**DISCLAIMER** THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS. The following review reflects my experience reading the ORIGINAL release of the book back in 2022. I cannot and will not comment on the June 2023 release with Simon & Schuster as I have not read that version. I do not know how or if the rerelease differs from the original release. Please keep that in mind as you read, and feel free to point out anything that has since changed compared to my review! TRIGGER WARNINGS Please read at your own discretion. *** Writing Style: The biggest reason I nearly dnf-ed this book twice was the writing style. I’m sure you’ve seen numerous reviewers say this already, but it rings true: this book was written as if its only intention was to be quoted. The writing style was less of a writing style and more of improper use of grammar. Some sentences were just fragments. Others were incomprehensible run-ons. Despite the author’s intent to be “musical”, the grammatical inaccuracies happening on EVERY PAGE did the opposite effect. I found that there was little variation in sentence structure, especially as more fragments were introduced. So many lines were just so short, and all the ones following them were short too. It created this very robotic, monotonous feel. On the contrary, some sentences were run-ons, and ones so long that I had to read them multiple times to figure out what they were supposed to mean. They lacked commas in the proper places. In general, the writing was incredibly naive. The plot was buried under purple prose, distracting from whatever was happening. There were countless times where dialogue would be split with paragraphs and paragraphs of monologues, and when a character would speak again, I would have no clue who was talking or what they were even responding to. It felt distinctly like a thesaurus was dumped onto every page. Characterization: Maybe this one’s just me, but the characters were just super stereotypical to me. - the giant athletic boy who’s actually a softy? Seen that before. They all felt super underdeveloped, and especially so given their lack of depth due to cliches and harmful stereotypes. Honestly, because of their lack of depth, I felt like I was reading about the same character over and over again. This was especially true when apparently almost every character had some kind of affinity for writing. (And because every character was either a reader or a writer… I felt like I was reading about the author, you know? Though she claims to separate herself from her characters, they were all painfully resembling of her, and that furthered my feelings of it seeming like I was reading about one character over and over again.) These characters didn’t really have personalities beyond the brief things I mentioned in their stereotypes list. C was just aloof and gentle, Neo was just mean and poetic, Sony was just chaotic and loud, and Hikari was just Shakespeare quotes and tears. None of the characters developed beyond this. And then there’s Sam. God, they’re a whole other issue. Again, SPOILER WARNING. We find out at the end of the book that Sam is the physical incarnation of the hospital. (Which, in my opinion, was a really confusing, rushed, and mediocre twist.) Their entire drive in the story was wanting to know why people suffer and die. Sam had this awfully annoying savior complex in which they frequently insisted they wanted to save everyone… …and then never actually did anything to help. Despite the savior complex, they also claimed they weren’t allowed to interfere. It just doesn’t make sense. If the hospital can create its own physical body, be able to talk and touch and feel and love, then why couldn’t Sam interfere with the patients’ diseases or other issues? Their selective complacency is exactly what killed their friends. Sam never told anybody about Neo’s ED or abuse. They never told anybody that C and Sony were overexerting themselves. They never told anybody that Hikari was suicidal and was cutting herself. Obviously it’s not like Sam could’ve cured them, but Jesus, they could have TOLD someone!
- Mentions of suicide/self-harm
- Mentions of eating disorders
- Mentions of physical abuse
- Mentions of pedophilia
- The dark and broody boy with daddy issues? I can name quite a few
- The conventionally attractive loud girl whose only qualities are conventional attractiveness and an overwhelming presence? Totally hasn’t been done before.
- And this last one just rubs me the wrong way… The yellow-haired, yellow-eyed (???) suicidal Japanese girl… huh?
It would have been better if Sam wasn’t the hospital’s incarnation. It just created a massive plot hole and lots of inconsistencies.
Not only that, but I just couldn’t stand them as a narrator. I get that the book was supposed to be heavy, but at the same time, it was supposed to be a book about hope. And for supposedly being about hope, Sam’s internal (and external) monologues were just chock FULL of melodrama and apathy. Their whole “I’m not sure I’m capable of feeling” schtick was odd.
Long story short, I couldn’t stand Sam, and they are probably the most inconsistent, annoying narrator/character I’ve ever encountered.
Dialogue:
Hinging on the last section, the characters’ lack of depth also affected the dialogue.
Every character, save for Eric (who is the only character I like), spoke like it was poetry night at their local coffee shop. They all had such embellished airs to them, speaking in metaphors and, somehow, purple prose. It pulled me out of the story and created an incredibly unrealistic feel. I already said these characters had little depth, but this just made it worse considering they all spoke in this equally obnoxious manner.
This especially applies to Hikari and Sam. Their interactions were just bizarre and oftentimes incomprehensible.
