Know yourself. And go in swinging.

wow, it is not every book that can start with just a boy in a house that wakes up and slowly finds out where he is - not every book can hold my attention for hundreds of pages with very little talking and yet have me riveted and sitting at the edge of my seat!

and I was ! I totally was! This story was so well told and so fascinating I never wanted to put it down. I'd wished I hadn't been reading any other book so I could just read it all at once!

wonderful, I loved it! ( )

Some might say that reading two novels about dying teenage boys in one week is somewhat excessive. The two were very different, though! While [b:The Last Leaves Falling|20743633|The Last Leaves Falling|Fox Benwell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1409161674s/20743633.jpg|40074501] is a quiet examination of friendship and other bonds, 'More Than This' is more plot driven and toys with being existential. It begins with the death by drowning of Seth, whereupon he wakes up somewhere else with no idea what has happened. Saying more would spoil the plot, which keeps up an impressive degree of tension throughout. The writing styling is very simple, at times verging on perfunctory, but the central conceit is well sustained. Although I foresaw one of the twists, I remained thoroughly invested throughout. The combination of highly readable style and tense plot made this a swift read, yet it was interesting too. Behind the plot machinations dwell some thoughtful questions about perception and ego. I liked this philosophical angle and found it the most memorable thing about the novel. The diversity of the characters was also refreshing.

One thing I wonder when reading Young Adult novels like this, though, is how different (or how similar) they would be if told from the point of view of an adult. Putting things very vaguely to avoid spoilers, in this book an adult narrator would have had a degree of agency and responsibility for the situation that Seth did not have. Exploring the dilemmas created by that could have have been very interesting. I don’t mind teenage narrators, they just sometimes make me ponder how differently the same person might react to the same events ten years later. Teenagers never get the chance to accumulate the wisdom of experience, such as it is. ( )

Meh.

The central idea, the settings and the first few chapters are not bad at all, what with the eerie ash covering everything and the horse and the looming dream/memories, but I stopped believing the whole thing half-way through. The characters are quite bi-dimensional and they do improbable stuff like having long-winded conversations while running around with their knees up to their ears, the Polish boy's speech patterns make me want to gouge my eyes out, and now that I think about it there is a whole lot too much running around, in general, for my taste.

Also, I wasn't at all impressed by the sneaky metafictional nods to the fact that the narrative is heavily plot-driven. I can nearly hear the author thinking "sh*t, I wrote myself into a tragic ending and now I need the cavalry to save the day at the last minute, AGAIN. Shall I rethink my approach to this novel? Nah, let's get the deus ex machina to do my job instead of me, and then I'll make the boy ONCE AGAIN muse on the possibility that this is all a hallucination made up by his brain, BECAUSE THE CAVALRY KEEPS COMING AT THE LAST MOMENT. So maybe the readers will not notice what I have done here. And let's leave the whole mess unsolved once I get to writing the end, because, who cares. I can't be bothered". Seriously, I kept waiting till the end for it to be a major plot twist and... niet. The ending itself would have been decent, if it were not for all the guns appearing in the first act and never ever being given a chance to shoot at the end of the third.

Finally, a question for whom already read this novel: that Terminator guy, was it really necessary, except for creating plot without having to actually write one? Wouldn't have spared us a lot of "this can't be real, it's all too convenient for me" and "oh look I thought you were dead impaled on a metallic leg and instead here you are bruised but fine after losing half your blood"? Are you satisfied with the explanation that nobody really knows anything and who cares, I love y'all anyway and life is beautiful?

All in all, a very good occasion spoilt because of sheer laziness. ( )

Meh.

The central idea, the settings and the first few chapters are not bad at all, what with the eerie ash covering everything and the horse and the looming dream/memories, but I stopped believing the whole thing half-way through. The characters are quite bi-dimensional and they do improbable stuff like having long-winded conversations while running around with their knees up to their ears, the Polish boy's speech patterns make me want to gouge my eyes out, and now that I think about it there is a whole lot too much running around, in general, for my taste.

Also, I wasn't at all impressed by the sneaky metafictional nods to the fact that the narrative is heavily plot-driven. I can nearly hear the author thinking "sh*t, I wrote myself into a tragic ending and now I need the cavalry to save the day at the last minute, AGAIN. Shall I rethink my approach to this novel? Nah, let's get the deus ex machina to do my job instead of me, and then I'll make the boy ONCE AGAIN muse on the possibility that this is all a hallucination made up by his brain, BECAUSE THE CAVALRY KEEPS COMING AT THE LAST MOMENT. So maybe the readers will not notice what I have done here. And let's leave the whole mess unsolved once I get to writing the end, because, who cares. I can't be bothered". Seriously, I kept waiting till the end for it to be a major plot twist and... niet. The ending itself would have been decent, if it were not for all the guns appearing in the first act and never ever being given a chance to shoot at the end of the third.

Finally, a question for whom already read this novel: that Terminator guy, was it really necessary, except for creating plot without having to actually write one? Wouldn't have spared us a lot of "this can't be real, it's all too convenient for me" and "oh look I thought you were dead impaled on a metallic leg and instead here you are bruised but fine after losing half your blood"? Are you satisfied with the explanation that nobody really knows anything and who cares, I love y'all anyway and life is beautiful?

All in all, a very good occasion spoilt because of sheer laziness. ( )

Really interesting book, I liked the idea even if the end felt a little nebulous ( )