All the Ugly and Wonderful Things: A Novel

This was one of the slowest books I've read- slow in the beginning, slow in the amount of time it took me to read. But, the best things in life require plenty of patience. All the Ugly and Wonderful Things was one of the best, most thought-provoking books I've ever read. I didn't want it to end and I still don't want to put it down. I don't want to forget a word of this story. 343 pages is not created equal by every author. This book took me on a journey that spanned decades, in the space of very few pages. The depth of the characters was overwhelming and real. I knew these people inside and out after reading. Wavonna (Wavy) Quinn is introduced to us as a young child, bounced from place to place. When her grandmother and current caregiver dies, Wavy has to move in with her druggie mother and baby brother. While her mother lies in bed all day, Wavy is tasked with being the mature adult at 8 years old. She feeds and cares for her brother and gets to school by herself each day. The reader follows Wavy's life through 21 years from the perspective of several narrators, Wavy included. From the moment Kellen was introduced, my heart was drawn to him. He reminds me of a not-so-little kid I know. He has the most genuine and good heart out of anyone, but always finds himself in situations he can't explain or break free of. His past haunts him, and he can't shake the stigma of being the bad guy. Looking at Kellen is like looking at the stars in a thunderstorm. You can't see past the scary to see the bright and beautiful, unless you're Wavy. This novel challenges everything a person may think is moral and right, and craps all over it. It shows that true love isn't in a number or in the shell of our bodies, but soul-deep. Unconditional love withstands the test of time and all of the ugly things the world throws at it. It is proof the law doesn't always know what's best for every person. It shows us we never really know someone until we've walked a few miles in their boots. What could a 8 year old child and a grown man possibly have in common? Simply, we're all human, we all ache over the same things, but we all handle those aches in different ways. Kellen and Wavy connect over the pain of loneliness, and form an innocent love that leads to criminal consequences. On this journey, there are several roads to six feet under, and we have to draw our own map through All the Ugly and Wonderful Things that make up this life. I couldn't have chosen a better book to begin 2017 with. If you haven't picked this one up yet, it is a must. It is perfectly done, full of goodness and equal parts heartache. It is a novel that leaves the reader wanting more, while thinking it couldn't have ended better. This is a one-of-a-kind work of art! Review originally posted on 5171 Miles Book Blog.

The writing was great, the family dynamics and story was engaging, and each character played an important role, but as soon as I realized that the boundaries between adult and child were crossed and then continued throughout the rest of the book with many of the background characters seemingly not phased, I couldn’t help but be disgusted right until the very end. Not once did Kellen explain to young Wavy why things were so inappropriate. He publicly said and did inappropriate things in front of other characters and no one protected Wavy and even justified his actions and words. I don’t care that he took care of her in so many ways…he helped her believe that being a child- 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 years old- was perfectly acceptable to do some very adult things just bc of the already severely messed up life she was unfortunately experiencing. That’s manipulative and an attempt at justifying what was CLEARLY illegal, morally corrupt, and self-serving. As an adult, it is your responsibility to ALWAYS do the right thing for a child. Kellen satisfied his own sick needs and rationalized it by calling it love and care. Well I thought this book was incredibly emotional and difficult to walk away from, it felt at times more like gawking at the scene of an accident,; it totally doesn’t feel right, but you just want to find out what happened. I would recommend this book, but it definitely needs a huge trigger warning for many things especially pedophillia, sexual content, child abuse, child sexual and emotional abuse, child neglect, and drugs. It’s so uncomfortable, creepy, and just disgusting through so much of the story. Just be prepared before you start reading this. I can’t get over the justifications right to the very end…

