Aja

DELICIOUS. downright delicious! and while it still makes me wanna knock down the doors of Goodreads HQ and tell them to allow half-stars so I can give this a proper 4.5 star-rating, I actually do not mind bumping it up to a 5! like it was that good to me! so fun, so smart, so so charming. and tbh the -0.5 was solely due to the fact that it took a little bit of a moment to fit my American foot into this book's Irish shoe. and that is not to the book's detriment at all! this book was just so complex and well-rounded without ever being exhaustive. and I don't think I've ever read a book that utilized the element of pop culture so well and right, especially being a reader who grew up in the 2010s. caroline o'donoghue you did that shit. also we need to talk about that ending because....................wtf.

“What is a game?” Marx said. “It's tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. It's the possibility of infinite rebirth, infinite redemption. The idea that if you keep playing, you could win. No loss is permanent, because nothing is permanent, ever.”

This book was...good? yes; kind of grand and sweeping? also yes; a wild portrait of a friendship as it weathers time and art and creation? hell yeah. Did I like it? Holistically speaking, I think so. It took just a little bit to get to where it was going, but once it kinda got there, it got really interesting. I think there were some very cool elements at play here. But, I wouldn't say it “changed my life” as some people in the comments claimed it did for them. And I wouldn't say that's a total disservice: not every book has to do that, it just colored a lot of my expectations going in, so I couldn't help but feel slightly let down at times.

I just have to say, what a concept this book is; a sort subversion of what can happen when a “boy” meets a “girl,” what can come of a relationship, a partnership, how life's trauma can warp said relationship, and, really, one's understanding of what it means to love someone as well.

Smart writing, yet surprisingly simple. Admittedly, made me fall back in love with hardcover. I liked it, that's it. But it's moments like these that really made me wish Goodreads had an option for half-star ratings...

“But nothing I've worked on in my career nor in my life has been as rewarding, as fulfilling, or has made me feel even a fraction as good as it feels to be in love with Emma. Maybe I love my stupid little life, and I just want a house and kids and a vegetable garden and pets named after fictional characters and to learn how to pickle and to crochet and to be love. Maybe I don't need to be special anymore. Maybe I can let that go.”

**Jill Gutowitz, you have gutted me! As someone who self-identifies as both queer and annoyingly into pop culture, you have seen, heard, and affirmed me in ways colorful, comedic, and concise. I want to be your friend, I want to *be you, I want to follow you on every single publication and platform from this point forward. Thank you for this! Thank you for all of this!

(Oh, and this book is officially instated into the lesbian canon starting now!)

this was, like, major. and (tmi) so much of the narrative - its style, written with so much care - had me thinking back to the peak of my own manic phase

August is a time....So, August is a place....So, August is a person.I love you. Summer never ends.Jane

—

Well, if there's one thing Casey McQuiston knows how to do, it's fucking ruin me. She ruins me with perfect-written worlds, with the most wonderful characters, the sexiest smut, and genuinely fun and creative storylines where characters learn the most compelling things about themselves, things we know deep down and things that we need to be told every once in a while, to remind us that we are not alone. That learning through loves hurts, but it's so beautiful and necessary.

TL;DR: Casey McQuiston is a queer literary GOD and this book has left quite the mark on me. “We all have ghosts” is a lesson I have learned and continue to learn, both in love and life in general, and this book was such an enjoyable, funny, quirky, smart, and genuinely romantic way of exploring that idea. The minute I picked it up, I couldn't put it down. Casey, you've done it once again!

fucked my shit UP and made me sad, once again, that all books eventually have to come to an end. very happy that this book's particular one sat right with my spirit.

do yourself a favor and read this book...

“Who am I? Who am I?”
“You're Jude St. Francis. You are my oldest, dearest friend. You're the son of Harold Stein and Julia Altman. You're the friend of Malcolm Irvine, of Jean-Baptiste Marion, of Richard Goldfarb, of Andy Contractor, of Lucien Voigt, of Citizen van Straaten, of Rhodes Arrowsmith, of Elijah Kozma, of Phaedra de los Santos, of the Henry Youngs. You're a New Yorker. You live in SoHo. You volunteer for an arts organization; you volunteer for a food kitchen. You're a swimmer. You're a baker. You're a cook. You're a reader. You have a beautiful voice, though you never sing anymore. You're an excellent pianist. You're an art collector. You write me lovely messages when I'm away. You're patient. You're generous. You're the best listener I know. You're the smartest person I know, in every way. You're the bravest person I know, in every way. You're a lawyer. You're the chair of the litigation department at Rosen Pritchard and Klein. You love your job; you work hard at it. You're a mathematician. You're a logician. You've tried to teach me, again and again. You were treated horribly. You came out on the other end. You were always you.”

“And who are you?”
“I'm Willem Ragnarsson. And I will never let you go.”

—

The journey that I went on with this novel was...something, to say the very, very least, and it started with a warning. Actually, several, from many different people who, when I expressed that I was even considering picking it up in the first place, were quick to DM me variations of the phrase, “Aja, don't. Do not read that book. Don't do it.” Well, anyone who knows me well enough knows that I am quite the contrarian, and when things come into my view with blaring lights and sirens, warnings and controversy, I just have to explore for myself.

And when I tell you that I am so glad I did, that would be the understatement of the century.

This book - this dense and rich character study, this portrait of a fictional person I think I could safely say I know more intimately than most of my own extended family - was the book to end all books, the narratives to end all narratives. Never have I picked up a book and been so enthralled, so continuously compelled to read one page and then another and another til the sky went from light to dark. Never have I been this engaged by, this taken by a character (Jude), or characters so much so that their failures and successes, their highs and lows feel like my own, feel both thrilling and upsetting, so personal to me. And it got soooo much emotion out of me, smiles and laughs, as well as tears and sobs.

The world this book created in my head was so vast and detailed. Never have I had more fun mentally “casting” people to play each part, never has a literary image produced in my head been so vivid and real. It was absolutely delicious in that right as well. God, all of the lore, the trauma!!!!!

And look, I am trying so hard to give words to what was such a transcendental experience for me, so sorry for all the rambling. But I am just at my wits end with this, y'all. This book was everything to me, and not even a one-million word review could encapsulate that.

Like, I just...I just can't.
Do not listen to the haters or some random people on Twitter who only read the Sparknotes.
Please read this fucking book: today, tomorrow, or somewhere down the road in your life.
I promise you will not regret it!