Radio Silence in Dumbledore's *Reading* Army

Sep 24, 2020 Lucy Tonks (the invisible life of a reader) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: i-love-that-cover, favourite-authors, books-ill-never-stop-recommending, god-tier, 2020-favourites, favourites

"Hello. I hope somebody is listening."

I feel so happy! This book gave me so many happy feels! I can't. Just thinking about it and I feel happy. I know for sure that I am going to re-read this book over and over in the future. I've only read Heartstopper from Alice Oseman before this book, but I already know that she will be a favourite author of mine once I finish reading all her books. Wait, no, scratch that, she already is a favourite author of mine.

This will probably be a bit of a chaot ...more

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Jan 07, 2021 Moony (Captain Mischief) MeowPoff rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

It was so nice and cute, beautiful and sad. But it was also amazing. I adored Aled, Daniel and Frances so so much. I love the universe Alice Oseman is creating <3

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Dec 06, 2018 Sylvs (NOVELty Reads) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favourites

*screams like crazy in fangirl*

WHAT EVEN WAS THAT!? Seriously? What did I just read! That was one of THE BEST CONTEMPORARY READS I HAVE EVER READ THIS WHOLE YEAR!!! THE CHARACTERS WERE AMAZING AND RELATABLE, THE STORYLINE WAS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE AND THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN THE CHARACTERS WERE SPOT ON! AHHH!!! I GIVE THIS ALL THE STARS I'M SCREAMING INTERNALLY!!!

This book was recommended to me by a friend when I went interstate one day for a book award ceremony and she told all the people th *screams like crazy in fangirl*

WHAT EVEN WAS THAT!? Seriously? What did I just read! That was one of THE BEST CONTEMPORARY READS I HAVE EVER READ THIS WHOLE YEAR!!! THE CHARACTERS WERE AMAZING AND RELATABLE, THE STORYLINE WAS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE AND THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN THE CHARACTERS WERE SPOT ON! AHHH!!! I GIVE THIS ALL THE STARS I'M SCREAMING INTERNALLY!!!

This book was recommended to me by a friend when I went interstate one day for a book award ceremony and she told all the people there to read Radio Silence by Alice Oseman. I was there thinking "Okay I'll read it but I'm not going to expect it to end up being one of my favourites" See, I used to get book recommendations from friends and I was usually really let down so I just mainly stuck to the books I picked out from the library or off my shelf. But when another friend who picked this book up and read it said it was amazing I knew that "Okay I'm pretty sure I'd love this" and so I picked this up a few days ago when it was extremely hot and my clothes stuck to me like ants in honey and let's just say I myself found myself in a sticky situation... I was glued... I was hooked... and I was determined to keep reading this book like a moth to a light bulb. Because oh my goodness... I did not expect this level of amazingness to occur to make me a blubbering mess on Goodreads, Tumblr and the Inside A Dog website.

So what was Radio Silence about in the first place to have made me fall head over heels in love?

Glad you asked because it's about a girl named Frances Janvier who has set herself up to be a study machine with one goal: To get into Cambridge. In the meantime, Frances secretly creates fan art for a Youtube podcast show called Universe City but suddenly her life spirals out of control and makes her confront the past she's tried covering up. It's a book about identity and finding yourself and I can't really say anything else apart from that because of spoiler reasons.

I'd start off by saying I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THE CHARACTERS they were all so diverse and it was really great to see. The main character was bisexual which I loved seeing as we usually get either straight main characters or lesbian/gay ones but we don't really see many bi ones in young adult so it was really great to see and even better to read about. I loved how we also got different cultures getting represented the main character was British-Ethiopian and another character was Korean. They even wrote his Korean name in the text formats of the book which I found was really cool.

There was also a lot of relatable characters mainly in Frances who didn't have many friends but found herself having conversations with the character Aled that I was screaming internally at because I was literally turning each page being like "That is so me" which you don't see in many YA books because they usually are "the chosen one" cliche or "I can swing a sword like I'm an assassin and oh yeah this is my first time using one" I know the aforementioned is mainly in fantasy but in contemporary it is usually that the main character is just unrelatable. It's one of the reasons why I shut myself off from this genre but I was glad I gave this book a go.

