Thursday, December 15, 2011

Review: The Vast Fields of Ordinary

Title: The Vast Fields of Ordinary
Author: Nick Burd
Publisher: Dial
Pages: 309 (Hardcover)
Date of Publishment: May 14th 2009
Days to Read: 3
Rating: 3.5


Description: Goodreads
It's Dade's last summer at home. He has a crappy job at Food World, a "boyfriend" who won't publicly acknowledge his existence (maybe because Pablo also has a girlfriend), and parents on the verge of a divorce. College is Dade's shining beacon of possibility, a horizon to keep him from floating away.

Then he meets the mysterious Alex Kincaid. Falling in real love finally lets Dade come out of the closet - and, ironically, ignites a ruthless passion in Pablo. But just when true happiness has set in, tragedy shatters the dreamy curtain of summer, and Dade will use every ounce of strength he's gained to break from his past and start fresh with the future.


My Review:
SPOILER ALERT!!

Even though this book is a couple years old, I really wanted to pick it up and give it a s hot. Even though I do a lot of independent writing that has homosexual character, I've never picked up a full novel before that has a main character this is homosexual. Now obviously the book had a different feel because of all of this, but eventually after getting over certain scenes (ones that had my blushing nonstop) I found myself really enjoying the book; glad I'd decided after all to pick it up. 

Honestly...I don't think there was one character in this entire book that I did not like. Dade had such a warm and lovable personality in my book. Sure at times I could get annoyed with him, but I feel like that's just something that happens in books, because the characters and story line can't go exactly how you want them to go every single time. Watching Dade slowly but surely come to terms with his homosexuality, gaining the love that's he's been looking, and finally opening up to those around him. 
Dade and Alex were definitely a couple that I loved, and the friendship that Lucy and Dade had as well was a fun one to watch. The one thing that I would definitely change about this book was the constant appearance of weed in this book. I felt like it was all they really did, or all that really brought them together. 

I have to say that I was actually a little surprised and even a little stunned near the end of the book when I read about Pablo's death. Obviously you could tell throughout the entire book that Pablo was having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that I did stuff with boys, basically Dade only, but I had never though once that Pabolo was going to kill himself. I thought maybe he'd finally tell Judy, or break up with her, maybe even run into Dade in the epilogue and explain that he was finally happy being who he was meant to be, but I was very wrong, and actually found my jaw hanging for a good amount of time after finding out. Even if it was a rather big shocker to read I felt...okay with it. Sure it was cliche and all but...for some reason I didn't find myself minding...or caring. 

As much as I wanted to really really like this book, I still felt as though it didn't deserve any higher than a three star rating. The plot was fun, and this book did have really good parts in it, but it was...the ending that got to me. I won't say anymore because of spoilers, but I will let you know that I was NOT satisfied at all with the ending of the book, which managed me to drop my initial rating of four stars down to three and a half. 

The Vast Fields of Ordinary was honestly one of those books that really stood up to it's genre. It was a true coming of age book, showing the growth of it's main character as he learned from life and finally learned to be himself. Through heartwarming scenes, and even steamy ones, The Vast Fields of Ordinary graced it's readers with a wonderful story. 

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