Book Review: On the Bright Side by Anna Sortino
[ID: a purple book with two teens on the cover in front of a blurred background of pastel lights. One teen is a brown haired girl with pale skin wearing a hearing aid and the other teen is a brown haired boy with a cane. The book is in front of a white aspen tree and green grass with a few purple flowers in the background.]
My Book Review:
I really enjoyed Anna Sortino’s debut novel GIVE ME A SIGN (check out my review here) so I was thrilled to receive an early copy of her second novel ON THE BRIGHT SIDE. Thank you to @NetGalley and @PenguinTeen.
ON THE BRIGHT SIDE has dual disability representation based on personal experience. The book follows Ellie, a Deaf teen whose Deaf boarding school was just shut down, forcing her to live with her hearing parents and attend mainstream public school, and Jackson, a soccer player at her new school who has been dealing with mysterious health problems that his friends and family are eager to ignore.
I really loved Jackson and Ellie’s unique identities and experiences with disability. You can really tell it’s based on personal experience and real emotions. Their connection is unique, sweet, and emotional. I especially related to Jackson’s experience as he undergoes a diagnosis of MS, but I wish that there had been more time devoted to his journey post-diagnosis.
In a perfect world, I think this book would be a duology so the plot could’ve been more fleshed out with time to breathe. However, even with the short page count, the author packs in a lot of character work and moving reflections on disability.
I wasn’t always the biggest fan of some of Ellie’s decisions, but I understood her hurt and resentment just like I understood Jackson’s fear, confusion, and grief. I just wish she had owned up to her mistakes a tad more, but with limited page count there just wasn’t enough time for the characters to develop, in my opinion.
Even while wishing for more pages, I highly recommend this book for those of you looking for a sweet romance and authentic, profound disability representation. It’s definitely going on my favorites of 2024 list!