Sometimes the characters would say normal things, and for a moment my hopes would increase, but I would immediately deflate when someone spoke in poetry again. For being young adults, they were overly philosophical. They’re simply too young to be speaking they way they are; they don’t have the life experience for the type of things they say. On the other hand, they were also all incredibly childish, though I can sort of understand that part — they’re teenagers whose childhoods have been taken from them. I get it, but their childishness juxtaposed against their apparent proclivity for philosophy didn’t quite match.
Mental/Physical Illness:
I cannot stress enough just how dangerously this book portrays both physical and mental illness.
Not only does it promote self-destructive behavior (see: running away from the hospital to “live a little”), it uses their illnesses as plot devices.
Before I get into the dangerous portrayals, I’ll explain what I mean for the latter. The reasons it felt as though the illnesses were just plot devices was because they weren’t important until they were, if that makes sense. For example, there are moments where the characters are so obviously doing things that should be nearly impossible given the severity of their illnesses, but unless the scene was specifically ABOUT their illnesses, they were just… fine.
But lets get into why they were dangerous portrayals:
They get glossed over. Everyone ignores everyone else’s obvious signs of decay. Their diseases get swept to the sidelines.
Until, of course, it’s all too late and they start dying rapidly.
I mentioned earlier that Sam never helped anyone, but this applies to all of them, honestly. Both Sam and Hikari knew about Neo’s ED and never told a staff member. EVERYONE saw Hikari’s fresh self-harm wounds, but instead of, I don’t know, getting her help, Sam KISSES HER, and then proceeds to cut their hair. HUH?
That REALLY bothered me. Hikari was sobbing on the floor, bleeding profusely, hair falling out because of her disease, yet Sam decides “ah yes! This is the perfect moment to confess my feelings to her since I hurt her feelings earlier!” I think I shuddered when Sam straight up kissed her then. Of all times to confess your feelings, and of all times to have a FIRST KISS… maybe don’t do it when someone is in the most fragile mental state imaginable, okay? That was just disgusting to me.
But back on track. Every character is complacent, willfully ignoring the signs and just letting each other wither away until it was too late.
I’m connecting this to the next section, which is the following:
Romanticization:
Their mental and physical illnesses are so grossly romanticized.
When C realizes he needs a transplant, he doesn’t want it. His reasoning is that his broken heart is the one he gave to Neo… implying that a transplant would erase that. He WANTS to die because the sick version of himself is the one Neo loves… or something??? And then there’s the fact that when C’s body did reject the new heart, resulting in his death, Neo starves himself to death just to be with him.
That is two instances of the author blatantly romanticizing suicidal tendencies, using their illnesses as a springboard into it.
I was also generally bothered by the way their diseases and symptoms were painted with flowery language. Yet at the same time, while trying to raise awareness about chronic illness, Lancali also just succeeded at demonizing them. I remember Neo’s dad’s abuse being COMPLETELY dismissed in the following passage: “The great abuser in Neo’s life was not his father but the sickness in his veins.”
WOW. The way his victimhood is pitted against his illness is awful. It’s framed as though those two things can’t coexist, which isn’t true. So Neo’s abuse being dismissed in favor of demonizing his illness absolutely does not sit well with me. Obviously illnesses are bad and are not fun, but again, it’s the fact that it’s used to overlook his abuse that’s incredibly dangerous.
“Genderfluid Representation”:
It’s in quotes because it’s a lie.
When the author introduced the characters in a character sheet on her instagram, it said that Sam used any pronouns.
Right. Well, in the book, there is a SINGLE instance of someone using a pronoun for Sam. There is a single “they” in 400+ excruciating pages, about 300 or so pages in. And yeah, that means that throughout the entirety of the book, everyone just referred to Sam by their name. No pronouns, no nothing.
And let’s talk about the fact that Sam’s being genderfluid was actually a really harmful portrayal.
Sam’s genderfluidity was not genuine in the slightest. Remember, Sam is the incarnation of the hospital. They created a body for themself.
Sam’s androgyny and ambiguity did not exist for genderfluid representation. It existed for the end-of-the-book plot twist when we find out Sam isn’t quite real.
There was a moment where I believe Sam describes Neo’s mom’s reaction to seeing them, saying something like “I know from the look on her face that she can’t tell if I’m a boy or a girl.” That sentiment would have been nice if the fact that Sam’s androgyny wasn’t just because they weren’t exactly human.
And later, Sam describes themself as essentially looking like nothing you can describe and everything you can imagine at once, meaning they have no set appearance.
I was throughly angry by then. Not only did Lancali skirt around genuine trans rep, but she didn’t even make her one and only genderqueer character HUMAN. This perpetuates the idea that trans/nb people are “less than human”. It also perpetuates a notion I hate with a burning passion, which is that “trans/nb characters only make sense if they’re shapeshifters”. It is SUCH a harmful notion, and this book is no exception.
