I Joined with Them in the Ether Literally

Hey, I somehow loved this book for the longest time I could remember. My TBR had this for so long, but I kept delaying starting it. So glad that this book was in my TBR. For so many days, both MCs just existed in my mind like they were real.

Key notes?

• A standalone

• Both MCs are flawed, more like mentally ill.

• Genre: Romance

A lyrically written, mesmerizing love story of two flawed people. The writing style made the story feel like a melody. Regan is a bipolar counterfeit artist, and Aldo is a mathematician with logic and a strict routine, always lost in his head. Aldo is single-minded, whereas Regan’s head is in chaos all the time. They both meet at a museum, and the immediate connection leads to only six conversations. After each conversation, they learn about each other, and a growing attraction eventually makes the story progress.

The metaphors, bees, and hexagons made the book stand out from other romance novels. The metaphor of being in the ether is so beautiful! Their own world, where they make sense. Regan’s fixation on finding the perfect circle and Aldo’s time travel theories before meeting her—just dreamy.

This book shows that we can love someone while still having negative thoughts, no matter how ugly they sound in our heads—they are real. Through all their struggles with themselves, the way they loved beyond everything else made me literally cry, as I related to some moments.

Is reading the book worth it?
Please read it. You will find it real and relatable, and at the same time musical. The love story between two complicated people will make you want to root for them at every turn of the page.

I was turning every page, leaving the last page’s thumbprint in my mind. I kept thinking, Oh my God, how beautiful this sounds.

The whole book is colorful, as I marked almost every line. Here are some of my favorite ones:

My Favorite Quotes

✤ He wasn’t just unconventionally handsome; he was uncommonly beautiful, she realized.
“What did you learn?” he asked.
“That I could study you for a lifetime, carrying all of your peculiarities and discretions in the webs of my spidery palms, and still feel empty-handed.”

✤ There are two ways to manipulate a man: either to let him pursue you or to let him pursue you in a way that makes him feel like he’s in the pursuit.

✤ The night before he met her, Aldo had resigned himself to the fact that an epiphany might never find him. That was the risk with time—that knowing things or not knowing them could change from day to day.

✤ When you learn a new word, you suddenly see it everywhere.

✤ “Can you do something for me?” Aldo asked.
“Just don’t be gross.”
“Is it gross?” she said with a wary glance.
“Look, I’d like you to lie to me.”
“What does that even mean, Aldo?”
“Because I want to know when you’re lying to me,” he said.

✤ “I think that the inside of your head must require a specific set of keys. For someone to get close to you, you must have to give them one key at a time. And even then, only one level can be opened at once,” he said.

✤ “Sometimes, doesn’t happiness seem… fake? Like it might be something someone invented. An impossible goal we’ll never reach,” he said slowly.

✤ Why him? Mimicry from her father’s study.
“Because I know he’ll sit for me. Because I know he won’t mock me, won’t suffocate me. Because he is the thing I can’t unsee,” she said.

✤ “Sometimes I feel like I’m just waiting for something that will never happen,” he said. “Like I’m just existing from day to day, but will never really matter.”

✤ “She does burn me; she ignites me. But it’s different,” Aldo said to his dad. “She is my hope, and for that, she is dangerous, unequivocally. But she is also alive, unreservedly.”

I had to filter; otherwise, I’d type the whole book again. My recommendation would be to give it a chance—thank me later.

Brainstorming question of the day- Who decides what is healthy? (If you’ve read the book, you’ll know what this means.)

If you read this book, do share with me your thoughts.

Let’s chat another day!

Thanks

Jessie.