karen's Reviews > Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe (Aristotle and Dante, #1)
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HAPPY PRIDE MONTH!!
i really thought this was going to be a slam-dunk of a book. all those prestigious awards and recognitions, a gay coming-of-age story that got the coveted dana stamp of approval, that cover….
and it is not a bad book, not by a long shot; i definitely enjoyed reading it. it just doesn't transcend its YA status like so many YA books do. this is an excellent book for its audience, but for me, it doesn't have that crossover appeal that so many recent YA titles have had.
it gets points for featuring an untraditional LGBT protagonist; a young mexican-american boy with few social attachments, dealing with his distant war-haunted father, his much older, clucking sisters, the (figurative) ghost of his brother, about whom no one has spoken since he was incarcerated, and his own inability to make emotional connections, or even feel much of anything except a simmering, inarticulate rage. his mother is very loving and supportive, but ari lacks a true male role model figure, since his father is shuttered in a cage of his memories of vietnam and drifts through ari's life without being any kind of real presence. ari has always felt apart, particularly from the world of boys and their interests.
I’d never really been very close to other people. I was pretty much a loner. I’d played basketball and baseball and done the Cub Scout thing, tried the Boy Scout thing – but I always kept my distance from the other boys. I never felt like I was a part of their world.
his is not a case of being a bookish, indoor kid who doesn't relate to the rough and tumble world of "normal" boys; he likes to fight and drink and he wants a truck and a dog - he has just never felt comfortable in the company of boys.
until he meets dante.
dante is definitely one of the indoor boys. he is sensitive, he reads poetry and draws, he is emotional and frequently cries, and asks probing and highly personal questions with his deeply inquisitive mind. he is also mexican-american, but has only a tenuous relationship to his cultural heritage, and this discomfort affects him deeply, even though he is very self-assured in other aspects of his character.
for some reason, the two boys find something in each other that just clicks, and they become inseparable over the course of a summer. the novel traces their relationship and their various insecurities and their growing attachment to each other from ari's perspective, as he struggles with his identity and his inability to recognize what it is that he wants out of life.
and that is gripe number one.
(view spoiler)
my second gripe is the writing style, particularly the dialogue. there are people who have a knack for dialogue and people who do not, and people who have a facility for writingstilted stylized dialog that doesn't "ring true" but is still effective, like david mamet. but here, the dialogue didn't feel natural and these characters never came alive for me. there was a lot of repetition in their speech, and a lot of those snappy, witty moments you find in YA contemporary fiction, but it never felt relaxed. to use this portion of a david foster wallace interview i just read:
and i wasn't bored - i am not saying that, but i think the same rule applies to things that are so overly manipulated that they don't feel the way people really speak or interact. i mean, it's a novel - we all know it is a construct, but sometimes even a construct can feel… effortless.
for example, i just don't buy this kind of emo-poetic musing coming from a kid who pushes down all his emotions and is battling all his violent urges:
Even though summers were mostly made of sun and heat, summers for me were about the storms that came and went. And left me feeling alone.
Did all boys feel alone?
The summer sun was not meant for boys like me. Boys like me belonged to the rain.
but enough of my griping - there are some really touching moments in here, although for me, the most resonant ones came from ari's relationship with his parents rather than his relationship with dante.
good stuff, just not the lingering heartbreaking tenderness i was anticipating.
come to my blog!["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>
i really thought this was going to be a slam-dunk of a book. all those prestigious awards and recognitions, a gay coming-of-age story that got the coveted dana stamp of approval, that cover….
and it is not a bad book, not by a long shot; i definitely enjoyed reading it. it just doesn't transcend its YA status like so many YA books do. this is an excellent book for its audience, but for me, it doesn't have that crossover appeal that so many recent YA titles have had.
it gets points for featuring an untraditional LGBT protagonist; a young mexican-american boy with few social attachments, dealing with his distant war-haunted father, his much older, clucking sisters, the (figurative) ghost of his brother, about whom no one has spoken since he was incarcerated, and his own inability to make emotional connections, or even feel much of anything except a simmering, inarticulate rage. his mother is very loving and supportive, but ari lacks a true male role model figure, since his father is shuttered in a cage of his memories of vietnam and drifts through ari's life without being any kind of real presence. ari has always felt apart, particularly from the world of boys and their interests.
