simon is so wonderfully snarky at times and also flawed - but it's great that he points these out in hindsight. The relationship with his family was given a good amount of depth as well. I'm glad it also shows his interactions with his friends and that messy, emotionally-strung drama that comes with teenage years. And the romance was just...so wonderfully warm :'). It's so important that a book like this has a happy ending.
One thing I was really glad to see was that
Spoiler
MartinSpoiler
even if the person he truly remorseful at the end.My only minor issue was that it felt quite short - I would have loved it to be a little longer and maybe flesh out the romance outside of the emails a bit more. But overall, I'm really glad I read this book - a wonderful example of YA at it's finest.