Book Talk With Taylor

Separate Peace Book Review

February 16, 2022- Taylor Starkey

This short, 204-paged book, was hard to get into. When I say that it took weeks for me to get into it, I am not lying! The whole book is basically about a boarding school in the early years of World War II. Gene is 16 years old, and roommates with the most envied boy on campus. On one summer's day, Gene and his roommate decided to jump off a soaring tree into the river, which they did every day. After a mishap that was jealousy-fueled Gene’s fault, his roommate’s leg is broken in two, and he can never walk correctly again. As soon as this “accident” has occurred, everything seems to go downhill abruptly.

Gene seemed very aware of this fact and seemed very emotionally numb. The rest of A Separate Peace is just Gene trying to fix what he has done and feeling trapped in his head about literally everything. Like there would just be a whole page on how he thinks his roommate is trying to sabotage his studies. After all, he was jealous, which was a lie because his roommate just wanted to be his gosh darn friend! This book is from the first-person point of view, so reading all of Gene’s thoughts and emotions was very frustrating. Why could he not tell his roommate that it was his fault? Why doesn’t he just be friends with his roommate? Why can’t he just forgive himself and move on? And not to mention there is a war breathing down their necks the whole time! I swear every chapter had at least an entire paragraph on Gene trying to decide if the war was real or not, which of course, it was! People were dying, and all he did was sit around thinking. Also, when his roommate was out, Gene went crazy and started trying to be like him. Like wearing his clothes and looking at himself for an extended amount of time while laughing. Like, what are you laughing at? Your insanity? It was weird and honestly very upsetting to read. But then you realize all of this had to happen to get the growth John Knowles wanted us to have.

I want to spoil the whole thing and tell you all the tea, but the book would not have any victims willing to read it. Even though this book made me want to gouge my eyeballs out and throw the book across the room, it was worth it in the end. Since A Separate Peace was, for the majority, a giant dumpster fire and had me cursing John Knowles name for creating such a dull and utterly displeasing book, I give it a two out of five. I feel like it is very generous from the pain this author has given me, but the 5% of the book was at least a five out of five. And so, if I am doing my math right, it earns two gold stars. This is not a typical book I would read because I am a total sucker for cheesy romances, but it made me want to know what has become of our dear Gene. This book will make you feel smarter with all of its difficult vocabulary words, but you will also find your growth and explore emotions that are not normally felt.