This book is quite a short read yet it took me quite a while to finish, genuinely almost a year. It was extremely emotional and my fave character obviously got the sad ending but it is so meaningful how these relationships have evolved and changed through gaming and how they have had to adapt to the changes in technology as well as personal challenges like postpartum depression. It has its problems with plagiarism and I thought the writing style was too simple for me (just personal preference). I love how the ending is a full circle moment to the beginning, like regardless of their dips in friendships they're able to meet again and bond over what brought them together in the first place aka gaming. The author doesn't touch upon Jewish culture even though it is key to Sadie's identity which I find so frustrating because I feel like the author just added that in and never went into depth of her connection to religion, why mention it if it's not explored? I wish it was explored more.
The cross references with the time and just the way that we have such a complex character who acknowledges her mistakes but would never change it if she went back in time because she accepts that she’s made bad choices and she takes accountability for it alongside other characters. Lowkey a heart wrenching book but was so enjoyable to read I found myself going through the pages quite fast. I also understand the hype surrounding it and it’s definitely exceeded my expectations.
It was quite slow but the author would slowly reveal small plot twists throughout which aims to mislead you because the big key plot twist warps everything you’ve read so it’s totally unpredictable because you see each character’s perspective apart from the ones who are truly the masterminds behind these particular initiates being chosen so you are seeing it through their lens and are even more confused and creating personal theories which makes what really happens at the end more surprising than anything else because we now finally know what’s happening but the characters still don’t know the real reason why they’re there. I’m definitely reading the other books in this trilogy! I have a feeling everything I just wrote made no sense I was aiming to not spoil so it’s a book you need to read if you want to understand what I wrote 😭 it’s also got such a diverse set of characters and it’s such refreshing representation in all honesty :’)