Review: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenz

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Synopsis:

Aristotle is an angry teen with a brother in prison. Dante is a know-it-all who has an unusual way of looking at the world. When the two meet at the swimming pool, they seem to have nothing in common. But as the loners start spending time together, they discover that they share a special friendship—the kind that changes lives and lasts a lifetime. And it is through this friendship that Ari and Dante will learn the most important truths about themselves and the kind of people they want to be. (Goodreads)

Review:

I don’t think I’ve ever had as much difficulty rating and gathering my thoughts for a book than this one. Two thoughts are clear for me and that’s that I definitely didn’t hate it, but I also know it’s not a new all-time favourite book.

Firstly, I can see why people might not take to the writing style. It’s written in fairly short sentences the majority of the time so it’s almost quite choppy at some points. It took me a couple of chapters to adapt to this writing style, and once I did, I actually didn’t mind it. I also found there was a lot of repetition in terms of words used. For example, things like ‘He laughed’ was used a fair amount. Again, I don’t think this was something I had a huge problem with but can also see how this might annoy other readers.

Ari and Dante were lovely characters, and different too. I found myself connecting with Ari quite a bit and the way he felt. There was definitely a lot of emotion he was feeling and there was certainly times I could feel that. Initially, I felt like I couldn’t take to them as well as I did other characters, but after letting the book sit with me for a bit now, I’ve actually realised I love them a lot more than I realised.

I can’t say there was really too much of a plot, to be quite honest, so if you’re not a fan of character driven books, then this one probably isn’t for you. But it does deal with some important topics and situations. There’s the situation with with Ari’s brother in prison, homophobia and homosexuality, friendship and of course, growing up. I definitely felt there was an accurate portrayal of the confusion of what it can be like to grow up. There was a lot of aspects of this book, in that sense, which I enjoyed, and I think they were carried through well.

For some reason, I was a little worried about the fact it was set in the 1980s. Perhaps because I’m not used to reading books set then, but still, I loved The Perks of Being a Wallflower which was set just a little bit later I believe (correct me if I’m wrong, it’s been a long time) so I really don’t know why that made me a little hesitant about this book before starting it. Perhaps, I thought nothing much was going to go on. But I loved how this was set in the 1980s and really wouldn’t change it. While I wasn’t born in or grew up in the 1980s, it definitely brought back memories of playing outside, even though I was quite a bit younger than the boys. And it made me miss that.

I can’t really pinpoint any clear negatives that made me feel that I couldn’t give it the full 5 stars. There was just something in which I didn’t enjoy it perhaps as much as I’d hoped to. I wouldn’t go as far as saying this book is overhyped because I can completely see the reason why people loved it so much. But I guess this rating, this time, just come down to personal enjoyment and perhaps I just didn’t have quite the same enjoyment as I was expecting. But nonetheless, I did still enjoy it and it is a book I’ll be keeping on my shelf as no doubt I will want to do a reread of this book some time in the future.

Would I recommend it?

I think I would. Especially if you love coming of age stories, or simply books that deal with lots of different aspects and issues or even if you like books set in the 1980s/1990s period.

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Have you read Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe? What did you think? Or are you planning on reading it?

Lucy 🙂 x

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