All the Ugly and Wonderful Things

What a fierce, horrific, terrifying and beautiful look at love and family that challenges all of our notions and preconceptions about the notion of true love. Beautifully written, with characters who ooze authenticity, All the Ugly and Wonderful Things lives up to its title and examines love in its most beautiful and horrifying variations. Not for a squeamish reader who avoids having their comfortable, complacent world challenged, this novel pushes boundaries but succeeds brilliantly at challenging a reader to immerse themselves in a world that is turned sideways and often upside down.

This book kept me up all night, and I think I only took about 5 breaths the whole time.

Wavy is an 8yo wisp of a girl, known for not speaking or allowing anyone to touch her; a daughter of meth dealers and addicts who shaped her into something intangible. She is the sole person responsible for herself and her baby brother, until one of her derelict dad’s thugs crashes his motorcycle near her.

The thug she calls Kellen turns out to be the only person who really sees her, and becomes vital in her and her brother’s ability to survive the life they landed in, to feel what it’s like to be loved. To say this gets complicated is an understatement.

The books follows Wavy and those around her for the next decade or so, including those who give up on her and those willing to keep trying, as well as her well-meaning aunt who does not see things as Wavy does.

I’ve read many difficult things and many beautiful things over the years, and this book blends both experiences in a way that stuns me into silence. I only took breaks when I needed to brace myself, because I just cared so much and had no idea how each chapter would play out.

The way the author peppered puzzle pieces that explain who Kellen really is was both torture and a delight. I don’t even know that I’d want to suggest this as a read for my book club, because I kind of want to protect certain characters that others may instinctively lash out at, for their beauty is fragile and misunderstood in a way that not everyone will understand. Just like Wavy.

Just finished this strange book. It’s not for the faint of heart.

The sweetest most disturbing book I have ever read.

***my review has spoilers***

This book isn’t for everyone at all. This is no simple age-gap story and not at all Lolita. Kellen is no Humbert with an obsessive attraction or infatuation. Humbert was the villian to peoples’ view and Kellen is symphatized hero. There is a HEA. My review is messed up and my thoughts all over the place. After finishing this book I went through the reviews, the low rated reviews were obvious and the high rated ones were curiously satisfying. I wanted to see how people justified the actions of this book and I was reasurred by my views.

Triggers: abuse, violence, drugs, cheating, under-age fondling.

‘My mother always started the story by saying, “Well, she was born in the backseat of a stranger’s car,” as though that explained why Wavy wasn’t normal.’

Wavonna (Wavy) Lee Quinn is one of the unfortunate child in this world granted with the worst parents of the century. From the moment she was born she was mentally and physically abused just by the taunts of the two people who were supposed to cherish her. While her father, a criminal/drug dealer refuses to acknowledge her presence her mother has destroyed her life as a drug addict. Wavy’s mother had the most influence in her life – she has eating issues, refuses to let people touch her and won’t talk unless necessary. Wavy was an adult for a little kid, she does get into trouble but it’s more for the sake of finding little pleasures. Wavy was 7-years when she starts taking care of her new born baby brother, Donal. Her negligent parents most of of the time forgot about their children. She cooked, she laundered, she kept the house clean, she went to school and took care of her infant brother.

‘He didn’t fuss like Mama. Sometimes he asked me about what I was doing, like why I put bread in the bottom of the meatloaf pan. I liked that he asked and didn’t get upset if I didn’t answer.’

Jesse Joe (Kellen)/Junior Barfoot was a giant dumb brute with no education with a bad temper. Kellen works as a mechanic and owns a motorbike. He also works for Wavy’s father. He is mocked and called “fat” who was a waste of space. Kellen is everything I described and also a huge compassionable man who treated people kindly even those who don’t deserve it. He is also a tattooed biker. Kellen is the son of an abusive father and alchoholic mother.

‘Nothing belongs to you.’

