PUBLISHER: Headline
FORMAT: Paperback
BUY IT: Waterstones
RATING: 4 Stars
SUMMARY
How would you spend your birthday if you knew it would be your last? Eighteen-year-old Leonard Peacock knows exactly what he'll do. He'll say goodbye. Not to his mum - who he calls Linda because it annoys her - who's moved out and left him to fend for himself. Nor to his former best friend, whose torments have driven him to consider committing the unthinkable. But to his four friends: a Humphrey-Bogart-obsessed neighbour, a teenage violin virtuoso, a pastor's daughter and a teacher. Most of the time, Leonard believes he's weird and sad but these friends have made him think that maybe he's not. He wants to thank them, and say goodbye.
REVIEW
Hey guys! Today, I’m going to be reviewing Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Matthew Quick. This was the first Matthew Quick book I read but I absolutely adored it! I will definitely be picking up The Silver Linings Playbook as soon as I can. Now let’s start with the overall non-spoiler review.
Going into this book after having read the summary, I was expecting it to be very depressing and at parts it was. However, the book as a whole was funny. Leonard was an amazing narrator with a lot of character and I really cared for him. This book focused on him and I loved that. It was weird to be in the mind of someone who wanted to commit suicide but I feel like this book made me more aware of the issue and made me aware that what I can do can affect someone a lot and I hope I never be mean to anyone in the way that some of the classmates were to Leonard. The supporting characters weren’t as well developed however except for Lauren and Herr Silverman. I wish we would have seen more of Walt or Baback. I also wish that we would have got to seen his mother a little bit more, I would have liked to see them happy at the end.
This book deals with a lot of major issues that we are all aware of but try to hide and I loved that. We try to disguise all the problems that teenagers go through but this book handled them straight on. This allowed us to see these issues first hand and in some way, feel what it’s like to go through them. It allowed us to see why people want to commit suicide and what happens to people who go through traumatizing events. Matthew Quick write brilliantly and it felt as if he really knew about the subjects in hisbook.The thing about this book is that Leonard is doing something that none of us really like and we don’t like to know about it but when you’re in his head, you can see where he’s coming from and why he wants to do that. It’s a scary thought but you start to understand why people commit suicide.
This book was slow to start with and I found the writing style to be odd to start with. The book had footnotes! Having read mainly YA, I’ve never really come across footnotes in books that I read for pleasure. Once you get into the book, however it will grip you and you will fall in love with Matthew Quick’s writing. I sure did!
Overall, I’d give this book 4 stars as I did really enjoy it but I just can’t bring myself to give it 5 stars, because it wasn’t one of my absolute favourites. I do however recommend it to anyone and everyone! This book will really help you to understand the problems many young teenagers go through.
- Sofia.
http://fifisofa.wordpress.com/
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