Sabrin

i enjoyed this! jennette mccurdy's writing style is simple and i like her sense of humor which makes reading a story that's so harrowing also feel light? but also not in a way that ignores what's going on. very similar to <i>i'm glad my mom died</i> in that regard. i listened to the audiobook in a day. waldo is so relatable to 17-year-old me, unfortunately. in her horrific thought patterns, her compulsive behaviors, and the way the shadow of her mother looms over her every thought related to men. i can see how she might be unlikable to others but i love her dearly. and her high school best friend who pronounces every -ing as -een, which waldo finds irritating and i find so charming. too bad she's marrying a mormon, or whatever. i already forget. reading the end had me feeling pretty meh, but i ultimately enjoyed the ride.

the premise of this serial killer romance was really interesting, but i did not like this book... i borrowed the audio book from the library, and the only thing that kept me listening to the end were the excellent narration and voice acting done by joe arden & lucy rivers. i probably would not have finished this book if i had read a physical copy of it. rowan started to get annoying to me once i realized he wouldn't let go of the 'woah boobs' bit, and their whole dynamic just felt way too normal for who they are? i was expecting a little more chaos but at a certain point i just felt like i was reading a regular hetslop romance novel. so yeah. this was a bore.

i don't even know where to begin with this fever horror. i loved reading this book. it made me throw up in my mouth multiple times. i love these characters. i hate these characters. i got lost and i'm not sure all of me got found. i didn't want this to end and i was dying to see what would happen next. this book, with all it's strengths and all it's flaws, is the perfect cosmic trans horror to me.

i love sole, as much as i hate sole. he is such a fascinating character, drowning in self hatred and his own selfish desires that not even a new body can really fix. i love that he will do anything for his body back, and the extents to which he hurts the people he loves for it. i love that his story is one of unrelenting and unforgiving desire. "without malice, god had crammed me into a body, a purpose, which was going to kill me." i love the friendships sole has with ersilio (my dearest beloved ersilio...) and malacresta (who i like to call the walking talking lead poisoning psa) and the love he had for nene. i loved the childhood flashbacks and the drunken dreams and the gut wrenching realization that we end the book exactly where we began. there are some moments in the book that confuse me in it's hazy chaos but i think that's fine. it earns the description of being a fever dream cosmic horror. "it wasn't quite love. it was horror at the size of my love. it was self-loathing." it was a wild ride, reading as sole destroys everything that is good in his life in his dreams and in his discombobulated perception of reality. "i'd rather be stuck in a corpse's belly, dreaming happy dreams, than out here in abyssal nothing." if that's what sole calls a happy dream....

i highly recommend this book if you can stomach it. i barely could and i loved every moment.