inherentlysleepy's reviews
211 reviews

Had to dnf at 15% because I find everything (characters, prose, story arc) simply hilarious, unbelievably juvenile, ridiculously shallow, and farfetched. This is exactly why I'm skeptical of reading romance, even though it got good reviews on GR.

Seriously, why on earth does it have high rating?!

Ishiguro sure does know how to make me feel depressed.

Trippy! This feels like a shroom-induced writing lol. I got the creeps, in a good way.

For the first half it rambles on what I recognize as some known philosophical ideas. It's very smart. I like these types of conversations between characters. It's thrown here and there, all over the place, but I liked its overall ambiguity.

I'm Thinking Of Ending Things won't be for everyone. I see why people would feel divided about this novel. Either you like it OR you don't. I'm glad I lean more towards the former.

I enjoyed this more than watching the Netflix movie adaptation. I think it's become even better/interesting by listening to it in audiobook.

Oh me. I had once been Elio. Elio was me. In a sense that I take familiarity in his longing for someone he thought he loved. But was it really love? I beg to differ. For me it was merely teenage infatuation when the hormones were at their strongest.

Aciman wrote the prose so beautifully and artfully. Some say that they find the narrative pretentious. I can see where they're coming from, considering the author seems to drown the readers with endless literary and classical art references. But I didn't mind it. I'd soaked myself in them as though it was a warm honey.

What I loved most about it though was the thorough, carefully, and delicately worded observation of a juvenile, burning with desire and aching passion for someone we were once strongly attracted to, at least once in our younger lives. Aciman put this emotion under a microscope and held it out against the morning light when it's the brightest, so that our eyes could clearly see what it is as much as feel it for ourselves.

Easily a favorite read. Would even say it's up there on my top 5! Only for one thing: I thought the last part unnecessarily dragged on and would have preferred the movie ending. Either way, I can understand why this book is named one of the modern classics.

4.5 ★

[ Now that I've finished it....


*Stares blankly into the void.....* ]

"People can mean so well and want the same end results and still miss each other by such a cavernous margin. When we fell in love it was like I could only see the gorgeous top part of Jim, but now with the introduction of adversity I could only see his ugly pulsing sinewy underside. I knew they were both true, but I could never see them both at the same time."

I so badly want to not to want to give Ash Wednesday a 5/5 just because it's written by Ethan Hawke, my ultimately revered indie film King. But goddam knowing who he is as an artist, and as a huge fan of his films, I just couldn't help it.

One main reason I tried so hard to convince myself that it doesn't deserve a 5 star rating is that this novel disregards the golden rule, "Show, not tell," when it comes to writing (and filmmaking). And also simply because the whole premise of the story is just plain boring: Two complicated lovers pregnant with their first child, driving across the US as they take the biggest leap in their relationship.

But you see, that is what's on the surface, and that's where I got it wrong. Their driving across states is not just driving for no reason. And a story is never boring with very much unlikeable, but also complicated, intricately layered and ironically eccentric characters. One couldn't just fit them in a box for their sprawling philosophy and stupidly profound éxchange of dialogues. Which reminds me of characters played by Hawke and Julie Delpy with director Richard Linklater in the Before Trilogy (which I *adore* religiously).

Maybe it's just me, but I enjoyed how Ethan wrote the alternating POV of our two main characters, Jimmy and Christy, in a specific parts of the story where it would highlight their vulnerability the most.

It also got me wondering whether or not the tone and stance of characters throughout the book reflect Ethan's core beliefs and values on a more personal level rather than him as a writer simply drawing fiction from other people's real life experiences independent of his own. I'm romanticizing the idea that I got to see him eye to eye, subtly peering in through his mind and soul, just by reading this book. Or maybe I'm just being inappropriately nosy.

Anyway, nothing much really goes on throughout the book. It's a character driven story (and a character study, if you're into that kind of stuff) instead of hooking readers in for a spectacular storyline. Overall, I understand that this novel won't be everyone's cup of tea. But I find Ash Wednesday like a cerebral film on a crisp 200 page-novel format. I freaking loved it.

And yes, if it were a movie I want Richard Linklater to direct it.


******

BTW this concludes my 2020 Reading Challenge aaaaaaaaahhhhh I'm so happy

I've only read three of Christie's books so far, and once I heard that a movie adaptation of this book comes out soon I had to hurry and read it. And boy was that too much drama for a mystery novel. I loved it!

One can't help but marvel at Nabokov's prose. Most of the time I find myself re-reading sentences and paragraphs not because I did not comprehend it, but because it was just plain beautiful. This short story compilation (and a few chapters from Lolita) is a masterpiece.