“You can close your eyes to the things you do not want to see, but you cannot close your heart to the things you do not want to feel.”
I needed some time to compose myself before I wrote this review. I spent the whole next day moping, mutter inconsistencies while in a daze of heart ache and contempt. How could four hundred plus pages affect me so profoundly? It is a work of art, that’s how. My chest was contracting, the last 85% of the book I spent heaving, mewling sounds coming from the back of my throat.
To sum up in one sentence the ramifications this book left on me personally by the end would be ‘I died a little on the inside’.
All I can contrive from it now is the opportunity to having bared witness to a love develop so pure through the pages, that it is to my solemn belief such love that evolved between these two could put contemporary romance to shame. With the modern day melodrama that tends to seethe in relationships I have come across that, in reality feigning interest has become the norm for most epilogues.
****************************FORBIDDEN*******************************
******************Warning may contain spoilers***********************
Lochan 17 & Maya 16 brother and sister have been left to their own devices from an early age. Neglectful parents; father abandon them, mother became an alcoholic partying floozy that disappears for days to weeks. With three younger siblings to think about the duo step into the role of partners splitting tasks in efforts to give the younger three somewhat of a family existence.
No one understands them let alone knows what’s going on at home. With the pressures of school mounting, raising three kids and add on top of that the stresses of figuring out who they will become/where to go as legal adulthood approaches in a disquieting life that was thrusted upon them they’ve only have each other to lean on their whole lives.
• Taboo
• Sick
• Disgusting
Are labels we/society tend to thrust on people and situations we cannot fathom or fear due to the lack of unwilling to understand. When you already have the expedients to connect with others, where does that leave people that feel labelized and outcasted?
Maya has one friend, a wanton little thing; biding her time she nurtures her siblings coveting the role of a mother. While Lochie suffers from social anxiety, the only people he can communicate with without feeling as if the world is closing in on him is his family. About to graduate school and expected to apply to go off to university by his teachers do to his exemplementry grades and literature writing ability, all he can focus on is bills and feeding his family. Both Maya and Loahan have a strong sense of family values.
“I might appear confident and chatty, but I spend most of my time laughing at jokes I don't find funny, saying things I don't really mean - because at the end of the day that's what we're all trying to do: fit in, one way or another, desperately trying to pretend we're all the same.”
“You think no one else understands, I want to tell him, but you’re wrong. I do. You’re not alone.”
“Never before have I imagined my life without him-like this house, he is my only point of reference in this difficult existence, this unstable and frightening world. The thought of his leaving home fills me with a terror so strong, it takes my breath away. I feel like one of those seagulls covered in oil form a spill, drowning in a black tar of fear.”
“He is the first to break the silence. ‘Maya what the hell are we doing?’ Although his voice is barely more than a whisper, he sounds close to tears. ‘I don’t understand. Why-why the hell is this happening to us?’ I close my eyes and press against him, stroking his bare arm with m fingertips. ‘All I know is that I love you,’ I say in quiet desperation, the words spilling out of their own accord. ‘I love you far more than just a brother. I…I love you in-in every kind of way.’”
“It was only a matter of time before it broke through our fragile web of denial, forcing us to confront the truth and acknowledge who we are: two people in love-a love that nobody else could possibly understand.”
“He looks at me, his eyes full. ‘I’ll stay with her for as long as she likes. I’ll marry her, if that’s what she wants. I mean, at the end of the day, what the hell does it matter who I end up with if it can’t be you?’”
“It’s not just the physical frustration-it’s the impossibility of our situation, the horror of what we’ve got ourselves into, the despair of knowing that I will never be able to love Maya the way I want to.”
“I’m slowly being torn in two. You stand there covered in cuts and bruises that I might as well have inflicted on you with my own hands. And I love you, so much that it’s killing me, yet all I can do is push you away and hurt you until eventually your love will turn to hate.”
“The shallow dip in the ground is carpeted with leaves and surrounded by a few remaining green ferns and winter shrubs, enclosed in a circle of bare trees. The ground beneath us is a tapestry of russet and gold. Even in the depths of winter, my little piece of paradise is still beautiful. Lochan looks around in bewilderment. “Are we here to bury a body or dig one up?’”
I have been a tad on the biases side in the past when a book did not end the way I wanted it to. This one did not end the way I would have hoped. I knew before I started reading it that something bad would come about that was irrevocably unchangeable. Yet for the sheer fact of the poeticism expressed in the narration of their days to the unyielding drive of their basic needs and desires for one another, there was never a doubt in my mind this deserved the highest ranking I could give it in my book.
As must as this book tore me up emotionally I am forever grateful to have discovered it. This will be a book that I will continue to reread throughout my life in exertion to consume a love so begotten and a love so lost.