Speechless. This book made me gasp, cry, and laugh. Impossibly beautiful. It's not often that I write a full review anymore. If I do, it has to be that the book REALLY moved me. Shook me to my core. And, boy, did this story do just that. I love a story that is controversial, taboo, out of the box, and one that is thought provoking. Not in a shock value type of way, but in an authentic way. I know that this book has had its fair share of controversy surrounding it and I am not even going to give voice to any of that. Because there is no way (in my mind) that anyone could interpret what happened in this book as anything but beautiful. To me, Wavy and Kellen are lovers who will love each other for hundreds of years. Soul mates. That type of love that knows no bounds, and cannot be limited by age, race, sex, or any other dividing factor that society imposes upon us to tell us who we can and cannot love. I think old man Cutcheon said it best: "You know," I said. "I married Paola when she was fourteen. And I was twenty-six. Her parents had eleven kids and they was glad to get her settled." Kellen's reply to that was that those were "different days," and they were. Now, because of 1% of the population who is disgusting, sick, and perverse, ALL love that looks like this is filthy and wrong, right? Well, I disagree. I don't like generalizing ANYTHING. Because in my experience, life always comes with exceptions. Anywho, I digress. Back to the book. Wavy is a quiet girl. Smart way beyond her years. Resourceful. Her parents are...jeez, I don't even know what freaking word to use. Her parents (if Liam was even her real dad) are a hot mess. This girl had to fend for herself AND care for her younger infant brother basically from the time she was a small child. Because of some of the deranged things her mother polluted her mind with, she's hyper vigilant of people and germs and pretty much anything. The only thing she takes comfort in is sneaking out at night and watching the stars. And it's on a night like this, when she's lying under the stars, that she happens to meet Kellen. Well, she saves his life actually. I have to say that the writing in this book is some of the most exceptional I've ever read in my life. And that is saying a lot. I've read some great stuff. The way that it is narrated is completely brilliant as well. I don't see another way to have told this story. There are many, many points of view. Probably close to 10 or more. But, all of them are geared toward Kellen and Wavy and how THEY see them. So then when you read Wavy and Kellen's POV, it is SOOOO much more revealing. For example, if you read Kellen's description from Wavy's POV, you would think that he was the most beautiful man who ever roamed the earth. When, in actuality, he is very average looking. Simple. Over-weight. Not super attractive—hardly even swoon-worthy BBF material. But that's not how Wavy sees him. That's just one example. The book is FILLED with things like this. Showing them to you. Brilliant. It's also freaking funny in places that it really shouldn't have been. I seriously almost peed my pants from laughing so hard when Wavy gave her deposition. So freaking wrong, but I laughed my ass off. Basically, Kellen is the only person who gave a shit about Wavy and her brother, Donal. Her parents are the epitome of the word neglectful. And then some. If it weren't for him, she probably would be dead. And vice-versa. They saved each other. "Thanks, but I just came to get Wavy." Kellen looked at me for a second, not long enough. Liam [her dad] made me feel invisible. I needed Kellen to see me." And for those of you who are squeamish about the underage thing, just know that this book is just not like that. It's not written in an in your face, taboo for the sake of being taboo way. It's raw and unapologetic and honest. Yes, lines are crossed. Big ones. SOME things happen when Wavy is thirteen that any OTHER thirteen year old probably wouldn't be emotionally ready for, but it is consensual and if anything, she is the one pushing for it. I have two girls. I get it. But for me, this book never rubbed me the wrong way. Yes, she was 13, BUT the girl was pretty much an adult mentally by then. Based on the hard life she had led. At least, that is the story that I read. Of course, it is open for interpretation and not everyone will feel the same way. That is the beauty of reading. Me? I was so rooting for these two to get their HEA. But, fret not, the very controversy that this book is getting is ironic because it's what happens in this story. People vilify Kellen. They think he's a monster, a pedophile. They want to beat him up, keep him from a job, keep him from living any type of normal life. They don't want him to exist. Just like many did not want this book to exist. I pretty much felt like Wavy's roommate, Renee, who was one of my fave secondary characters of the book, by the way. Chick was hilarious! "I wanted a fairy tale ending for Wavy, because if she could find happiness, there would be hope for me, too." This was one of my top 5 reads of 2016 so far. I think it should be made into a film. I don't have enough wonderful things to say about it except that I highly, highly recommend it.

I really have a hard time rating this. I really have a hard time understanding how I feel about this book as well. It was very well written and interesting; it kept me entertained right until the end. I don't know if I've read a single book that spanned over so much of the characters' lives, but it was incredible that the author could take us from little girl to grown woman without any kind of lull. That being said, it's the content of the book I struggle with. Part of me thinks, if it weren't Kellen and her aunt, Wavy would've grown up just like her mom and her dad's girlfriends. She would've made bad decisions and gotten nowhere in life. Kellen made sure she had what she needed, comforted her, and even gave her money to go to school and make something of herself. Her aunt, despite being made to look the villain, was the only one who ever really made the hard decisions for Wavy. The ones that signify you're a parent and not a friend, things that would anger the child but ultimately were for the best. The problem is, how do you glamorize what is essentially pedophilia? If Kellen had taken care of her, but not started with the kissing and climbing in her bed, maybe they would've grown with an appropriate relationship (although I realize there'd be no story) but it was almost as if he was grooming her. Such a young, impressionable girl had almost no choice but to fall in love with him. He should've known better, but then it's mentioned several times how he wasn't very smart. I honestly feel this book requires a lot of reading between the lines. Despite Wavy's intelligence you have to see that ultimately she was still a very vulnerable young girl. And despite Kellen being an adult, you have to take away that he wasn't very smart and was very confused about appropriate relationships. I just can't see this as some, "meant to be" "romance of the century" type story. It says a lot about what effect toxic people can cause on the lives of others, just how far they reach, and maybe this was the happiest ending they could've hoped for, but it was still a very twisted thing. My other concern is this: So often you hear of pedophiles insisting they aren't doing anything wrong, love is love, no matter the age. It absolutely vile and shows no regard for their victims. This story feeds DIRECTLY into that mindset. Honestly, this story is a pedophiles dream come true and it makes me very concerned for the people that can't see that. That fact alone made me consider giving it a much lower rating. I enjoyed reading this, and I'm willing to consider that maybe special circumstances dictate certain situations can't fit inside society's norms, I really feel it's dangerous to tell people that if you fall in love with a child they'll love you back and you'll live happily ever after.

