Anita Kelly’s Something Wild & Wonderful accomplishes an fascinating feat: Its wealthy, lyrical writing manages to make mountain climbing the two,500-mile Pacific Crest Trail sound positively beautiful but additionally like the very last thing anybody however essentially the most outdoorsy of us would wish to do. But oh, these characters—I’d go on a journey with them anyplace.
Alexei Lebedev is hoping that mountain climbing the path will assist him transition from Alexei 1.0 to Alexei 2.0: a model of himself who’s extra open, extra adventurous, braver and happier. Someone who will be capable of transfer previous the emotional blow of his dad and mom disowning him six months in the past, after he got here out as homosexual. Alexei 1.0’s life revolved round household and church, and now he has neither. He wants to determine what comes subsequent, however he by no means anticipated one thing as superb as Ben Caravalho.
Where Alexei is a meticulous planner, Ben is spontaneous. Where Alexei is shy and socially awkward, Ben is outgoing, making buddies round each nook. Alexei is dazzled by Ben proper from the beginning, and a few of the early velocity bumps of their relationship come from the truth that Alexei struggles to consider that Ben might need not solely him but additionally one thing long run with him. But that very same openheartedness that so appeals to Alexei causes issues for Ben, who all the time falls too quick and offers an excessive amount of of himself.
Something Wild & Wonderful is a journey of self-discovery, as Alexei involves phrases with who he’s and learns to let go of who he was. It’s a journey of self-actualization, as Ben learns to cease blaming himself for previous errors and settle for a future constructed on the issues that make him blissful. It’s an precise, bodily journey by means of a variety of landscapes and climates, all of which Kelly depicts in attractive, transferring prose. But most of all, it’s a journey to real love, made all of the extra plausible because of the agency basis Alexei and Ben begin from. This isn’t a romance through which the principle couple tease and taunt and drive one another up the wall earlier than they lastly hook up. This is a romance through which affection, want, admiration, appreciation and respect radiate from each web page. It’s crystal clear from the beginning that Alexei and Ben don’t simply get pleasure from one another—they’re actively good for one another. Something Wild & Wonderful is so candy and satisfying that you simply’ll wish to learn it many times, simply to expertise the varied journeys inside its pages.
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