The first fifty pages of Commencement put me on a nostalgic tear. It made me miss my time in college so much, that I immediately sent emails to my closest friends from my floor my freshman year. In a story that I would imagine many people who went away to college can identify with, four girls meet at Smith after randomly being assigned to the same house and become best friends. From there, the book follows the women through their years in school and the years afterwards. Their time together is written remarkably well, and the descriptions of the main characters leaning on each other and becoming a family were so like my time in my first year of college. It’s interesting, emotional, and unbelievably relatable.
After the first fifty pages or so, the book takes a turn that I can only label… well, a little disturbing. Traumatic events ensue, and because of the story being told simultaneously in present and past tense as the four women meet up again after two years apart for a wedding, it has a reflective feel to it, while also putting the reader in the moment being reflected on. Does that make any sense? It’s interesting, and an entertaining way of helping us to learn both who the women are and how they came to be that way.
Despite the disturbing turns, I very much enjoyed Commencement. It’s a book about growing up, a book about four girls that are in the same stage of life that I’m in at the moment, if a little more dramatic. I could identify with each one of the characters, some more than others, and I think that in itself is what made me like it so much. Reading about the journeys that each of the characters are taking is extremely captivating, and I was very disappointed when I finished. I am very much looking forward to reading Maine, J. Courtney Sullivan’s latest, which according to reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, is even better.
4- I will definitely read this again. I might even buy it. This one’s somewhere in between a 4 and a 5 for me, and I highly recommend it.
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