Lancali didn’t make Sam genderfluid to represent the trans community. She made Sam genderfluid for her cheap plot twist.
Relationships:
This will be the last thing I talk about here.
I did not like a single relationship in this book. Even Neo and C.
Let’s start with them. I hated the way their relationship began. I didn’t like the way C kept pestering Neo when Neo clearly wanted to be alone. I didn’t like the way Neo was just super rude to him (and to everyone for that matter. I honestly didn’t like Neo).
And I ESPECIALLY didn’t like learning what C did to Neo. So, no, C wasn’t involved in Neo’s bullying, but he was a willful bystander.
When we first learn that C “didn’t realize’ Neo was getting beaten up, it’s essentially passed off as C’s ADHD making him super withdrawn. (That is already a bad portrayal of ADHD, by the way). But we later learn that C is actually “almost always paying attention”, and shortly after this is revealed, it’s revealed that C did willfully ignore Neo getting beaten up because he was “indecisive”. That’s kind of fucked up. ADHD cannot and should not EVER be an excuse for being a bystander.
So from the beginning to the end, I could never once get behind their relationship.
Now on to Sam and Hikari.
They’re my least favorite.
Sam is immortal. They’ve been “alive” since the birth of the hospital, and they still retain their memories of that time. Though their body doesn’t really age, it’s still gross. I absolutely despise immortal x mortal tropes, because let’s be honest: it’s pedophilia.
(I’ll be calling Sam ‘Narrator-Sam’ for a bit here, because Sam’s first love was named Sam. That Sam will be ‘Real-Sam’.)
Narrator-Sam’s first love was Real-Sam, a boy they watched grow. Emphasis on “watched grow”. Narrator-Sam was THERE (not physically yet, but consciously watching) when Real-Sam was born, and then watched Real-Sam age and grow, eventually creating their physical form so they could get to know Real-Sam. (Narrator-Sam is called Sam because Real-Sam told them to share his name… which is just super super weird to me. AND it says that Narrator-Sam modeled themself off of Real-Sam. That’s also weird.)
We know Sam’s consciousness had been around for at least sixty years prior to Real-Sam’s birth.
And then when Real-Sam died, does that mean Narrator-Sam had to wait at least nineteen more years to meet Hikari?
Do you see the issue? It’s just thinly veiled pedophilia. I think the author tried to hide the age gap by having Sam be, like, SUPER ignorant to the workings of the world. You mean to tell me Sam is at least eighty years old but doesn’t know what chocolate or sarcasm is? For being an entity that has observed people for all their time existing, that doesn’t make sense. Again, Sam is a super inconsistent character.
But what also bothered me about Sam and Hikari’s relationship was the fact that it seemed like Sam was trying to fall in love with her BECAUSE she was Real-Sam’s reincarnation. I already don’t like the insta love trope, so that made this worse. For claiming that they refused to let love into their heart, Sam sure fell for Hikari instantly because of her “yellow-flaired eyes” (??? What does that even mean?). Hikari had such a boring personality that I and many others just don’t understand what Sam would have seen in her other than their past lover.
Then their relationship was just Shakespeare and cheesy dialogue. It had no depth. And again, the fact that Sam confesses to/kisses her immediately after she’d cut herself is just so so so wrong to me.
Summary:
All in all, this book was simply not for me. The writing style was overbearing, the characters were flat, and there wasn’t a plot I could get hooked on to.
But even if all that had been rectified, the fact that this book promotes self-destruction, insinuates that nurses/doctors are blind to/complacent about their patients’ issues, and romanticizes dangerous topics and notions is what makes this such an uncomfortable, disappointing read for me.
(By the way, the trigger warnings in the book are BURIED. They’re in the foreword — which should actually be called a preface, by the way — under paragraphs and paragraphs of the author kind of ranting about why this book means a lot to her. The TWs are not listed out; they’re simply lumped into another paragraph. Many people could not find the TWs are were very upset with this book. They fact that the TWs don’t stand out at all should have been my first red flag.)
Look. I don’t like bringing logical fallacies into arguments, but listen. I should have known better than to have high hopes for a book written by someone who worships Hanya “I don’t believe in therapy” Yanagihara.
But anyway, this review actually only scratches the surface of the things that bothered me about this book. Over the next couple of weeks, I will be posting an even more in-depth review on my instagram (@cerulean.writes), and there I will provide more topics, more examples, and even ways to avoid and/or correct these mistakes so that future authors don’t make them.
If you read all of this, thank you. I know I can get pretty heated when I’m passionate about something, so I hope this review doesn’t contain much of my rage. I know some squeaked their way in, but again, I have a hard time toning down strong feelings.
I wrote this review to shed light on the mistakes/dangerous things in this book that I don’t want to see others replicate, so I hope this was helpful and educational.
