sydn3y3's reviews
373 reviews

miss brontë sure knew how to keep a reader hooked!! idk if i’ll ever read this again but i do understand the hype 

enjoyed this a lot :) so romantic and interesting, but not mushy. i’d read another memoir of hers in an instant

felt like i flew through this bc so much happened!! i’m such a sucker for stories like these. like yes give me the drama but also the hard work of a farmer!! so simple but so human. i feel like everything was wrapped up pretty nicely too which i appreciate immensely
and ofc the women were stealing the show with these lines-

“maybe love is like collecting things, like collecting colored rocks to put at the bottom of a spring.”
and later
“i love you like a piece of colored stone”
like ok!!
“we all lost something, but we go on. now and again we lost whats dear, and the wound is on us. we carry many a wound by the time we get to aging, but i’m not afraid of scars, and I’m not fireside-tied yet, needing warmth, neither. I’m not old yet.”
exactly

the human aspect was the best part of course - the survivors’ stories brought me to tears, especially the two brothers finding each other… jesus. 
I could’ve done without the whole Wilson bit tbh 

not my fave Cather, but i did enjoy the subtle reflections of class, gender and capitalism. Cather pines for the old pioneer era without recognizing that the era had its own issues…nostalgia is apparent throughout. I’ve noticed this in her other novels of course, but i think it stood out in this one more, perhaps because it was alongside Niel’s nostalgia for Marian as she used to be… 
and tbh i did like Marian and how she was adamant at claiming “life on any terms” - yes girl!! live your life!! i wish we could’ve seen her through her own eyes instead of men in her life. 

A very sweet little book

so enjoyable to listen to

being a tween is torturous!! 

pretty depresso and ferdinand basically takes over the second half of the book w his rants which is meh but i do love

a cliffhanger ending

what can i say! capitalism is our enemy never forget 

i enjoyed this one more than the idiot, partly because i’m used to the writing style more now, and partly because Selin gets more into the “who am i” aspect of things. you can see the coming of age arc happening. covers so many aspects and questions involved in growing up as a woman, in a way that is both straightforward and complex. the deadpan humor vibe is good too. lovely overall