The whole idea of Universe City was also amazing and unique I seriously started considering if I should make a podcast youtube series like the creator Radio Silence did. It was so cool to see that there was a community surrounding this podcast show and the author also mentioned the fans and how everyone wanted to expose the artist and the creator to the world and the amount of stress this had on their wellbeing. Being a creator of a successful fandom is fun at times, people loving your work and being able to relate to them but sometimes the fans do go crazy and start pushing the boundaries in the worst possible ways and I loved how Oseman did not sugar-coat that fact.

This review is getting really long now but I just want to also mention the music taste. The references in this book were just quite something I was screaming, as a The 1975 fan as she mentioned them as well as other groups such as NERO. I swear not that many people have heard of them but I was fangirling like anything at those references. I'm a big music nerd if you can't tell :P

Anyway all in all, I LOVED IT SO MUCH!!! I shall never doubt my friends' book recommending abilities because this book ruined me in so many ways and let's just say I have a book obsession when it comes to falling in love then getting my heart crushed by a fist made of the authors words. I'm rating this a 5 star book because I think everyone should read it and be thankful later. ...more

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Mar 05, 2021 logan :) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

this book utterly destroyed me

i love EVERTHING about this book and cannot recommend it enough. frances at the beginning is such a mood and i love her so much. also her character really demonstrates how so many students literally only do things during high school because colleges like it. there's this pressure of having to get perfect grades all the time so you can get into a good college, get a good job, have money, and then be happy. its all about what's coming next, making it so hard to just l this book utterly destroyed me

i love EVERTHING about this book and cannot recommend it enough. frances at the beginning is such a mood and i love her so much. also her character really demonstrates how so many students literally only do things during high school because colleges like it. there's this pressure of having to get perfect grades all the time so you can get into a good college, get a good job, have money, and then be happy. its all about what's coming next, making it so hard to just live in the now. as a high school student, i really relate to what frances went through regarding school and college. like, for your major, you pick something you're somewhat interested in, as long as it can get you a well paying job. i think so many high school students can relate to frances on this.

moving on to aled. AKAKJSBDVHDISNSNDJHSBS THIS SWEET CHILD MUST BE PROTECTED AT ALL COSTS NO HARM SHALL COME TO HIM. I DONT CARE THAT IM A WEAK COUCH POTATO I WILL PULVERIZE ANYONE WHO THINKS OF HARMING HIM. i think you get the idea. aled is amazing and wonderful and the world doesn't deserve him.

now aled and frances. THEIR FRIENDSHIP. i love it so much. i love how they're totally platonic soulmates because my sister and i are literally the same. i relate so much with how they can have lengthy conversations about the most obscure things that doesn't make sense to anyone else listening. ahhhhh i love how they help each grow and be truly and unapologetically themselves aND, THIS IS NOT A DRILL PEOPLE, THEY DON'T END UP DATING. like when in ya do we have a boy and a girl grow close and help each other be the best version of themselves and not end up dating.
(minor spoiler. it's mentioned in the heartstopper where they go to paris and not that far into radio silence so it's really not a spoiler but i wanted to warn y'all)
speaking of dating, i love aled and daniel. they are wonderful together. daniel skipped chemistry class for aled. ajajhdjsjxjsjs i just love everything about this book. NOW READ IT ...more

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Apr 29, 2020 Simone rated it really liked it

Shelves: contemporary, young-adult

This is another YA contemporary that surprised me (read my Eliza and Her Monsters review if you're interested). Teenagers, especially in fandoms, are difficult to write, and can very easily become cringey, yet Alice Oseman did this very well. Also, the purely platonic relationship of the main characters was wonderfully refreshing. And Frances's (the main character) mother was one of my favorite characters. It was so nice to see a contemporary have a nice mother. I pretty much have only two qualm ...more

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Jul 27, 2019 Emmiegilbs rated it it was amazing

Shelves: must-read

I relate with the main character so much. Recommend this book ❤❤❤

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Jun 23, 2019 Emma rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: owned-read, signed-books, young-adult, contemporary, lgbtq

Initial rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟 (4/5 stars).
Current rating: 🌟🌟🌟 (3/5 stars).

*some after thoughts*
I don't think I will ever review this book properly because of multiple reasons. But since finishing this novel and having read all of Oseman's full-length novels I've decided that I will no longer recommend them to other readers. I personally don't feel comfortable with recommending them. If you're for whatever reason are curious about why I no longer recommend or will read her upcoming novels here's the li ...more

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