I’d never really been very close to other people. I was pretty much a loner. I’d played basketball and baseball and done the Cub Scout thing, tried the Boy Scout thing – but I always kept my distance from the other boys. I never felt like I was a part of their world.
his is not a case of being a bookish, indoor kid who doesn't relate to the rough and tumble world of "normal" boys; he likes to fight and drink and he wants a truck and a dog - he has just never felt comfortable in the company of boys.
until he meets dante.
dante is definitely one of the indoor boys. he is sensitive, he reads poetry and draws, he is emotional and frequently cries, and asks probing and highly personal questions with his deeply inquisitive mind. he is also mexican-american, but has only a tenuous relationship to his cultural heritage, and this discomfort affects him deeply, even though he is very self-assured in other aspects of his character.
for some reason, the two boys find something in each other that just clicks, and they become inseparable over the course of a summer. the novel traces their relationship and their various insecurities and their growing attachment to each other from ari's perspective, as he struggles with his identity and his inability to recognize what it is that he wants out of life.
and that is gripe number one.
(view spoiler)
my second gripe is the writing style, particularly the dialogue. there are people who have a knack for dialogue and people who do not, and people who have a facility for writing
That's why people use terms like flow or effortless to describe writing that they regard as really superb. They're not saying effortless in terms of it didn't seem like the writer spent any work. It simply requires no effort to read it - the same way listening to an incredible storyteller talk out loud requires no effort to pay attention. Whereas when you're bored, you're conscious of how much effort is required to pay attention.
and i wasn't bored - i am not saying that, but i think the same rule applies to things that are so overly manipulated that they don't feel the way people really speak or interact. i mean, it's a novel - we all know it is a construct, but sometimes even a construct can feel… effortless.
for example, i just don't buy this kind of emo-poetic musing coming from a kid who pushes down all his emotions and is battling all his violent urges:
Even though summers were mostly made of sun and heat, summers for me were about the storms that came and went. And left me feeling alone.
Did all boys feel alone?
The summer sun was not meant for boys like me. Boys like me belonged to the rain.
but enough of my griping - there are some really touching moments in here, although for me, the most resonant ones came from ari's relationship with his parents rather than his relationship with dante.
good stuff, just not the lingering heartbreaking tenderness i was anticipating.
come to my blog!["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>
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December 13, 2013
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December 13, 2013
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Gema
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Dec 16, 2013 05:21AM
hey Karen, I want to read this book because it looks awesome. What do you think about this book?
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Odd that we would read YA books at the same time and come away with similar reactions, albeit mine was gay-themed (although it was gay-friendly).
I loathed the same things about this book. I read and listened to it on audio, hoping the repetition would be a device. (It was not). I loved this book but it didn't haunt me like I wanted it to.
hi karen, thx for the review - at first I thought I was the only one thinking how weird these 15y.o.s talked, and your review nailed it. I still love the lyrical style, but have to wonder if it'd work better if the characters are females? just a thought..
A+! Can I just copy this review, put it on quotation marks and paste it...! I agree with 97% of the things you said.
I just finished this and I had the same problem with the ending. SPOILER: I felt that the author took the easy way out. How much more difficult would it have been to write an ending where Ari is NOT gay and has to deal with that? Much harder. Nothing prior to the ending pointed to him being gay. People do shit for their friend and feel strongly for their friends without being gay. In the end, it all felt to easy ...
I loved this book but I have to agree with the part of Ari's coming out. I was hoping more for him to say it and his parents to accept rather than his parents tell him. Like an awkward, croaky admission to being gay or loving Dante. Though it was sweet, it sorta dumbed down the how meaningful it is to come out.
