The Sun Is Also a Star

I have never felt as close to a writer or a fictional experience as I do to Nicola Yoon and The Sun Is Also a Star. It’s been said that having a wide variety of characters and cultures represented in literature is vital to our understanding of others and for others to understand us, and I’ve made that statement multiple times. What I never thought about before was how important it is to have a wide variety of characters and cultures represented in order to better understand ourselves. I understand myself and my family better because of The Sun is Also A Star.The Sun Is Also a Star is a brilliant representation of humanity, and the roles love, fate, chance, and purpose play in how our world unfolds around us. Sun follows Natasha and David, two teenagers who are at points in their lives when their decisions have more weight, their futures uncertain, and their destinies seemingly in everyone else’s hands but their own. The story takes place over the course of a day, on the busy streets of New York City, and uses a unique narrative consisting of multiple POVs. Nicola Yoon converges lives and shows that even within our own story, the rest of the world matters.Sun is about dreamers. It’s about the romantics and it’s about the realists. It’s about everyone who simply dreams of a life filled with happiness, passion, and love. It’s also about those who practically dream of security and freedom. Sun is about the immigrant story, one that’s more important than ever.Sun follows Daniel, a Korean American boy who doesn’t fit into his family, and doesn’t fit into his country. It’s about Natasha, an undocumented Jamaican immigrant, who would appear more “American” than most Americans, because she certainly doesn’t “act Jamaican” but she’s not and she’s about to be deported. Sun is about our parents, who grew up with dreams as well, and we may or may not have played a part in those dreams. Sun is about the strangers around us, whose decisions can have unforeseeable, and long-lasting effects on our lives. It’s also about the strangers who are also affected by the decisions we make.This is a story I think everyone should experience. It’s both global and intimate. It’s a love story, but also so much more. The characters in this book are layered and multifaceted. The story is thoughtful, profound, romantic, and hopeful. Yes, it’s a teenage love story—one that I fell hard and fast for—but it’s also about family and history. And of course, I was all in once I saw that it’s a reflection of my culture, and myself, and Nicola Yoon brightly showcases the beautiful complexity of my history, the complicated relationships intertwined, the dreams of my past and my future.If you’ve read Everything, Everything, then you’ll recognize the exceptional style of Nicola Yoon’s prose. It’s gorgeous really, and even more so because she has this way of including seemingly random gems and factoids, and making the dry seem poetic. It’s hard to understand unless you’ve read her (read her!), but like Natasha, Nicola is a scientist and a romantic, and when those two combine, magic happens.The Sun Is Also a Star is magic. It’s sweet, it’s meaningful, it’s heartbreaking, it’s buoyant, it sweeps you away, and yet keeps you grounded at the same time. This thought provoking love story is one I had a difficult time reviewing because I didn’t think I could truly convey what it meant to me. I reviewed it, but still haven’t expressed all I felt. I’ll just say that The Sun Is Also a Star shows how love provides hope and reason in a sometimes unfair and unreasonable world, and that message is everything to a romantic in a cynical world. I highly recommend.

This is the second book I've read by Nicola Yoon, and it tells me that her book Everything, Everything, was not. Fluke. What an original voice this writer possesses. As a teen novel, her work stands out for its intelligence and the depth her characters portray. Tackling important and touchy subjects, Yoon moves with grace, while always entertaining her readers, which has to always be at the forefront of any good novel.Like Everything, Everything, this novel centers on the two young people of far different backgrounds and cultures, who fall in love. Natasha is from Jamaica originally, and Daniel is Korean, but born in America. They meet because of what someone might consider 'bad luck', but if fate is at work, as Daniel believes, then everything is a set up because they were meant to fall in love. Natasha relies on science and doesn't believe in love, expect as a chemical reaction. Her father's dream of becoming a great actor has shown her the folly of following your dream, so she follows numbers and decides to be a data specialist, at until her father comes home with a DUI and an order to leave the country he's been staying in illegally for the past nine years. Desperate to stay, Natasha is offered the help of a lawyer, and while on her way to meet with him, she has a series of events that lead her to Daniel, who is also at a crossroads in his life. If he doesn't go to Yale and become a doctor, his parents will cut him off.I love the way Yoon gives a snippets of the people who influence the two lovers lives, helping them to find their fate and meet. Yoon even gives us short definitions of Fate, and how our eyes work, when Daniel suggests that he and Natasha stare into each other's in order to fall in love scientifically.Beautifully written, this novel touched my heart and made me feel like magic is still working in our world, even if it's hard to see sometimes.