Let get a few things corrected before we start. Pedophile: A person who is sexually attracted to prepubescent children. That means that this book is not about pedophilia. Sorry, that's simply the fact. A word means something, it doesn't mean just what you want it to. Now that we got that out of the way, lets actually talk about the book and not the hot button words people like to throw around to get attention. This book does detail with a relationship between an adult and what is by popular definition a child. I used those words carefully as the girl child is between the ages of 10 to 14 during most of the book. There is sexual conduct between the characters, masturbating each other is about as far as we are getting here however. I'm not going to go into the good or bad of the relationship, mostly because historically as soon as a woman menstruated she was considered sexually adult and I have personal experience of being taken advantage of as a child. In the end you either are okay with the material or find it offensive, no arguments I make for or against are going to change that. Good 1: Beautiful romance, I loved Wavy and Kellen and thought the moments together were touched with real love. I never felt he was manipulating her, in fact many times I felt she had the upper hand. This book is clearly one where the female is the driver in the relationship. Everything they do together is instigated by her despite his objections. She is simply the only person he loves and the only thing that gets him up in the morning. 2: The characterizations were well done. I was able to get into the heads of the two with Wavy being the more fleshed out model while Kellen felt a little cliché to me. She was the stronger person, if there was no Kellen then Wavy still would of been okay but if Wavy wasn't around Kellen would of eaten a bullet. Kellen to me is a much more tragic figure than Wavy, when he was growing up he didn't have anyone to love him. There were no hero's in Kellen's life, no one to stop the abuse, no one to run too, no one that cared that he went to school. All he had was broken dreams and a battered heart. 3: The overall arc was well done. There were some choices I didn't like but I'll get into those later. The beginning relationship was done fantastic and makes up the most riveting part of the book. You get to see the simple magnificent dysfunction of a family. None of us live in the movies, instead out lives are created out of the dreams we want and the horrors we are put through. I found the family life of the Aunt to be both realistic and sorrowful in its own right. Bad 1: Too many POV's. Sorry but I like my books to be tightly focused on my main characters and while all the POV's revolved around them, while it was illuminating to see them from other angles, I felt that it distracted from the overall book. Some were essential but others felt like filler. This is purely a stylistic thing and should in no way indicate I thought it was bad writing. 2: The ending with the Aunt lacked any kind of punch. There wasn't enough to redeem the character in my book so that meant I felt cheated when it fizzled out. No realizations, no payback, just nothing. 3: The brother was a kind of throw away. I would of liked to have more of how they found him and what he'd gone through. A few chapters of happily every after instead of a brief epilogue of the highlights. We went through hell to see them together, the least we could do was actually get to enjoy it before the book ended. Overall A wonderful book that shows serious guts to tackle such a taboo subject with both understanding and caring. It had to be hell to write this book and wonder just how it would do when it was so out there as far as subject matter. The author stuck to her guns and wrote a book that I think will become one of my favorite in this genre. Few artists have the kind of mettle to create art that they know others will attack. To see those attacks you only have to look at the other reviews. This book isn't about sex with minors, or if you think love will triumph over anything and it sure isn't about pedophilia. Its simple about Wavy and Kellen and their love. Ugly, grotesque, strange and fey, it isn't my kind of love but then no one is asking me to love like them.