The style itself didn't bother me as much as it seemed to bother others, though,
The style itself didn't bother me as much as it seemed to bother others, though,
I loved this book but kinda agree with you too - but I was so caught up with it that the stuff you mentioned didn't bother me too much.
yeah, i definitely didn't hate the book, it just wasn't as mindblowing as i had hoped. still good, though!
I found your comments really insightful. Exactly what I was thinking except so much better expressed. Have you ever considered being a beta reader for an unpublished manuscript?
i've done it once or twice, for friends, but i don't really enjoy it. i don't have strong enough grammar skills to help on that front, and the rest is all just opinion. i do't even have time to read all the book i have planned on reading, there's no sense in making it worse!
My feelings exactly. Gripe number one was a big one for me - I would have liked it if he had come to the decision by himself. It seemed to be going that way at the start then completely veered off, so coming back round to it so suddenly right at the end didn't seem like a natural flow, it just felt rushed and abrupt.
My feelings exactly. Gripe number one was a big one for me - I would have liked it if he had come to the decision by himself. It seemed to be going that way at the start then completely veered off, so coming back round to it so suddenly right at the end didn't seem like a natural flow, it just felt rushed and abrupt.
It's truly a shame that you don't get this book, which is beautiful, both stylistically speaking and in content. The awards from Lambda, Stonewall, and other legitimate voices in the LGTB community speak for themselves.
But your review points to the problem when reviews are written by people who have no common touching points with either the characters or their lives. It's as if i were qualified to write a review of what it is like to grow up as a girl, transitioning to a woman. My review would be false, just as any attempt I might make to write such a book would be. It's not my world.
Growing up and emerging alive as a gay young man, a boy, in America is hard enough. As a Mexican in the South West it only gets much harder. The sensitivity with which the difficulties in communicating, in expressing, in showing myself to others is laudable. Yet you feel that the conversational style is not real. As a member of that very community, let me assure you that it is very real. And how can you think that you can comment on that.
This is not a grade-school style - this is the way many young Latino boys, gay or not, communicate.
I am appalled that such a sensitive book, about such a sensitive subject, written with such beauty and classical stream of consciousness style, has been trampled by such unfeeling feet. It saddens me.
I was there and shared much of that life. The portrayal here is real, accurate, and honest and sweet. I would hope you would try to feel the confusion of the protangonists, not put your own mold over their confusion. This could have been your story - it could have touched you deeply. I am sorry you weren't open enough to allow it to do so.
But your review points to the problem when reviews are written by people who have no common touching points with either the characters or their lives. It's as if i were qualified to write a review of what it is like to grow up as a girl, transitioning to a woman. My review would be false, just as any attempt I might make to write such a book would be. It's not my world.
Growing up and emerging alive as a gay young man, a boy, in America is hard enough. As a Mexican in the South West it only gets much harder. The sensitivity with which the difficulties in communicating, in expressing, in showing myself to others is laudable. Yet you feel that the conversational style is not real. As a member of that very community, let me assure you that it is very real. And how can you think that you can comment on that.
This is not a grade-school style - this is the way many young Latino boys, gay or not, communicate.
I am appalled that such a sensitive book, about such a sensitive subject, written with such beauty and classical stream of consciousness style, has been trampled by such unfeeling feet. It saddens me.
I was there and shared much of that life. The portrayal here is real, accurate, and honest and sweet. I would hope you would try to feel the confusion of the protangonists, not put your own mold over their confusion. This could have been your story - it could have touched you deeply. I am sorry you weren't open enough to allow it to do so.
i think it's pretty silly stance to suggest that readers can't form opinions on a book just because they haven't shared experiences with its protagonist. that would shut me out of 98% of literature, and pretty much 100% of all genre fiction - sci-fi, horror, fantasy, etc.
i'm glad you liked the book, and i'm glad you have taught me that gay mexican american boys in the american southwest speak primarily in call-and-response repetitive couplets, because i absolutely did not know that.
