Set in contemporary everyday life LA (not just the pretty Beverly Hills), Love and Other Sins, the debut novel by film and TV actress Emilia Ares is intelligent and adventurous. It has as well the same amount of emotions as touching upon sensitive issues such as child abuse and various mentions of miscarriage, anger management and suicidal thoughts. Although such topics are rarely addressed in YA novels it does on mean that they don´t exist. In fact, as far as I remember from my own young adolescent life, such issues are very much presents into the everyday life of a young person - particularly suicidal thoughts - but adults rarely accept to acknowledge it. Such a courageous take makes the book even more appealing in its realistic approach to everyday young life.
In a very organised world, Mina and Oliver would never meet. Each would have follow up their own paths, in their own worlds. Particularly Mina, a very academically focused young lady, whose main interests are predominantly about school grades and academic achievements. But life, real life, is less about our plans and more about our capacity of being able to adapt and even embrace difference into our life: different people, different destinies, a turn of luck.
Although Oliver is interesting and intelligent, but despite the young age, he has a heavy and complicated destiny he is carrying with him, deep hidden into his heart. As a child abuse survivor, he needs a new identity and a new life to start and life, as usual, is not always generous with him. However, he struggles to get back his life and on his way, he meets Mina whose growing up fond of him.
The story construction seems to be sometimes too much focused on the relationship between the two. On one hand, it allows a good profile of both of them, but on the other hand, it neglects some of the other characters as well as the course of action. I´ve enjoyed the intelligent conversations though as well as the ways in which the relationship between the two, even at the very beginning it seemed very impossible. But love is often about impossible things, isn´t it?
Love and Other Sins is a book recommended to young adult readers, but also to their educators and psychologists interested in new takes of very common encounters for this age. Personally, I am very glad that there are new and new takes on such important issues affecting young adults, storified in such a very new and empathic way.
Rating: 3.5 stars
Disclaimer: Book offered by the published in exchange for an honest review but the opinions are, as usual, my own
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