Radio Silence

No words will be enough to tell you how much I loved this book, and the funny part is, it wasn’t even on my radar! Curiousity led me to Radio Silence but everything about it made me stay.

This is probably the first time I’ve been able to relate to characters this much and it’s exactly the kind of book I needed to read as a teenager. If you’re a young adult, please don’t pass this up. Even if you’re past that life stage (like me), read it! You can still get so much out of it.

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Radio Silence by Alice Oseman
Published by Harper Collins on May 3, 2018
Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary
Format: Audiobook
Length: 10h 23m
ISBN: 9780062474612
Source: Library
Goodreads

From critically acclaimed author Alice Oseman comes a smartly crafted contemporary YA novel, perfect for readers who love Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl. This is an utterly captivating and authentic new teen novel from the author of Solitaire, which VOYA said “could put her among the great young adult fiction authors.”
Frances Janvier spends most of her time studying.
Everyone knows Aled Last as that quiet boy who gets straight As.
You probably think that they are going to fall in love or something. Since he is a boy and she is a girl.
They don’t. They make a podcast.
In a world determined to shut them up, knock them down, and set them on a cookie cutter life path, Frances and Aled struggle to find their voices over the course of one life-changing year. Will they have the courage to show everyone who they really are? Or will they be met with radio silence?

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But yes, Radio Silence. The book sounds straightforward enough. Smart girl meets smart boy and the fall in love. Wrong! Actually, smart girl meets smart boy, they become friends, and they work on a podcast. No romance!

I thought that was all I was getting, but it was so much more than that.

Friendship that Lasts

Radio Silence showed me one of the best friendships between two people and it was beautiful. Imagine having someone you’re so comfortable with, someone you can talk to about anything, someone you can count on, all while being accepted for who you are. I love how the main characters, Frances and Aled, were able to be themselves with each other. They took care of each other in every possible way, even when circumstances were hard and it wasn’t convenient.

“I couldn’t quite believe how much I seriously loved Aled Last, even if it wasn’t in the ideal way that would make it socially acceptable for us to live together until we die.”

I love that they were platonically in love with each other because how many books can you name with a friendship like that? It was love in its purest form, precious on every level, and will make you wish you had something like it.

The cleverest pair of their age

High school feels like another lifetime to me, but it’s one of the things that made this book personal and extremely relatable.

Frances and Aled are known to be the smartest students in their classes. They’re what you think of when you imagine what good students look like. But see, a lot of the time, Frances had to hide her personal interests in order to be more proper and impressive on her college applications.

“Being clever was, after all, my primary source of self-esteem. I’m a very sad person, in all senses of the word, but at least I was going to get into university.”

This quote hit me so hard when I heard it. I saw myself in Frances, who spent years reading books she felt she had to read even when she wasn’t that interested in them. There’s a moment in the book where Frances’ friends suggest that she go to art school, because art was important to her and she’s always loved it. And she thinks about it, but in a way that shows that she’s been so conditioned to be an academic that seeing art as a career was something she’s never done before. It’s a hobby and that was that. Right?

I loved watching Frances’ growth as a character as she learned more about herself and what she wanted, and I loved this book for that.

Aled on the other hand, has a similar but slightly different experience. Like Frances, he’s a good student who’s also expected to go to university. But unlike Frances, Aled has no desire to. He is pressured and emotionally abused by his mother to go, but he dreads it so much he creates a sci-fi/fantasy podcast series called Universe City (think Welcome to Night Vale) as his way to escape reality. Aled feels so trapped by the pressure around him that his mental being suffers.

“If nobody is listening to my voice, am I making any sound at all?”

This was another win for me. I don’t think I’ve read other books that explored how this kind of expectation can affect someone, and yet we all know how often it happens. It was difficult to read about Aled suffering at school while dealing with his depression, but it was also so important.

Family Relationships

Frances and Aled’s relationship with their parents couldn’t be more different to each other. Frances and her mom had such a supportive relationship that I wish everyone had a mother like her. Aled, on the other hand, was constantly being emotionally abused by his mother. This made such an impression on me because emotional abuse doesn’t always come in the form of harsh language, but can also be snide comments said in a joking/well-intentioned manner that no one other than the victim will recognize as an attack. To those who don’t know them, these abusers seem like pleasant and friendly people. They never physically hurt the abused so the lack of evidence to their behaviour is what makes it even more heartbreaking. (Another important issue to portray!)

Diversity

Readers who want diverse books will be thrilled with this one. There’s biracial representation and LGBTQ+ representations (i.e. gay, lesbian, demisexual, bisexual) that didn’t feel like token additions or used as plot points and I appreciated that so much. I didn’t know anything about demisexuality before this book, so it was nice to learn about it while reading.

All the Stars

I can go on and on and on about how much I love this book, but I think you’ve read enough already. If I haven’t convinced you to read it at this point, I don’t know what will. Radio Silence is emotional, relevant, and intimate in ways that will make you laugh, hurt, and smile in the biggest way. I recommend it so damn much!