i don't think my feet were so unfeeling; i just thought there were some weaknesses in the writing and i would have liked a stronger and more self-aware coming out moment. but if you tell me that it's more authentic and powerful to be told by someone else what your sexual orientation is, then i guess i have to accept that as a fact and that my own experiences in life and literature are incorrect.
i'm glad you liked the book, and i'm glad you have taught me that gay mexican american boys in the american southwest speak primarily in call-and-response repetitive couplets, because i absolutely did not know that.
i don't think my feet were so unfeeling; i just thought there were some weaknesses in the writing and i would have liked a stronger and more self-aware coming out moment. but if you tell me that it's more authentic and powerful to be told by someone else what your sexual orientation is, then i guess i have to accept that as a fact and that my own experiences in life and literature are incorrect.
What a remarkably arrogant response - As if you had lived the life that would permit you to judge how people may actually talk, how they may actually feel. I don't suggest that you shouldn't read and enjoy books about people and places that you haven't experienced but, rather, that you might want to understand the point of view of primary sources before you impose your judgement upon them.
tell you what - since you feel so strongly about this book, why don't you go write a review of your own for it? i didn't tear the book apart; i thought it was fine, but not mind-blowing and i think i was pretty clear on what didn't work for me as a reader. your comments to me are absurd and condescending and it's just too hot to parse right now.
It's a conversation, not a pronouncement. Sorry that you feel the need to withdraw. I don't agree with you. And so we converse. As you wish not to, I will respect that as your rules, very much like Ari's.
I know one of my exes definitely appreciated being repeatedly lectured for years by her lesbian friends on how she was absolutely a lesbian, and she definitely didn't regret listening to them, because they were absolutely right and not just trying to get in her pants at all... XP
but it's not really a conversation when you've already declared i have no right to participate in a conversation on the subject, yeah? i'm honestly not even sure what you're seeing in my review that constitutes trampling or trashing in any way. i thought it was a fine book, but not great. that's hardly a reason to get so ruffled.
karen wrote: "thanks! books sure are touchy subjects!"
I shudder to think what your monsterotica reviews will elicit!
I shudder to think what your monsterotica reviews will elicit!
karen wrote: "nah, those are less problematic because i've lived that life, so i know what i'm talking about."
Oh PLEASE assure me you weren't Taken by the Trash King or whatever that was!
Oh PLEASE assure me you weren't Taken by the Trash King or whatever that was!
Dave needs to chill. It's FICTION Dave, a created work of art, and can be judged based on style with no commentary on the substance. Karen did a fine job discussing why the book didn't work for her. Your mileage obviously varies ...
I completely agree with your gripes about this book. It's so weird to me that his parents TOLD him he was gay. That really bothered me.
Hey, you said this is a good book but not like those YA monsters :) can you recommend me some please? Bye!!
I loved this book, but I felt the same way about the "coming out" scene. Ari sits there saying "no, no, no", then "oh I guess you're right". It was forced and awkward and very out of place considering I found the rest of the story smooth and flowing (we differ in our opinion there!
Our Diversity in All Forms Book Club is reading this for March. We’d love to have you join the discussion on it. :) https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
I realize I'm 2 years too late to this party but I appreciate reading this review and chain and REALLY appreciate Karen not letting people get under her skin! Wahoo! Freedom of speech and opinions and all that. That said... I did think the book was good, just not 4.35 worth. Do I think other people who relate to the story more would think that YES! Am I glad there are books out there for everyone? YES! Do I have to love them all? No. Just like I assume other people dont think as highly as The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing as I do - which I loved because I identified with so much at the time I read it. I'll go out on what might be an unpopular limb and say the 4.35 is probably inflated because I bet a lot of people have it 5 starts because they thought they were supposed to. Personal opinion. It was a good book. The dialog didn't bother me because teenage boys aren't exactly emotionally articulate. The story was good until it turned into OK. Like the author got tired of writing or something. Eh, read by lin Manuel miranda who did a good job with voices- so there's that. :)