idksomethingaboutbooks
Carry On by Rainbow Rowell | Spolier- Free Review
The Three P’s
Publisher: Pan Macmillan
Publication Date: October 6th 2015
Pages: 517
Brief Synopsis
‘Simon Snow is the worst chosen one who’s ever been chosen. That’s what his roommate, Baz says. And Baz may be evil and a vampire and a complete git, but he’s probably right […] Carry On: The Rise and Fall of Simon Snow is a ghost story, a love story, and a mystery. It has just as much kissing and talking as you’d expect from a Rainbow Rowell story - but far, far more monsters’
- From the blurb of Carry On
The Actual Review
I was blown away by how much I loved Carry On! I thought I would enjoy it, as I am a huge fan of Rainbow Rowell’s other books, particularly her writing and the characters she creates, but I didn’t think I’d love it quite as much as I do. As I mentioned in my January TBR , I was slightly apprehensive when going into this, as I wasn’t totally keen on the Simon Snow extracts in Fangirl. I was clearly wrong in assuming this full length story would be no better. If anything, I really want to re-read Fangirl as I think I’d understand the extracts and appreciate them more.
As a whole the story was fast-paced and fun-filled. It had such a lovely, heartwarming vibe and was so much funnier than I expected. There were actually a few times were I laughed out loud which is always a sign of relatable, well-placed humor. My favorite funny lines were often delivered by my favourite character: Baz. His sarcasm was exactly the sort of thing that I find hilarious, and his entire personality was pure perfection. Baz wasn’t the only good character though, in fact I really enjoyed almost all of them. Rowell manages to write realistic characters with developed personalities, which makes most of them incredibly lovable.
The narrative actually jumps between a bunch of the characters point’s of views but most of the chapters are from either Simon or Baz’s perspective. There are also occasionally chapters from a mystery characters POV and it’s interesting to see how their story develops and how they fit in with the main storyline. In the end, we readers discover who this person is, but I would have liked to see it perhaps explained a little more and concluded for the characters as well. Some people don’t like multiple viewpoints, but I think it kept this story interesting and gave us an idea of how all the characters think and connect with each other.
I did find a couple of things about this book slightly annoying, though nothing so major as to totally ruin it. Towards the start of the book, some of Simon’s backstory and information about his past years at Watford (the magic school he goes to) was ridiculously similar to Harry Potter. Luckily, I managed to look past this after a few chapters and as the story progressed it became it’s own. I also though the magic system was a bit meh - it didn’t bother me much, but I would have liked to see something a bit different and in-depth from Rowell.
My Rating : Four stars!
If you’ve read it, what did you think about Carry On? Thanks for reading!
Kate AKA idksomethingaboutbooks x