Valentine

Cute, easy read with some essence of the feels at the end

this book just seemed like a novelized version of the general Amanda Knox story

wow. Wow. Wow. Wow.

I couldn’t possibly write a review that would do this book justice. The more that I learn about the history of Palestine the more my heart breaks. Must read.

fine if you like tennis. I found the main character to be shallow and wholly unlikable.

what, and I cannot stress this enough, the actual fuck? 🥴😭

the book was cute. It was an easy read but was still interesting.

I should have read reviews before buying the book. I loveddddd Under the Whispering Door, so I blindly got this book.

We meet joe when he’s 10. we really get to know this character throughout his childhood. Then suddenly at 17 there’s an attraction and lots of detailed talk about what ox wants to happen but ThEy’Re wAiTiNg until joes 18. Then right before he’s «of age» he disappears for a huge bulk of the book, and doesn’t return until there’s like 1/8 of the book left, and then there’s a lot of really explicit stuff happening, with lots of reminders of how Joe was when he was little.

I’m sorry but the story would not have suffered without all the highlights of age, or a character being of age. And with all the weird E FILES stuff happening now I’m just really no thanks on this book.

I was also not a fan of the writing style. It felt really choppy.

😻

the writing was a bit scattered for me. I have adhd so when I’m reading, I like the plot to be kind of a grounding factor. It felt very clear to me that the character in the book also has adhd, so it was really difficult for me to zero in and focus on the book - reading through the character’s mental spirals kind of exacerbated my own.

good story; but the entire plot just felt like mean girls with a different cast.

read this to make sure it’s appropriate for my almost 10 yo - happy with the historical content and the plotline. Will be leaving the book out laying around for my son to discover and read when he’s ready 🙂

I had trouble getting into the book, only making it to page 20 the first time around. It is clear the author put extensive research into this book, and it shows in the deep, personal character relationships and descriptions of their work. By the time I was halfway through though, I didn’t want to put to down.

this book highlights the privilege I have just because of where I was born and who I was born to. Quick, but important read.

The plot had the potential of being really great, but unfortunately the writing was a little juvenile. There was too much of a focus on body shaming, a lot of repetition of details that weren’t important enough to be said more than once or twice, and over-simplifying of plot points that could have been expanded upon to make the story more engaging. The chapters were each so short it made the story feel choppy, and the book didn’t become a real attention grabber until the last four chapters.

Though I love most of Murakami’s other novels, this one just didn’t do it for me. There was too much repetition, and the character development left a lot to be desired. At times it felt like the writing was happening for the sake of reaching a word count rather than to make a full, comprehensive novel. A lot of details repeated in great detail, but didn’t seem to be relevant to furthering the story along in any way.