Let me tell you this is a powerful line to be acknowledged by a 5-year-old. When Wavy’s mother was arrested and put under therapeutic stuff Wavy was first taken to foster care from there she bounced to her Aunt Brenda (Wavy’s mum’s older sister) and then her grandmother (her mum’s mother). If Wavy first felt a little compassion for a human being I think it was for her grandmother. But she kept her grandmother outside her heart because nothing belongs to Wavy and she doesn’t get to keep it.
When Wavy first met Kellen it was an explosion I mean an accident which was Kellen crashing his bike and breaking body parts. Kellen was instinctive to help and protect Wavy simply because he grew up facing what she was going through. His motivations towards her was compassion, he couldn’t unsee the things she was facing. Kellen became her guardian. He did her groceries, helped take care of Donal, paid her school fees, took her to school.

(now comes the part where most readers are disgusted of the relationship more than the abusive parents they grew up with)

‘Nothing belonged to me, but the rule didn’t keep me from wanting Kellen to be for me only.’

Wavy was almost 11 years junior to Kellen, a huge age-gap which is more expressive when one from the pair is not of legal age. Wavy looked up to Kellen as a guardian who noticed her, let her be and understood to the ruckus that was her life. She even adopted to the name Kellen called her “Wavy” and responds only when everyone calls to that name. We find Wavy’s romanticizing feelings from 11-years of age. Kellen to his defence didn’t notice her until she started growing up. It’s weird when a 13-year-old thinks of bj-ing a guy and more weirder when a matured man is attracted to a girl who hasn’t yet shown the budding shape of womanhood. We call them pedophile when an older person is attracted to a child, so what makes my point to support Kellen? I was in Kellen’s head and understood his feelings. Kellen isn’t attracted to little girls but only to that girl he protected, provided and loved. Wavy was the first person to appraoch with sexual intention and Kellen is shown to resist her. This is no love story of a normal teenage girl who fell for an older man, this is Wavy, a 13-year-old who went through abuses and has mutured beyond her years early.

‘Jesse Joe come back to the shop with Wavy, her looking happy for a change. Girl that age ought not to have so many troubles, but she did. Looking at it that way, them two was about made for each other. He’d swum his share of sorrows.’

‘Jesse Joe was a man with a deep streak of lonely, until Wavy came along.’

Life is a pretty canvas when things are right. Kallen and Wavy were very happy for a time. My piss pound moment came when Wavy is away at night (not to get in trouble) or when she hangs out with an older man, her parents barely know about her whereabouts. I’m glad how the story ended for them.

‘The bike and the ring, they were just things. Donal and Kellen were all she cared about, and they’d both been taken away from her.’

Aunt Brenda was an annoying character in my case but she is the only person who took action and this help us lean towards Kellen positively. I mean if she didn’t do what she did to Kellen this story would be a simple fictional story where unlike relationships get their HEA. She destroyed not only her life but worked on making Wavy miserable, what she thought was doing good and justifying on behalf of Wavy but instead she made Wavy miserable. Aunt Brenda was not bad, she was trying to make things right for Wavy. Her influence through the end of the book shows us the purity and genuine Wavy and Kellen’s relationship was. My final star to this review is dedicated to that.

I don’t usually enjoy multiple pov’s and like h’s views mostly but here I enjoyed everyones povs. The story is told in multiple characters views personifying their thoughts on Wavy and Kellen. They are judgemental, repulsed and also happy. What made the story beautiful was that the love was pure. The whole book is not romantic, not until the second half of the book. I’m unaware of why Amy (Wavy’s cousin) took a liking to Wavy from the beginning. The first and last POV was of Amy and I liked how she was with Wavy. The writing is very good and enrapturing. This book satisfied my urge to read an unconventional story and it wasn’t too romantisized which I needed at the moment.

Great book …wonderful characters

Disturbing, but wonderfully written!

This book will make you think about right and wrong

Wow. What did I just read?

