My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is another book we found at K-Mart the other night. I was intrigued by the synopsis, so I got stuck into it right away.
In 1997, five tight-knit high school friends enjoy a wonderful Australian summer together, but after graduation, everything falls apart. Fifteen years later, one of them reaches out to arrange a meeting with The Nocturnals...
Engrossing. Interesting. Addictive. Sad.
As soon as I started reading this book, I knew it would hook me in. And I wasn't wrong because I couldn't put it down!
At its core, this is a story about the deep bonds of young friendship rippling into adulthood. It's about flawed people finding comfort, and a sense of belonging, while complementing each other in the most unexpected ways. It's also about how life and circumstance can get in the way of the closest friend group and destroy their connection in a split second.
Told in the shared POV of the main characters, Nina, Beatrice, Hunter, Cosmo, and Harriet, there are also other perspectives thrown in that help balance out this interesting story. The chapters are short and snappy, which keeps the momentum going at the perfect pace and alternate to cover what happened in the past, as well as what's going on in the present.
I seriously loved everything about this book. It's hard to summarise exactly what makes The Nocturnals such a special book because it's not one thing, it's everything. The characters are real and amazing, the locations vivid, the problems totally relatable but at the same time, so foreign. But what brings all of this together is the writing, and the melancholy but hopeful and raw way it unfolds.
This is a story I will remember for years to come, and that final chapter is beautiful.
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