Ri ♡ 's Reviews > Beautiful World, Where Are You

“Because we loved each other too much and found each other too interesting. And I love that about humanity, and in fact it's the very reason I root for us to survive - because we are so stupid about each other.”

Beautiful World, Where Are You was my first book by Sally Rooney and it was surprisingly okay. I'm still trying to navigate my mixed feelings about this book because this is definitely not those perfect books with perfect and lovable characters. While I liked the story, loved a certain character (Simon), understood the characters and their choices and reasons, even enjoyed reading this book and to know about the realistic and flawed characters, I also kind of hate this book and the characters (not you Simon) because so many things and people frustrated me in this book.

“At times I think of human relationships as something soft like sand or water, and by pouring them into particular vessels we give them shape.”

The story is about four people—Alice, Eileen, Simon and Felix—navigating their way through life while also discovering the meaning and pleasures of life, friendships, love and sex. This is a character-driven story so you won't like it if you are here for the plot. I liked Sally's strange yet impressive writing. Also the infamous lack of quotation marks in her books didn't bother me because I read this book as an audiobook. Sally definitely has a way with beautiful words and raw and flawed characters. I could criticise them for all the choices they made but I also understand why they did what they did and the choices they made (but that doesn't mean I didn't wanted to punch them in their faces). This was written in third pov and it alternates between two stories—Alice and Eileen. The story was a little confusing in the starting because of the third pov but I also liked the way it made me feel like I was watching these people and it took me about 5 chapters to finally understand what's happening in this book.

“And life is more changeable than I thought. I mean a life can be miserable for a long time and then later happy. It’s not just one thing or another—it doesn’t get fixed into a groove called ‘personality’ and then run along that way until the end.”

Eileen and Alice were two best friends living just a few hours away from each other but not meeting that each other for months and months because work and life got in the way. The emails they exchanged added more depth to their stories even though they were just about random topics like climate change, environment and politics. It was more like Sally was using her own characters to share her own feelings about various philosophical ideas.

“Maybe we're just born to love and worry about the people we know, and to go on loving and worrying even when there are more important things we should be doing.”

➸ Simon

The best character and the only character I loved in this book. Simon was an incredible person with his sefless and loving personality but he was also the most reserved person. He finds it hard to share his feelings because he thinks he's not so easy to be taken care of. Which is the biggest lie in this world. He deserved so much better. The way he was giving and always giving all his love, care and attention to the people he loved and maybe its because of his martyr complex personality but he is always there for everyone. The way he loved Eileen only to get rejected by her everytime because she couldn't be more than just friends with him was just so annoying. Because how can anyone reject this man?

“If God wanted me to give you up, he wouldn't have made me who I am.”

➸ Eileen

She was a difficult and sad person like she said. Always thinking that something bad or worst will happen if she let herself feel happy. She was ready to sacrifice what Simon and she could have only to feel a little secure in her life. I don't really hate her and I get why she always thought that way about her but she can't always play safe when it comes to life and I'm glad she finally understood that in the end.

“I was tired, it was late, I was sitting half-asleep in the back of a taxi, remembering strangely that wherever I go, you are with me, and so is he, and that as long as you both live the world will be beautiful to me.”

➸ Alice
I feel like Sally tried or maybe actually did projected herself onto her characters. Especially Alice. Sad and tortured Alice who is rich but also doesn't want to be rich? The way she sometimes behaved and acted was a bit conflicting to the way she wanted things to be. I get she went through a hard time because of the mental breakdown. Yes, I felt empathy with Alice, but how she talked about her own sadnesses and predicaments didn’t have me feeling a lot of sympathy.
I wish there was more development to her character because in the end its just felt like she was all okay but also not okay?

“I feel very embarrassed by all that now, but I was lonely and unhappy, and I didn’t understand that these feelings were ordinary, that there was nothing singular about my loneliness, my unhappiness.”

➸ Felix

I literally don't know half the things he said and did in this book except that he had a dog named Sabrina. He was just a plain and boring character.


➙ Eileen and Alice

Their friendship was the most precious thing in this book. They loved each other, supported each other, helped each other, understood each other, never interfered with each other's lives like some intrusive friends did. And you may think everything about their sweet little friendship is perfect but it's not. They also hide things from each other, lied to each other, never tried to meet each other even when they were just living a few hours away from each other. The fall-out was always supposed to happen but what's more important was the way they acted on their feelings when it happened. It's normal for friends to grow apart sometimes maybe it's because of the actual distance and maybe it's because of the invisible barriers they both created around each other and blame one another that one loved them more but the other loved them less but what's more important was that how willing they are to make those mistakes right. They are your friend right? So they would understand you if you just talked about it with them. That's what Eileen and Alice's friendship was like.

Eileen put her arm around Alice’s shoulders. “If you weren’t my friend I wouldn’t know who I was,” she said. Alice rested her face in Eileen’s arm, closing her eyes. “No,” she agreed. “I wouldn’t know who I was either. And actually for a while I didn’t.”

➙ Simon and Eileen

Do I hate Eileen for the way she treated Simon? Yes. Do I ship them together? I don't want to but yes. Am I happy that they finally have found their happiness together in the end? Yes.

They are one of those complicated couple whom I hate with passion but also felt miserable when they were just toying with each other's feelings. They both loved each other, even confessed that love to each other, messed with each other and with others for years, had sex many times and not "No feelings attached sex", it was the intimate kind of sex where you tell each other how much you love them and how much you think the world of them. Their dynamics frustrated me a lot because why can't they be together when they love each other so much, understand each other and trust each other. WHY?

“But if you think there’s any chance that I could make you happy, I wish you would let me try. Because it’s the only thing I really want to do with my life.”

They love each other and help each other but they never were in a exclusive relationship because Eileen was always afraid of losing whatever she presently had with Simon. She wanted him but always told him "Let's just be friends". She also hated and only showed any interest in him when he was dating some other girl. She was concerned about what would happen if she just give him and them a chance. And that's a genuine reason and concern when you have a friend like Simon who made you feel so many emotions—the bad and the good ones but that's just another way of hurting that person's feelings. There were so many things she never talked about with Simon and the way Simon always tried to ignore talking about his feelings and needs which just lead to miscommunications. He thought she didn't loved him the way he did and she was just too affraid of everything Simon could give her. They are toxic but also so right for each other. They had everything from chemistry to love. And I was happy when they finally got together in the end and Eileen actually acted on her insecurities instead of running away from them.

“I find it hard to believe anything really bad about myself when I consider how much he loves me.”

➙ Felix and Alice

They met on Tinder and then she asked him to come Rome with her, they got closed during that time, shared their darkest secrets, had sex, Felix cared for her and treated her like a normal person, she said she loved him, she said she's not so easy to love and he said that's what she always did because she always wanted to have a upper hand in everything she did. Their realtionship was even more complicated than what Eileen and Simon had. What Felix and Alice were something in between the friends and the lovers and I don't know what I feel about them. Also I didn't felt any chemistry between them. They just clicked when they met and I liked that they both confided in each other and even took care of each other but there was just something missing between them.


The ending was a bit bittersweet but a happy one, which I never expected from Sally. Everything was imperfectly perfect and a typical Sally Rooney ending. Apart from the happy ending all the characters in this book need therapy which they definitely won't agree to because not going to a therapist makes them more extraordinary realistic.

This book might be a hit or miss. I always thought Sally was not my type of author from what I read about her books in reviews but maybe I was wrong for all this time.