The story begins with the rather sad life of then 8-year old Wavonna (Wavy) Quinn. She’s the daughter of a major meth dealer and a seriously disturbed woman who can’t seem to function without drugs and “her” man. Wavy is the only adult in the house, giving care for her toddler brother and self managing, seeing and living through too much to ever recapture childlike innocence. Her life is forever altered after an encounter in the meadow with one of her father’s men. Joe Jesse Kellen thought he was seeing a vision of an angel at the time and together they form a bond that continues and escalates over the next five years.

It was like watching a slow motion train wreck…I couldn’t close my eyes even though I knew what was coming would disturb me. What I didn’t expect, however, was to become invested in these characters and their relationship. Wavy is an old soul because she had no choice but to be anyone otherwise. It made Kellen’s connection to her more understandable, at least some foundation for it but moreso than anything else, trust was the cornerstone of their relationship. Neither had ever experienced that with anyone.

This book isn’t for everyone as I even questioned whether it was for me. The writing and characterizations are brilliant no matter where you land in judging the subject matter. I never expected my paradigms to shift, let alone move aside. It’s a tough story and one I won’t forget. The narration is excellent and I highly recommend the audio format.

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway. The author sent me a beautiful signed, hardcover. She signed it, “all the way”. From an honesty and artistic integrity, Bryn Greenwood does indeed hold nothing back and go, “all the way”. This story is a moving love story, it’s a troubling tale of the destructive wake of drug addiction, it’s a disturbing take on a pedophiliac relationship, it a poignant look at resilience and overcoming tragedy. Yes, it’s all those things.

It’s the story of Wavy, the very young daughter of a drug dealing, piece of crap, meth lab lord. Wavy is surrounded by pitiful and broken people, and it shows. She barely speaks, she cannot eat in front of others, and at ten, she is completely and hopelessly in love with a tender-hearted thug that, while being 12 years older, seems to be the only one with the fortitude to care for her and her little brother. The story follows Wavy, her brother, her drug addled mother, and a host of other characters. The last third of the book reveals a violent double murder, which adds horror, intrigue, twists, and conflict to an already fascinating story. Each chapter is titled with a character’s name which represents the perspective of that chapter. We get a great deal of different perspectives, probably ten or twelve different character point of views. It’s an interesting mechanic which mostly works, although it did pull me out of the story a few times, as I contemplated it.

Anyway, I don’t want to spoil too much of the story. I wanted to talk about Bryn Greenwoods writing. It’s lean without anything unnecessary. It’s brutally honest. Greenwood shows us a place and describes characters and relationships without a bit of “tell”. She leaves the judgement to us. In fact, she dares us to judge. Is it a horrific tale of a twenty-something sex offender grooming and defiling a young pre-teen? Or is it a tender tale of love that overcomes horrific circumstances to find something touching. Is it ugly or is it wonderful? (see what I did there?) I’m not sure I’ve read a more raw and honest novel. When you hear reviewers talk about tell verse show, this should be the poster child of show! Well, I’m going to pass it on, I’m not going to pass judgement either (at least not in this review).

I did not grow up the child of drug dealers. I did not have to deal with poverty and violence at a very young age. I did not get passed from a dysfunctional family to disapproving relatives to foster care, only to end right back with the original, messed-up family. So, I’m not going to pass judgement about trying to find someone with a bit of good in them, a rare person in their life that actually seems to care, even if it’s a disturbing, socially unacceptable relationship. Just like Greenwood, I will leave that judgement up to you, good reader. Greenwood did grow up the daughter of a man who ran a meth lab, sold drugs, and spent time in prison. So, she is in a much better place than I to pass judgement, but she doesn’t. She lets the characters live out their lives, deftly describing the setting and the action.

This is a book that pulled me in and yes, disturbed and troubled me. It made me question my beliefs and struggle with my own views on who exactly is the criminal, who is the victim, and who among us is truly innocent? And that, folks, is what a good book should do. Five stars.