Holly Jacobs

A Special Kind of Different

Jo H

This interrupted a micro-slump for me so thanks to Holly Jacobs for that.

OMG. Buckets cried in the last third, and this is a short book. Does that make me a sissy? Maybe and I OWN IT. Also, I may have been looking a bit too deeply into this story, but it is what it is.

Everyone needs to read this book, not for the romance, which IMO is the secondary plot here, but for Colm and every other person in the world like him. He is the reason I bought this book, ages ago, and is the biggest hero I've read in ages, despite that fact he started out as an underdog. And Colm's story could be used as an emblem of the many different issues that are causing separation in our world at the moment. Possibly a bit on the nose for some people, but absolutely necessary IMO, and it was written 10 years ago in 2010. I bet attitudes towards mentally challenged individuals hasn't improved much (if at all) since then. 

My couple of criticisms are about the brothers' twinship as I felt this could been explored a bit more and earlier on in the book than it was. And the continual mentions of Anna's very curly hair which is described as Medusa-like... some of the ways it was described made me feel a bit uncomfortable given many issues that people in certain groups are faced with when they wear their hair naturally (again, I think I may be looking too hard at that, but I can't unsee the words). I don't think anything was meant by it at all, but personally I am extra sensitive because of some issues I've faced in the past because of my very curly but perfectly normal hair.

But those couple of things aside, this a great uplifting story about a very special person. Special not because of his disability, but because of the utter joy he brings to the page. I wish I has someone as pure and good as Colm in my life. We could all learn a thing or two from him and all the extraordinary people of the world.

A Special Kind of Different

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