Loveless by Alice Oseman -A book review!

“In the end, that was the problem with romance. It was so easy to romanticise romance because it was everywhere. It was in music and on TV and in filtered Instagram photos. It was in the air, crisp and alive with fresh possibility. It was in falling leaves, crumbling wooden doorways, scuffed cobblestones and fields of dandelions. It was in the touch of hands, scrawled letters, crumpled sheets and the golden hour. A soft yawn, early morning laugher, shoes lined up together dy the door. Eyes across a dance floor. I could see it all, all the time, all around, but when I got closer, I found nothing was there.”
– Alice Oseman, Loveless

Loveless by Alice Oseman: 3⭐/5
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What an entertaining read. I had no expectations going in considering this is my first novel by Alice Oseman.

Loveless is about Georgia Warr, a teenager at the brink of adulthood who is still facing loads of doubts about her sexuality. The book is divided into five parts. And the first two parts of the book deal with the uncertainty that comes with understanding oneself. It reflected in Oseman’s writing and it can make the reader rather impatient and frustrated. So, I think Oseman did a good job conveying the emotions of the protagonist there.

When Georgia finally comes across the word “asexuality”, she realises how much she was in the wrong before. Soon, a lot of melodramatic things go down and the story gets really entertaining to read about. I didn’t enjoy a lot of those necessarily but they were engaging nevertheless. I did not enjoy the writing as much either but I really liked reading about the dynamics between Georgia and Rooney, her roommate. I really liked the communication b/w the two and the effort they both put in their relationship. It showed their emotional maturity. However, Pip, for me, felt too overbearing and really melodramatic. Like, she didn’t even give her “best friend” a chance to explain her side of the story. That just felt really off for me. Constantly denying one’s own feelings and expecting people to just read their emotions is just not something I like in people. Although what Georgia and Rooney did was something stupid, it was not like Pip was in a relationship with Rooney to get so mad about it.

Jason was okay but I did not understand the importance of his character at all. I don’t think he had any role in the story apart from acting as an experiment to Georgia. At one point, I thought – “Doesn’t everyone experiment with a new person to find out if they really like them in a romantic way or not? Isn’t that what modern dating is basically?”

Overall, it was a good reading experience for me and it made me realise how much romance is actually romanticised in media and all around us and the unhealthy amount of obsession we have with the idea of love itself.

Thank you, HarperCollins Australia, for the review copy!

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