Call Me By Your Name
By André Aciman
3 stars
When both the book and the movie came out, everyone was talking about this story. I hadn’t read the book or seen the movie, but after I found a beautiful edition of the book I decided to give it a go without even knowing what it was about. Although I am glad I read this story I do believe I needed to read what it was about first because then maybe I wouldn’t have picked it up.
Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera.
Like I said I wished I had read the description before I started reading it. I love a good romance story however my cup of tea are fluffy easy to read and cheesy romance stories. Call Me By Your Name even though it is a love story it is such a complex and very “monologue” novel that I had a very hard time connecting with it. I am able to appreciate what the author tried to do, being able to see every thought and feeling in the main characters head, but for a love story it was way too deep and complicated for my liking.
This book made me feel uncomfortable, and that was probably the best thing about this book. The fact that it made me feel things goes to show how powerful the writing is. I honestly have no complaints about the writing style other than it is not for me. This is not a critic on the book itself I just personally had a very hard time connecting with both the characters and the story because of this overdone writing style.
What I had the most issues with were the characters, I had such a hard time trying to connect with both Elio and Oliver. I felt no empathy towards any of them and being inside Elio´s mind was a deeply disturbing experience. This book is so repetitive, yes the language is beautiful, yes I understand that sometimes when we are in love we tend to over analyze everything and repeat scenarios in our head, yes I understand all of that, but I just didn’t want to read about it. Again, this is not the author´s fault, it was my fault for not knowing what I was getting into.
Overall, Call My By Your Name is a romance novel that may become a favorite for a lot of people, it just wasn’t for me. I felt uneasy the entire time and although I understand that this is probably what goes through the mind of a horny and desperate teenage boy, it simply was too much for me to handle. Again, everything that I did not like about this book is simply personal preference, the book is very well written and there is nothing wrong with it, I just wasn’t the right audience.
P.S: I will have a very hard time trying to forget the peach scene.
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