Elyssa
This book is great because of the way its written and how it uses video games to inform the writing style. It changes its writing style based on how the game they are working on and that makes me so happy.
A lot of the things I love about this book are how it deals with identity. I appreciate how jewish this book is, whether intentional or not. I say this as someone who grew up in the south with a very narrow understanding of my personal jewish identity. I love that Sam is disabled and the fact that the book talks about disability as being debilitating at times. I love that Sam is mixed race. I love how Sam has trauma and the book doesn't shy away from that. I loved that his descisions and reactions are trauma informed. I loved that Sam majored in math because he was good at it and the conversation with that proffesor. I love that the book includes the sexism that Sadie deals with as a women in computer science and in the industry. I love that Sadie and Sam are both neurotic. A lot of the aspects of these characters are aspects of myself.
There are parts of this book I didn't love, but that doesn't mean I think it makes the book bad and makes it so the book is bad per say. I personally would have cut out a few scenes. I would have cut out, for example when Sadie and marx do a drug of some sort and like things get weird or Sam losing his virginity, because I felt like these scenes didn't add anything and took away from this lovely friendship. Maybe I say that because I learned the author widely writes YA and I wonder if these scenes were added on to seperate from the genre.
I still also am unsure about how I feel about Marx as a character, because what I love about Sadie and Sam is how flawed and imperfect they are written. Marx was not written nearly as complex, which was intentional but I think NPCS can be complex.
I liked the fact that this book portrays a complex relationship with Dov, but I also wish that the abuse was made a little more subtle and less obtusely gross. I wish Sam had done something about it. I think the reason I didn't love these parts is they were hard to read and imagine these characters who I relate to so much having to go through these weird out of place experiences.
The video game references also make me sooo sooo happy.
The reason this book is a 5 stars is despite all of my issues with it, I really loved reading it. I imagine a world where Sam and Sadie live together as roomates with her daughter and they make games together. I like how ambiguous the ending was, and how this book had different formatting.
Austin did change between 2015 and 2020 sorry Casey. Also the way she described the Austin house is wrong. No bay windows are there. Also that house is likely worth more then a million.
Outside of my Austiness of it all. This book is very very cute and even if I don't love the main characters and find Alex a little annoying and insufferable(he likely went to lasa it's not his fault). Poly science kids are always that extra tbh, it's not his fault he's insufferable. I love how dramatic and silly this book is.
I have issues with this book but here are my general thoughts:
1. Atlanta feels real like the same suburb I lived in briefly as a child, and my neighborhood was like that filled with asian immigrants. I lived in Cobb County.
2. The author seemed unaware of the fact that Jewish people are only a few years removed from being immigrants and unaware about the fact that Jewish kids in the South are always in the same neighborhoods as Asians and how those groups always intertwine throughout school.
3. The fact the author writes Bombay rather than Mumbai every single time.
4. How north indian this book is constantly mentioning generic North Indian dishes such as dal and other North Indian dishes, ignoring any acknowledgement of the Southern Region.
5. The audiobook narrarator mispronounced tamil pronouncing tamil the t hard american tam part like jam and il like ill like illness. This lost it a star from the 3 stars it would normally get.
