Review: Side Effects May Vary by Julie Murphy

3 Stars

“I knew how to die. It was living that scared me.”

I'm guessing in due time everyone will be comparing this to Fault In Our Stars, since anything that is remotely similar to a popular book must be differentiated. 

Well, there's no use comparing Side Effect May Vary to Fault in Our Stars, and not because they have no similarities, it's merely the fact all novels containing the subject of cancer always have vast resemblance. So, what I’m evidently saying is - I will not judge this book based on its originality but on its content. 

It’s hard to break this book into my own blurb because there is not much to summon up. It’s essentially about a girl named Alice who is revealed to have leukemia. She creates a bucket list of things she needs to complete before her death. Forming a close relationship with Harvey is one of them. They were buddies during their younger years, before fate took them to different directions 

“Then we’d drifted. High school did that to you, turned you into pieces of driftwood. And the parts of you that you’d tried to keep in one piece became the property of the wind and water, sending those dear pieces you were not.”

After a while, their relationship begins to blossom again. Once Alice is certain her expiry date will come soon, her doctor exposes she’s on remission. 



Well, this is when the story went downhill for me. Alice could not simply be happy about the revelation. No she can’t. Well, if she was then we would have to chop off 250 pages. So, we make her somehow upset about her remission. It’s not stated clearly why she is, only it makes her saddened for reasons too important to specify very clearly. 

“I had Harvey, and I had him for good. Hadn’t that been all I wanted? To make those perfect moments last? But now I felt trapped, like a homeless person who’d been given their dream home only to suffer from intense wanderlust because we always wanted something until we have it.”

Nice simile. 

But..

still not helping because you won’t distinctively tell me, which part of getting better upsets you. I must have misread the book. Alice says, she’s unhappy about the remission because now she can be with Harvey. I don't understand. Is she upset about that since her cancer will always be a shadow upon her life? Does it concern her that she will live in fear with Harvey knowing any minute, she could lose him, therefore she has lost that comforting certainty of when her death was already set?

Might be.

The relationship between Harvey and Alice is quite dysfunctional. Harvey genuinely loves Alice and demonstrates this more than enough. Alice feels the same way but she complicates their relationship, and it’s not because of her health, it’s her utter confusing attitude. I felt frequently as if the book was primarily about Harvey's unrequited love for Alice. I would have liked to apprehend the motivation behind Alice's actions, but it’s never rationalized explicitly.

Don't give one sentences like: “I knew how to die. It was living that scared me,” and then expect me to completely understand the character. You need to dive deeper and express more, in order for me to connect with the character's emotional state.

For instance, after her remission, she attends school but becomes irritated by her classmate’s questions about her leukemia. After school that day, she meets a guy and begins chatting him up. Harvey finds her outside and says he should quickly drive her home, considering it’s cold, nevertheless she ignores him and continues to chat to the guy, while Harvey simply stands there waiting for her. 

It seems this bitchy attitude can be excused because she has cancer, but why? It’s not like cancer strips away your morals. Apparently, this must be it. Maybe that was the whole point of the story. Cancer or more specifically remission makes you a bitch, but you have to redeem yourself... Okay, that doesn't make sense. The story doesn’t have much of a purpose which explains the lack of making sense. 

Sometimes, I had thought Alice and Harvey were cute. I could almost see why they were so drawn into each other. 

“You can play the cancer card forever, Alice.”
“You’re right, just until I’m dead. Then I dub you the carrier of the card, which shall henceforth be known as the ‘my friend died of cancer’ card.”

Then again, overuse of angst in romance can really makes you think twice. Alice continuously angers Harvey by using jealousy methods, subsequently she would get overly jealous when he attempts to get over her by dating someone else. See my problem? 

Her attitude after her remission is intolerable. She treats Harvey who is relentlessly by her side like shit, because she she can't handle her emotions. As suggested earlier, it would appear odious if I criticize the heroine’s bad behavior since she has cancer. I on the other hand am not that easy enough to hand her the cancer card, and let her attitude go unnoticed. She basically behaves as if the world owes her something due to her sickness. seemingly, Alice must have been misinformed about how the world works if that's what she thinks. 


Not gonna work sweetheart.

I could have liked Alice, and many times I did, but there was potential to build her character and provide reasonable and believable explanations, as to why she chooses to act the way she does. It would have made the heroine's character development more thorough, insteading of purely giving her an epiphany about her actions. (No, it was not a spoiler, in case you're thinking that.)

The non-linear structure of the book might be exasperating to readers. In my opinion, I thought it was done well and fit the book perfectly. The book switches from the past to the present. The past is the first year of her leukemia and when she is completing her bucket list. The present is set a year after, throughout the duration of her remission. The POV is told from both Harvey and Alice. They have quite distinct voices, mainly because Harvey's tone sounds kinder and more caring, so you could easily identify it. 

The book has its amusing and engaging moments, therefore it earns solely two stars, plus an extra star for Harvey’s character. But I don’t find the book deserving of anymore. I initially finished the book with satisfaction, until I real thought and analyzed the story, which then I found myself quite unsatisfied. 

I’m sure some will enjoy this, but I find the book… pointlesswhen it comes to realistic fiction.