This story was beautiful, touching and hopeful in all the best ways. The style of writing was unique and kept me gripped in the moments each character experienced. Perfect amount of detail while keeping a quick pace.

Quando eu via as pessoas comentando que O Sol Também é Uma Estrela era melhor que Tudo e Todas as Coisas, eu confesso que não acreditava muito. Quero dizer, o primeiro livro de Nicolla Yoon já tinha me passado tantas coisas e sentimentos, que o meu cérebro pensava: "deve ser tão bom quanto... Mas não melhor". A questão é que, bem, fazem algumas horas que terminei Sol - e tenho que dar o braço a torcer: as pessoas estavam certas.Mesmo tendo uma trama mais simples do que a presente em seu livro de estreia, Nicolla Yoon constrói um verdadeiro universo para contar o encontro 'casual' (ou seria obra do destino?) de Natasha e Daniel. Ao mesmo tempo em que eles são incrivelmente diferentes, ambos possuem sutilezas semelhantes. E enquanto ela é metódica e realista, ele é passional e apaixonado. Juntos, em um dia, é como se vivessem uma vida inteira - e da forma mais simples e casual possível, e talvez tenha sido justamente este detalhe que me fisgou por completo.E eu notei as iniciais iguais, Sra. Yoon. Ah, se notei!Gostei muito de ver os dois juntos e conhecer os dois. Esta é uma história sobre imigrantes nos EUA, e a autora não decepciona ao montar os paralelos sociais, culturais e políticos na forma destas duas famílias - uma que se estabeleceu legalmente e outra ilegalmente, às vésperas da deportação. Cada família tem o seu peso para que este encontro aconteça, mas não apenas eles como uma miríade de personagens vão surgir para interligar a história de Natasha e Daniel.Por falar em personagens, assim como amei o casal, muitos surgiram para mexer com os meus brios. Odiei o irmão de Daniel com todas as minhas forças. Tive raiva do pai de Natasha. Entretanto, um personagem em principal foi o que mais me afetou. Principalmente por tudo o que ele faz e o que acontece com ele. Sim, eu percebi que a autora usou ele como uma crítica ao privilégio, mas ainda que tenha entendido a mensagem, não fiquei feliz por ele ter se dado bem - depois do estrado que faz na vida de tanta gente em nome de seu egoísmo.Enfim, este livro despedaçou o meu coração - no bom e no mal sentido. Conforme o final ia se aproximando, eu só chorava mais. Não estava preparado para as emoções que esta história iria evocar em mim, e mesmo antevendo o fim desde a metade, não me preparei para ele. Por isso, quando te disserem que Sol é mais impactante que Tudo, acreditem nisto. Talvez isto te prepare para a montanha russa em que você vai embarcar.

Though not quite a the norm for me when choosing books, I read the blurb for this book and knew I had to read it, and I was not at all disappointed. The cover is also quite beautiful and eye-catching.The Sun is Also a Star is a heart-warming and emotional journey of two very different individuals, a chance meeting and a series of events. It took me on a mini rollercoaster ride, stunning me with the amount of things that can happen in a period of 24 hours. Its the age old story of love Vs. science and how all our actions have consequences, no matter how insignificant we believe them to be. Not to forget how one's interactions and words can change the course of action for someone else's life and in some ways save them from their own fates.I enjoyed the back and forth style story telling, focusing on the POVs of Daniel and Natasha whilst also weaving in some additional characters we meet in passing. I found it to be a refreshing and delightful way of novel writing.In a time of such global sadness, this book allowed me a ray of light.

La historia para mí resultó poco predecible. Y amé que estuviera contado en primera persona de los protagonistas. Además los capítulos donde el universo explica cosas, me encantaron! Lo disfruté de tapa a tapa

Me lo he leído en un día me ha enganchando completamente. Si eres o has sido inmigrante o conoces a uno has de leerlo. Va mucho más allá de una simple novela de amor