I don't know where to begin. The writing in this book is so beautiful. I felt like I was cocooned in a safety blanket in the early first half of the book. Whenever Kellen and Wavy were out in the meadow, I felt that summer heat or the autumn breeze, and if I just closed my eyes I'd be able to see the stars along side them. For a book to give me that much feeling is something magical. Let me live in it forever. Which, the book pretty much lets me do. For it's not just some "hey look at the pretty stars" thing. Nope. It's naming and mapping and it's brought up countless times throughout the book. The stars are as much a part of them (Kellen and Wavy) as their love is. Hearing it repeated while going through all the ups and downs of their life makes it a constant comfort. Wavy even studies to be an astrophysicist. Like come on. If that doesn't get you going than maybe it'll be the characters. They're all a bit quirky and hold interest. It feels like if you just peek through the blinds long enough you'd learn everything there is to know about them. The info and details come in snippets and you're collecting as you go. Wavy, however, is by far the strangest. Which is why I love her. She has quirks and issues and bows to no one. Then Kellen comes and just seeing her grow emotionally and mentally is the best thing. A+ development. Which brings me to the romance of this book. There's a lot of talk of normalizing age gap relationships and I'm not going to sit here and argue for what is right or wrong. This is a story and in this story, for these two people, this relationship works. Are they an exception? You bet. But I know older married brilliant couples who have similar age gaps and I'm not looking down my nose at them. In this case, it's worth asking the question, "what would happen if this couple met when they were younger?" and well tada. Their love starts super innocent. It builds from trust and understanding. Grows more beautiful and don't for a second think Kellen doesn't know he shouldn't do this. He goes through so much sht for Wavy and Wavy fights for him like I've never seen her fight for anything else. It's special and it hurts to see them have to fight for it. The only thing keeping this book from a glowing five stars (I was really close to giving it five stars too) is mainly for the end chapters. The ending is fine! It was just how we got there that felt a bit rushed? Anticlimactic? It was kinda just given to us instead of feeling really deserved. Not saying there was no hard work given. Maybe it was because I really wanted to have someone slap Brenda with her ignorance. So kudos to Wavy being more mature than me i guess, haha. Still, it could have had some more tension. Also, there's some pretty odd jump cuts in the writing. For instance Wavy was at the hospital, and I kid you not, within a sentence runs out of the room, mentions a carnival that was down the street and now suddenly we're there. However, there weren't enough to distract me and I know it was more to cut out unneeded details. Still a little odd though. That and all the different people who narrate the chapters. I don't know if I needed all these outside voices...though it can be refreshing at times. Amy's voice was my favorite. All in all this book is worth the read and the praise. Seriously give it a chance.

Don't let others condemning the subject matter scare you away. This is such a beautifully written story that will stick with you The characters are unique, raw and genuine This is not for the easily offended but for those not viewing the world only from their own perspective

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things was my first read by Bryn Greenwood, and it absolutely won’t be my last. From the very first page, I knew this book was going to challenge me, and it did, in more ways than I expected. I will also add that I usually don't like too many other POV's while I read, but this one was done in a way that truly worked for me. They each were relevant, and I appreciated that they never went off course and lasted just a few pages. Well done!! This was a very hard book to read for more reasons than trying to keep the details of Kellen and Wavy's relationship straight in my mind. Seeing how Wavy's life would have been without him kept me on course. I appreciated that he wasn't the stereotypical MMC, muscle-bound and drop-dead gorgeous, the building of this flawed character made him seem more real for me. I just finished this book, and I know I will be thinking about how it actually made me feel for some time. I give major kudos to this author for writing this story, and I appreciated her explanations of her own life growing up and her deeper understanding of the actual relationship she was describing. This could not have been easy for her, and I can only imagine how much time she put into it. I sincerely enjoyed reading this book, as hard as it was, especially the world of drugs and how that affects so many in what they consider families, as I have no experience in any of that. My only issue was that it felt like it dragged out in some places, and I kept waiting for time to pass, and it seemed to crawl too many times. This book isn’t for everyone, and I wouldn’t recommend going in blind.. Anyone considering it should read up on the subject matter first. This isn’t a light read or a conventional love story. But if you go in prepared, you’ll find a deeply thought provoking and unforgettable experience.

Die Geschichte von Wavy und Kellen ist wirklich einzigartig, herzergreifend, überraschend, schockierend und fesselnd bis zur letzten Seite. Ich habe tatsächlich noch nichts Vergleichbares gelesen und lange nicht mehr so sehr bei einem Roman mitgefiebert. Immer wieder denkt man "Nein, bitte bitte lass das jetzt nicht passieren" und dann passiert es doch. Man muss echt auf alles gefasst sein und damit meine ich ein paar wirklich hässliche Dinge, für die die Beschreibung Drama eigentlich gar nicht ausreicht. Man wird bis in die Grundfesten erschüttert. In diesem Buch steckt so viel Schmerz und gleichzeitig Liebe, so viel Gefühl und Glück, dass man trotz kontroverser Themen Sympathie für die ausgefallenen und echt speziellen, doch dadurch gerade wahnsinnig realistischen Charaktere entwickeln muss. Gleichzeitig werden die eigenen Wertvorstellungen in Frage gestellt und man wird zum Nachdenken angeregt. Noch lange nachdem ich das Buch zu Ende gelesen hatte, ging mir die Geschichte nicht mehr aus dem Kopf. Fazit: Absolut lesenswert, ein Must-Read!

