fruitea's reviews
78 reviews

i’m not gonna lie. i try not to read too much of the blurb when i’m looking for a new book to pick up because i find it more enjoyable to be oblivious. but this is something i have no excuse for, like i’m actually a dumb bitch. it took me a good few chapters to realise this is a retelling of romeo and juliet. but i was very invested in the story and the characters, the setting was different to the other romeo and juliet retellings i know, so it was very refreshing. it’s nice for us asians to have retellings of well known stories set in our own countries, with our own cultures playing a big role, with references to our own history. 

5 stars, this was one of those books where i had to stare blankly at a wall for a good ten minutes afterwards. 

this was a reread bc i missed the crows and once i’d finished it i almost decided to read it again but i have too many unread books anyway i love this book i love the crows i love them sm but they really need therapy🖤 

victor frankenstein (derogatory). terrible terrible father. listen my guy, you can't run away from the consequences of your actions.

and you can't marry your cousin you nasty little coward

i read this like three times for my a level and every time i became more and more (more more more more more and more) infuriated with victor. the creature (who i will subsequently be referring to as boris) is basically your child. how are you going to rob graves and put body parts together like puzzle pieces and only realise how horrifying that is after you brought boris to life. it's undeniable that boris is not a completely innocent character either, but victor is the reason all of this happened in the first place. it does make you think about nature vs nurture. are good and evil inherent in us? do we have no control over it? or is it our life experiences and the ways we're treated as children that makes us good or evil? it's the tabula rasa. the mind is a blank slate when you're born and to be honest i think mine still is. or it needs a good wipe clean so i can start again. like a chalkboard. 5 stars for safie and justine.

i listened to the audiobook of this and i really enjoyed it!! i think this is the type of story that you should listen to rather than just read, the type that should be said out loud. i only wish it was longer, i was so invested in it!!

to be honest, this kind of book is just not my cup of tea.

i don't particularly enjoy stories about younger teenagers doing drugs and having alcohol addictions. i totally understand that these are problems, but i prefer not to be reminded that i am more likely to have a debilitating addiction because of my family's history.

also adult theo creeped me out. the only quote i remember from this book is "vegetarian sweat" and i'm not even kidding, that line made me stop being a vegetarian.

hate it. absolutely hate it. this is not a good book for many reasons but i will only briefly discuss them because i could go on about how much i loathe this book for hours.

firstly, the prose is so straightforward and simple. this made it very quick to read, but i didn't get anything out of it. like, when i read a book there's usually a couple of lines or passages that i'll underline because they left an impression on me. this didn't happen at all for the power.

secondly, the message of this book is not good. at all. whether this is an inadvertent result or not, the very obvious interpretation of the whole premise of the power is that women will never achieve equality without having superpowers. which, you know, is a pretty shitty message. not to mention the subsequent actions of the majority of women. this is not a feminist book. this book describes radical feminism. dangerous radical feminism.

and, i'm not saying this is completely factual, but i think if women were to get this power... our reaction wouldn't be so extreme? i mean, i get that power often leads to corruption but idk. feminists just want equal rights? feminism isn't about women being superior to men. in fact, feminism benefits men because the patriarchy targets all of us. that's just how i see it though.

also - alderman failed to mention other genders? it was just 'women' vs 'men.' and i'm pretty sure she was only talking about cisgender people. so. idk, the fixation on only those genders was kinda weird to me. like bro i'm just trying 2 vibe i don't have a gender i wanna be like a walking moss covered rock.

thirdly, what's with all the gratuitous graphic scenes? this links back to my first point, in the way that having all of these nasty descriptions of triggering & disturbing things felt like it was solely for 'shock' factor, if that makes sense. like there were so many of them that it became gratuitous in a way. i ended up skipping them because i didn't want to be, you know, triggered by them. it just made the reading experience very unpleasant.

0 stars for bad writing, bad message and giving me more trauma.