Kiwi

This is a book that will stay with you for a very long time, for better or for worse. It seems you either love or hate this book, and I came out loving it (even though I ugly cried through over 20% of it—and it's a long book).

As someone who usually reads fantasy and not much set in the real world, I could not put this book down once I got past the introductory section. It was very easy for me to get attached to Jude, who the entire book revolves around (I didn't even realize when starting that this is mainly his story). I was rooting for him the entire way through, desperately wanting to know more about him at each turn as it would offer me something new as a treat.

The characters all felt like they lived real and true lives, and written to perfectly match how you're meant to feel about them in that moment. Even certain characters who I loved the whole way through made errors that I hated reading about, thought to myself that I wouldn't forgive someone doing that to me—and that's life. The relationships everyone has with each other, not just with Jude, are the strongest part of the book.

I'm not used to reading such long prose, but it was very enjoyable. I did have several moments where I would start reading one sentence and get lost among the different branching off thoughts and ideas the single sentence goes through, and I'd have to return to the beginning of the sentence to remember what it was meant to be about. This would also happen with chapters, which would sometimes go into a completely different topic than where we first started before finally circling back around. There was also a lot of academic and legal talk that made me wish I were going back to university, and I didn't have a good mind map of the locations and geography talked about, which makes me curious if someone who knows New York well would be able to picture it clearly.

I think about this story at least once a day.

I wanted to start off 2024 by stepping out of my comfort zone (fantasy), and this was the first book that was available on the Libby app and that I finished this year. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed it, including the audio narrator.

I was confused on some aspects of the book, namely that the first short story had me thinking they were all going to be in some way about lesbians—that is certainly not the case, although I won't proclaim the book definitely said that's what they were going to be about. There was—obviously—a lot of religious talk and contemplation, and I found myself relating to a lot of the confusion and thoughts of some of the women.

As a very quick rundown through each short story: "Eula" nearly made me sob while I was walking to work; I didn't enjoy "Not-Daniel", any situation of unfaithful partners is very icky to me, but I was also still confused over the lack of lesbians; I enjoyed the style of the way "Dear Sister" was written, but I do wish I could've heard a response back; "Peach Cobbler" was simply a wild ride to go through, I felt so bad for the main girl; "Snowfall" was probably my favourite—thank you, lesbians—and it had the perfect atmosphere I wanted for winter; "How to Make Love to a Physicist" was genuinely sweet, I loved hearing about the budding romance and the struggles with God and faith really struck home in some spots; "Jael" was really rough for me to get through simply because of the blatant homophobia mentions, but the end was a proud moment; I actually had a great time with "Instructions For Married Christian Husbands" even though it featured more unfaithful partners, it was so full of well placed humour and unabashed rules; and finally, "When Eddie Levert Comes" was an incredibly sad read, it broke my heart as the final story.

Genuinely better than I hoped it could be after the initial hype. The last quarter of the book had me reeling.