Confessions of a Literary Addict

I’ll admit it — I was really skeptical of this book when I first started reading it because of everything I had heard about it, despite everything I had heard about it being good. I mean, yeah, usually I love books that other people love, but I’m always afraid the book will be overhyped and I’ll go in with such high expectations that I’ll ultimately be disappointed by what I read. I had nothing to worry about, though. This book was amazing.

Remember to watch out for spoilers!

I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson
Series: No.
Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Release Date: September 16th 2014 by Dial Books
Format: Hardcover, 371 pages.
Rating: 5/5 Crabapples
Find it here: Goodreads || Book Depository

Jude and her twin brother, Noah, are incredibly close. At thirteen, isolated Noah draws constantly and is falling in love with the charismatic boy next door, while daredevil Jude cliff-dives and wears red-red lipstick and does the talking for both of them. But three years later, Jude and Noah are barely speaking. Something has happened to wreck the twins in different and dramatic ways . . . until Jude meets a cocky, broken, beautiful boy, as well as someone else—an even more unpredictable new force in her life. The early years are Noah’s story to tell. The later years are Jude’s. What the twins don’t realize is that they each have only half the story, and if they could just find their way back to one another, they’d have a chance to remake their world.

I think the only thing I really didn’t like about this book was that the language was just a little too flowery for my liking. Don’t get me wrong, I can handle a good amount of flowery and metaphor, but this one heaped it on pretty heavily. It did seem pretty appropriate for two extremely artistically inclined twins, but I would still find myself pulling away from the story here and there when it just got to be too much. It didn’t make me hate the story in the end at all, though.

I found myself much more attached to Noah’s story than I was to Jude’s. In fact, for a long time I found myself dreading when Jude’s parts would come up, wishing I could read more about Noah and his love for the boy next door. I eventually came to love Jude just as much, especially near the end, but it took a little longer for her to fall into my heart than it did for Noah, whom I loved from the very start. Every single chapter I rooted for him, hoping that Brian would turn out to be the kind of guy who would love Noah back in the way he wanted to be loved.

Let’s just say I got way too emotionally invested in this book. Like. Way too emotionally invested.

I got so restless watching Brian and Noah interact, like I wanted to cram my hand into the book and just push them together. My heart absolutely shattered when it seemed like Brian had chosen Jude over Noah, and when Brian had left Noah to sink into himself. (I absolutely loathed Jude during this point, by the way.) And then, at the end, when he finally came back, all was well and I felt so immensely satisfied with the book at that point that I couldn’t not have given it the five stars that I did.

Ugh. I had way too many feels. I am not proud.

And while I did not life Jude for a good portion, I did start to warm up to her as I went, especially when she started working with Guillermo. He was hilarious and I started to really enjoy Jude’s chapters a lot more once he was featured in them more prominently. I hated Oscar though, and really wish he hadn’t put Jude through what he did. Frankly, I wish he had gone off and screwed himself. Jude deserved better.

All in all, great book. I want to read more of Nelson’s books for sure, but I don’t know if any of them will top this one.

Thanks for reading!

xoxo Nova