Nicola Yoon

Thanks to TheWriteReads and Penguin I bring you the review of another fantastic young adult novel. I anticipated to like the book but I did not expect to find such a treasure of a book. 

Book information: 

  • Author: Nicola Yoon
  • Date of publication: 3rd June 2021
  • Genre:  Young Adult
  • Pages: 304
  • Publisher: Penguin
  • ISBN: 9780241516911

Book Blurb:

#1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything, Everything and The Sun is Also a Star Nicola Yoon is back with a new and utterly unique romance.

Evie is disillusioned about love ever since her dad left her mum for another woman – she’s even throwing out her beloved romance novel collection.

When she’s given a copy of a book called Instructions for Dancing, and follows a note inside to a dilapidated dance studio, she discovers she has a strange and unwelcome gift. When a couple kisses in front of her, she can see their whole relationship play out – from the moment they first catch each other’s eye to the last bitter moments of their break-up.

For Evie, it confirms everything she thinks she knows about love – that it doesn’t last.

But at the dance studio she meets X – tall, dreadlocked, fascinating – and they start to learn to dance, together. Can X help break the spell that Evie is under? Can he change Evie’s mind about love?

 

Review and Recommendation:

At the very end of this book you can find a chapter called Acknowledgements. In contrast to my normal reading behaviour I read them this time. In them the author says: „I am very proud of it {the book}.“ And this pride is absolutely justified. 

The story of the book is a love story but it is not your typical young adult romance novel. It is kind of quite the opposite. I expected to get a nice and easy-to-read love story. What I got was something far deeper. It is not a romance novel. It is a novel about love and why everyone needs and deserves it. But it doesn’t tell you that as the title suggests in form of an instruction but it lets you figure it out for yourself. 

Going through a separation myself at the moment I thought it might be too hard for me to read but it was not. I also think that it is not only a book for young adults but adults of all ages as it is written so nicely. The characters are also very relatable and it was nice to be a part of their lives while reading. There is a character to like for everyone: the mum, the grandparents or of course the main character Evie. 

I can not recommend reading this book enough.  

For me the main message of the book is that there is always something good about/in a thing, even if it ends badly. And -as trivialized as it may sound- that everything has a reason and a time in life. 

Information on the author can be found on:

https://www.nicolayoon.com/bio-3

Instructions for dancing