The Heart Principle by Helen Hoang
Hello Books Lovers,
today is the release day of many interesting books such as Tracy Wolff’s Court and Kiran Millwood Hargrave’s The Immortal Girls. But I’m here to talk about a book released a few weeks ago, the third in a trilogy of stand alone romance that all dealt with the same theme. For this title I thank Fanucci both for bringing it to Italy and for providing me with a copy.
So, I start by saying that this book was a nice surprise. At first I didn’t like it, the reading didn’t take me, I was losing hope for the first 50 pages until things took the right turn. What frightened me the most was the fact that this is one of those booktok phenomenon books and to date, I have liked ish 4/5 books among the hundreds that are sponsored every day on the social network.
I was afraid this was one of those hundreds. Its original title is The heart principle by Helen Hoang. Iact the protagonist Anna is a violinist and the protagonist Quan is an entrepreneur.
The narration is in the first person – and as I understand it is the first book that the author writes like this – and the chapters are divided between her and him. As I said before, this book, or rather the entire trilogy, deal with an important theme and for the author they are very autobriographic. Already as an adult Helen Hoang, due to her behavior, was diagnosed with autism, a slight representation, and for this very reason all her protagonists will be affected by the same situation.
Being diagnosed as a child with certain problems, even if they are not problems, is not easy, when grown up there may be much more awareness on the part of the person, but in any case it is not easier to accept and deal with it and in my opinion these books are a great way to say accept yourself, surround yourself with people who accept you as you are, and don’t be afraid to ask for help.
One character I really hated in this book was Anna’s sister, Priscilla. From one point of view I can understand her attitude, what one does not know is scary and changes are scary, but as a sister she should have been more present and bossy. In the sense that in the book Anna’s father has a heart attack and they have to take care of him. I understand Priscilla is stressed out, but all she does is give orders to Anna and downplay her problems.
Because you must know that Anna, since she became famous, mentally took refuge in a dark place, that place that we all know a little, where we don’t feel enough, despite our efforts. However, Priscilla constantly belittles Anna by telling her that she can’t be stressed out because she doesn’t have a real job, she has no commitments. And even when Anna tells her about the autism diagnosis, Priscilla tells her that not everything revolves around her, that nothing is wrong and suddenly closes the phone call.
In those moments I hated her so much, because you can’t behave like that, especially with your sister. But luckily in the hardest moments, since Quan entered her life he has always been there. The way in which the author built the meeting between the two protagonists was to make Anna’s boyfriend want an open relationship to make them meet on a dating app.
But Anna and Quan are perfect for each other, they have their insecurities, he had cancer a year before, they have their fears. But they also love the same things, they have fun together, and Anna feels more comfortable with him than ever.
Among all this, which I still hope is enough for you to read this book, is the fact that it is an Adult book, so it has a lot of spice. It actually comes quite early. The book itself is not very long, it has 260 pages, and the interesting scenes begin to arrive already, in a preliminary way, on page 50 and something.
If you find yourself starting it and you see that it doesn’t take you, don’t give up. I’ve been there too, everything improves and it will be a read in one breath until the end. Let me know if you read it. And in the meantime I am waiting for you on tiktok where I post nice videos, unboxing and reviews every day, without exception, and answer many questions.
