Book Snails Book Group discussion

I haven’t finished yet (barely halfway through) but so far I like the story and the book overall. With that said though, I can’t stand the 2 main characters as they are portrayed so far. I liked Tom initially but then after he married Isabel, I feel like he’s become too much of a “doormat” with his willingness to compromise his values and bend the rules time and time again just because Isabel asks him to. And Isabel is downright irritating with her ridiculous requests and refusal to follow the rules (though for now, I’m attributing her actions to her young age and lack of maturity as well as being sheltered by her parents most of her life). Hopefully they get less irritating as the story progresses because I really don’t want to end up hating them….

I finished reading this over the weekend. Here’s my review on it: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I wanted to elaborate a bit on what I wrote in my review (which I tried to keep as generic as possible due to not wanting to spoil it for those who hadn’t read yet). As I said in my review, I hated the character of Isabel from the beginning, but thought that my sentiment would change by the end of the story. Well, it didn’t – I still despised Isabel in the end, even though she technically did “redeem” herself in a way when she made the right decision to “save” Tom instead of letting her desire for revenge get the best of her.

I read many of the reviews on this book and found it interesting that there were such extremes with how people felt toward it. Some people loved the book while others hated it with a passion. I feel like I fall into the “middle” category of people in that there were things I loved about the book but there were also things I absolutely hated. One of the things I hated of course was the character of Isabel, though I will admit that initially, I felt bad for hating her and thought that perhaps I was being too harsh – especially considering that as a woman, I should probably empathize with what she suffered through. However, from the reviews, it seems like I’m not alone in my dislike of Isabel, which made me feel a little bit better about having so much disgust for her despite everything she went through. While in a way, I did sympathize with all the hardships she endured and feel that no one should have to go through what she and her family went through, I couldn’t really bring myself to use all that to “justify” her actions.

I also didn’t feel that Tom’s actions of sacrificing everything for Isabel and wanting to protect her at all costs was “romantic” or “moving” in any way. In fact, I actually felt he was being stupid and irrational, which is why I said in my review that I was frustrated with Tom throughout most of the story. I think if Isabel wasn’t the person she was, my feelings towards Tom’s actions would be different. I think I might be in the minority on this, but I actually felt that Isabel never loved Tom – not in the beginning, not during their time on Janus, and not even at the very end. I felt like the entire time, the “love” in the relationship was one-sided on Tom’s part – that coupled with the fact that from the getgo, Isabel was the one who caused them to be in the position they were in, I found it difficult to see Tom’s “sacrifice” (or “near-sacrifice” I guess is more appropriate) as being even remotely “heroic” or “touching.”