O livro tem uma narrativa interessante pela perspectiva de vários personagens. Mas o enredo se torna quase um livro de romance barato, qdo entra em detalhes sexuais do relacionamento dos personagens. E, o tema relacionado à pedofilia pode não agradar alguns leitores, pois a autora tenta justificar os atos de um adulto em relação à uma menina de 14 anos por causa de amor.

My first thoughts before opening this book was hmmn not sure this will be for me, then I started to understand and accept how this situation could come about in the way it did, does this make me weird or a freak... probably and I'm so not sorry, love love love this story! The writing is incredible, the emotions it stirs wow what a roller coaster.

I'm not sure if I have ever felt so many different emotions, so powerfully, when reading a book. Anger. Hatred. Overwhelming sadness. Indecision. I'm still not sure how I feel about this book and some of the things that happened. I just know that I have to get my thoughts out by writing this review. That rarely happens immediately after I finish a book. Sorry this review is long, I have a lot to say. I don't even know what to classify this book as. I can't say it's a beautiful love story. I can't, and I won't. It's raw. It's gritty. It's actually quite disturbing at times. And it's fascinating. It's fascinating because it will push the boundaries of everything you believe about love. About right and wrong. I'm just going to put this out there in case you didn't catch on from the blurb. This is a story of an abused, young girl, Wavy. She begins what is a very important friendship with an equally damaged and lonely, adult man, Kellen. Wavy is damaged from the abuse she has suffered, in so many ways. It's infuriating and heartbreaking to watch what she goes through. Kellen comes along and protects her. He takes care of her in all the ways her parents don't. Ultimately, that friendship turns to love. When she's still very underage. I'll just leave it at that. All I will say is that this story does span many years. By the time it's all said and done, Wavy is an adult. BRAVE. Wow. This book was brave. After finishing, I have so much to say but that word keeps coming back to me. To write a detailed story like this, with the abuse Wavy suffers, the life she's forced to live as a child is hard enough. But my god, to add that kind of “love story.” So BRAVE. I need to be clear, I don't think it's brave because readers will have some big epiphany that what happened should EVER be tolerated in our society. And I can't say this was a story that needed to be told to open the readers eyes, or to make them learn some important lesson. It's brave because it IS wrong. As humans, we know this is wrong. But the author made me believe that no matter how wrong, these two saved each other from a fate MUCH WORSE than what would have become of them had they not had each other. She made me ask questions I never thought I would ask myself. She made me answer those questions in a way that I never thought I could. Ever. And probably never will again. SMART. So smartly written. This is what made this story. The lack of cheap plot tricks to make the reader fall for Kellen was so brilliant. She never tried to make you fall in love with him or to find the “forbidden” angle sexy. It was never meant to be romantic or sexy. This book is told in multiple POV's from many different characters. From Wavy, Kellen, family, and friends. Those multiple POV's allowed the reader to feel angry. To feel heartbroken. To decide for yourself whether their relationship was right or wrong. The author never forced what she wanted you to feel down your throat. Crazy as it may seem, in the end, I felt okay with where these two ended up. A product of everything HORRIBLE they had ever been through, especially Wavy, they were able to give each other something that no one else could've ever given them. No one. And she made me believe that they both deserved to have that. How the author made me believe that, I have no idea. As a mother of a nine year old girl, I'm still baffled that she was able to do that. REAL. Despite all the madness, these characters felt very real to me. If you can make it far enough in the book, you will root for these characters to triumph over everything. It's just a matter of if you will root for them to do so together. Either way, I have no doubt that readers will feel very strongly, one way or another, about this book. Here's the thing, I can't say I loved how this book made me feel. What I can say is that is was brilliantly written. It made me feel so much. It made me ask so many questions. It is a book that I will continue to think about for a very long time. It deserves no less than five stars for that. It is NOT for everybody. I don't think everyone will be able to read this one. But, if you ever want to push yourself outside of your comfort zone, this is the book to do that with.

Excelente libro. Una historia que te envuelve, te hace pedazos el corazón y te lo vuelve a pegar.... una y otra vez.