Girl, Serpent, Thorn

Girl, Serpent, Thorn, Melissa Bashardoust. Was going to be called "She Was and She Was Not" but presumably somebody realized that was going to lead to frustrating searches and bookstore conversations. (Although I like it better, myself.) Fairytale-esque YA about a girl cursed from birth to be deadly poisonous to the touch. I thought the concept had a lot of potential but the book didn't lean into what I found compelling about it, and what it was doing didn't really work for me. There was a point when the protag was like "everything was a tangle", and I do see the appeal of trying to write that kind of story - sometimes in real life everything is a tangle too - but as a narrative it felt like more of a muddle. Or at least I am the sort of reader who likes characters with clear goals and plots with momentum. I kept reading it to see if it was going to be gay (SPOILERS: yes) but I also didn't entirely love the (SPOILERS) bi love triangle, in which her attraction to the dude is more intense, but her attraction to the girl gets words like "gradual" and "delicate", which, again, sure! fine! but made me feel like she had more chemistry with the "wrong" one. ONE MORE SPOILER: ( Read more... )