A Separate Peace Review Saanvi Kunisetty

 A Separate Peace Review

Saanvi Kunisetty

A Separate Peace by John Knowles is a classic coming-of-age story that narrates the tale of Gene, who visits his old private school, Devon, which brings back a lot of memories about what he experienced during that time period. To sum it up, Gene was best friends with a seemingly “flawless” kid named Finny, and Gene always felt jealous of Finny, but suspected that Finny felt jealous of him. One day, after finding out that Finny was never jealous of him, he shakes the limb of a tree while Finny is getting ready to jump off, and Finny suffers a severe injury. He leaves school for a while, and can never play sports again. At the end of the book, when Finny finally finds out that Gene was responsible for this, he rushes down the stairs, and is injured again. When Gene and Finny finally make up, Finny dies during surgery for his second injury, and with this, Gene is forced to mature. So, what did I think of this novel? Well, I honestly wasn’t a big fan of it, but it wasn’t that bad. If I was choosing to read a book though, I wouldn’t choose it. I felt like a lot of parts were really drawn out, or repetitive, and sometimes even boring. In addition to this, I hated Gene as a character. I had a hard time understanding how he could hate Finny so much and be so jealous of him, after Finny gave him the world, always encouraged him, and was so kind to him. I didn’t really understand how the author still considered Gene and Finny to be best friends, regardless of these feelings. Overall, I wouldn’t really recommend the book to anyone. I do feel that it teaches a few good and important life lessons such as “sometimes things aren’t what they seem to be” and “avoiding reality instead of facing it is not the right option.”