This Winter by Alice Oseman Book Review

Welcome to my review of This Winter by Alice Oseman. This is the second in the Nick and Charlie series and is a quick read, also another of my Pride Month reads. It was an obvious choice to read after Nick and Charlie.

Click me to go to my Review

Synopsis

A short novella based on the beloved characters from Alice Oseman’s acclaimed debut novel Solitaire and graphic novel series Heartstopper – now a major Netflix series. From the author of the 2021 YA Book Prize winning Loveless.

The festive season isn’t always happy for Tori Spring and her brother Charlie. And this year’s going to be harder than most.

I used to think that difficult was better than boring, but I know better now…

I’m not going to think about the past few months, about Charlie and me, and all of the sad. I’m going to block it all out Just for today.

“Happy Christmas, ” I say.

About The Author

Alice Oseman was born in 1994 in Kent, England. She completed a degree in English at Durham University in 2016 and is currently a full-time writer and illustrator. Alice can usually be found staring aimlessly at computer screens, questioning the meaninglessness of existence, or doing anything and everything to avoid getting an office job. Alice’s first book, SOLITAIRE, was published when she was nineteen.

My Review

Christmas is such a hard time for so many people and its not just us older people but the teens in our lives too. Charlie has been through so much with his sexuality, bullying, eating disorder and self-harm and how his family deal with it but Christmas brings the whole family together and makes everything that much more difficult. Awkward conversations with grandparents, aunties and uncles, the visiting cousins etc bring things into focus and can easily become too much.

This was quite a tough read, bringing back some old memories of Christmases when I was young but it’s so true to life as well. Charlie has been through a rough time an I think there will be plenty of other young adult readers who will be able to easily relate to this and feel that they are not alone.

Tori is shown as a wonderful, caring sister again and little Oliver provides some great light relief. I love all of these characters and can’t wait to hear more from them.

The usual brilliant writing style and tough subjects from Alice Oseman make this another great read.

Rated