I needed some time to compose myself before I wrote this review. I spent the whole next day moping, mutter inconsistencies while in a daze of heart ache and contempt. How could four hundred plus pages affect me so profoundly? It is a work of art, that’s how. My chest was contracting, the last 85% of the book I spent heaving, mewling sounds coming from the back of my throat.
To sum up in one sentence the ramifications this book left on me personally by the end would be ‘I died a little on the inside’.
All I can contrive from it now is the opportunity to having bared witness to a love develop so pure through the pages, that it is to my solemn belief such love that evolved between these two could put contemporary romance to shame. With the modern day melodrama that tends to seethe in relationships I have come across that, in reality feigning interest has become the norm for most epilogues.
****************************FORBIDDEN*******************************
******************Warning may contain spoilers***********************
Lochan 17 & Maya 16 brother and sister have been left to their own devices from an early age. Neglectful parents; father abandon them, mother became an alcoholic partying floozy that disappears for days to weeks. With three younger siblings to think about the duo step into the role of partners splitting tasks in efforts to give the younger three somewhat of a family existence.
No one understands them let alone knows what’s going on at home. With the pressures of school mounting, raising three kids and add on top of that the stresses of figuring out who they will become/where to go as legal adulthood approaches in a disquieting life that was thrusted upon them they’ve only have each other to lean on their whole lives.
• Taboo
• Sick
• Disgusting
Are labels we/society tend to thrust on people and situations we cannot fathom or fear due to the lack of unwilling to understand. When you already have the expedients to connect with others, where does that leave people that feel labelized and outcasted?
Maya has one friend, a wanton little thing; biding her time she nurtures her siblings coveting the role of a mother. While Lochie suffers from social anxiety, the only people he can communicate with without feeling as if the world is closing in on him is his family. About to graduate school and expected to apply to go off to university by his teachers do to his exemplementry grades and literature writing ability, all he can focus on is bills and feeding his family. Both Maya and Loahan have a strong sense of family values.
“I might appear confident and chatty, but I spend most of my time laughing at jokes I don't find funny, saying things I don't really mean - because at the end of the day that's what we're all trying to do: fit in, one way or another, desperately trying to pretend we're all the same.”
“You think no one else understands, I want to tell him, but you’re wrong. I do. You’re not alone.”
“Never before have I imagined my life without him-like this house, he is my only point of reference in this difficult existence, this unstable and frightening world. The thought of his leaving home fills me with a terror so strong, it takes my breath away. I feel like one of those seagulls covered in oil form a spill, drowning in a black tar of fear.”
“He is the first to break the silence. ‘Maya what the hell are we doing?’ Although his voice is barely more than a whisper, he sounds close to tears. ‘I don’t understand. Why-why the hell is this happening to us?’ I close my eyes and press against him, stroking his bare arm with m fingertips. ‘All I know is that I love you,’ I say in quiet desperation, the words spilling out of their own accord. ‘I love you far more than just a brother. I…I love you in-in every kind of way.’”
“It was only a matter of time before it broke through our fragile web of denial, forcing us to confront the truth and acknowledge who we are: two people in love-a love that nobody else could possibly understand.”
“He looks at me, his eyes full. ‘I’ll stay with her for as long as she likes. I’ll marry her, if that’s what she wants. I mean, at the end of the day, what the hell does it matter who I end up with if it can’t be you?’”
“It’s not just the physical frustration-it’s the impossibility of our situation, the horror of what we’ve got ourselves into, the despair of knowing that I will never be able to love Maya the way I want to.”
“I’m slowly being torn in two. You stand there covered in cuts and bruises that I might as well have inflicted on you with my own hands. And I love you, so much that it’s killing me, yet all I can do is push you away and hurt you until eventually your love will turn to hate.”
“The shallow dip in the ground is carpeted with leaves and surrounded by a few remaining green ferns and winter shrubs, enclosed in a circle of bare trees. The ground beneath us is a tapestry of russet and gold. Even in the depths of winter, my little piece of paradise is still beautiful. Lochan looks around in bewilderment. “Are we here to bury a body or dig one up?’”
I have been a tad on the biases side in the past when a book did not end the way I wanted it to. This one did not end the way I would have hoped. I knew before I started reading it that something bad would come about that was irrevocably unchangeable. Yet for the sheer fact of the poeticism expressed in the narration of their days to the unyielding drive of their basic needs and desires for one another, there was never a doubt in my mind this deserved the highest ranking I could give it in my book.
As must as this book tore me up emotionally I am forever grateful to have discovered it. This will be a book that I will continue to reread throughout my life in exertion to consume a love so begotten and a love so lost.
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