jocelyn • coolgalreading's Reviews > Henry Henry

messy. lit fic with a queer, MMC — usually i'm all about the messy girlies but the messy dudes need some appreciation, too.

this is a retelling of shakespeare's henriad, which i have not read, so i have nothing to base this on.

when it comes to henry henry, i think this will either work for you or it won't (although to be fair, i'm somewhere in the middle). our MC is unlikeable and messy, which he's supposed to be. he's young and makes questionable decisions (but who doesn't at 22) and as a reader it's always easy to yell "what are you doing???" when a character is making poor choices.

but that's the point, right? our MC has a lot to figure out and he has a lot of repressed catholic guilt, which i honestly can't imagine how difficult it must be.

at a glance, this was a novel that first truly intrigued me bc the premise sounded right up my alley, but ultimately i had a hard time wanting to pick it up and didn't feel like there was any growth in the character's story.

i would consider giving it another try in the future and read other work by this author. thank you to the publisher for the eARC.