Really quite liked this.
For some reason it reminded me a lot of 'The Catcher in the Rye', although I didn't actually like that book - it just seemed like a lot of whining to me. This held my interest and I found Ethan Hawke's writing style very easy to get on with.

revisitei esse livro quase 15 anos depois da primeira leitura.
não lembrava da história com detalhes e o fato de ter visto o filme logo em seguida da primeira vez, fez com que as coisas se confundissem na memória.
mas lembro da sensação de que pensar que o amor, a paixão era algo parecido àquilo que estava escrito.
num ímpeto de bebedeira procurei o livro na internet à um mês atrás. achei e comprei.
li em dois dias e posso dizer que fez jus a minha lembrança.
agora sou mais velha que os personagens, mas Etha Hawke consegue capturar o que é a intensidade da paixão. Esse cliché do impulso jovem do que é gostar de alguém.
fiquei com vontade de sentir isso de novo, essa irracionalidade da paixão.
William é um jovem cheios de clichés da masculinidade, que justifica seus erros e sua intensidade no amor, que idealiza Sarah ao ponto de não vê-la de verdade. Mas a personagem da Sarah está escrita como alguém que se posiciona, que existe para além do olhar de William.
ansiosa pra me reencontrar com esse livro daqui 15 anos.

The worst book I have read in many years. I couldn't shake the feeling I was reading a woeful homage to The Catcher in the Rye the entire time. Do yourself a favour and don't waste your time.

Ok - was NOT expecting to be profoundly moved by this book. But I was. Hawke seemed like he was staring straight into the most hidden parts of my consciousness. The way he described things like attraction, love, dysfunction, ect were just absolutely disarming to me.

It seems like we've all come up with euphemisms for how we are actually thinking about things like attraction and love, and Hawke takes those mechanisms and tears them down, using language that you've never eve let your mind use to describe how you were really feeling.

I was in a funk for about a week after reading this book. I'm pretty sure this is MY coming of age novel. Catcher in the Rye did nothing for me, really. But i think what this book did to me is what Salinger did to everyone else I know.

Really couldn't get into this one. Should have known an actor would just write about himself.

Yeah, yeah, yeah... people regularly rip this overly achy bit of fiction to shreds. But not me. I love every word. And I have since the first time I read it. It's a regular read for me, every few years I pull out my copy and indulge. Generally over the course of a single day. I even carried around my copy at Sundance this past February on the off chance I ran into Ethan Hawke. I didn't.

temo che il problema più grosso di questo "amore giovane" ("the hottest state": probabilmente il fatto che sia stato scritto da un attore ha portato automaticamente allo stravolgimento del titolo, come si usa fare per i film) si chiama "mercoledì delle ceneri": perchè dopo aver letto un libro così ci speri che il resto della produzione del buon ethan sia allo stesso livello.
non è così, purtroppo: ma il risultato non è da buttare via, anzi.
c'è un aria da film giovanile metà anni '90 (guarda caso quando il libro uscì), tra storie sentimentali destinate al fallimento, famiglie sparse per l'america, vita da bohemien...manca giusto la colonna sonora, magari qualche gruppo indie rock minore, qualche cover di classiconi anni '70 e l'inevitabile ballata acustica (perfetta per l'ultima scena tra i bambini, direi).
lo rovina parecchio questa sensazione di deja-vu, ma al tempo stesso parecchie cose funzionano, e anche se i personaggi non sono esattamente simpaticissimi le vicende appassionano.
insomma: tutto bene per un paio d'ore di lettura che assolutamente non si rimpiangono, ma guai a chiedergli di più. proprio come a quei film giovanili anni '90 di cui sopra...

Hawke should stick to acting.

Reread on January 6, 1998
Reread on April 21, 1999
Reread on April 30, 2006

One of my faves.

The Hottest State was all about a guy named William that never really cared too much about anyone. Things kind of just came easy to him & he got whatever he wanted until he meets a girl named Sarah and all that changes. Williams relationship with Sarah takes him on this very unexpected journey of emotions he had never felt before. He starts to fall deeply in love without even knowing it and these feelings for Sarah cause him to do very unnecessary things. William then begins to lose himself over this experience.

Ethan Hawke is an actor, author, and director. He is from New York, which is where I am from as well. The fact that Hawke is an actor and director helps with his writing because he knows what type of movies or books people would be entertained by and will enjoy. He mostly shows his skills in directing in this novel because of all the action and detail involved in the novel.

Overall this book is a 4. I would read more books like these. This novel really showed me how strong and powerful love really is and how much it can control a person the do things they wouldn’t normally do. I would recommend this book to teenagers because it can show them how even adults go through all this pain. The fact that adults don’t know everything and have all their lives figured out can really open a teenagers eyes into realizing that they have time and they are not alone.

So I loved this book as an angsty teenager in the 90s, however even then something never sat right with me - the main character William literally rapes his girlfriend Sarah the first time they "have sex". I'm not sure why this is not talked about more (or at all?) with this book as it is written very clearly and explicitly. After a failed attempt at sex (he can't stay hard), they go to sleep. While she is sleeping, he starts to touch her - "I could feel myself relax. I kissed her neck. She was still asleep. I moved myself on top of her, pressing both her breasts against my chest... I placed my legs in between hers. She was still asleep. I kissed her mouth and eased myself inside her. She awoke." Pretty sure having sex with someone who is asleep is called rape, buddy. She also insisted on a condom earlier, and he's not using one. It's the first thing she asks him when she wakes up and realises what's happening. So no consent on either the sex or the lack of condom, but this is just a total non-issue for William, which tells you everything you need to know about him.

This book positions itself as a love story, but as an adult it reads more as a tale of a young man with a huge ego and need for control over women, and when he can't have it he struggles to deal with it, while painting himself as the wounded victim. After some pretty problematic behaviour, Sarah consoles William at the end of the book by telling him she's "not any fantastic thing", she's "just a pre-school teacher". She's no-one! She's not worth all his trouble! Ugh.

It's also incredibly pretentious.

3,5