A Taxonomy of Love by Rachael Allen
4 out of 5 stars.

“Sometimes you have a day that is so epic that you know, even before it’s over, that it’s going to be one of the dozens that you remember forever.”

Goodreads Description: The moment Spencer meets Hope the summer before seventh grade, it’s . . . something at first sight. He knows she’s special, possibly even magical. The pair become fast friends, climbing trees and planning world travels. After years of being outshone by his older brother and teased because of his Tourette syndrome, Spencer finally feels like he belongs. But as Hope and Spencer get older and life gets messier, the clear label of “friend” gets messier, too. Through sibling feuds and family tragedies, new relationships and broken hearts, the two grow together and apart, and Spencer, an aspiring scientist, tries to map it all out using his trusty system of taxonomy. He wants to identify and classify their relationship, but in the end, he finds that life doesn’t always fit into easy-to-manage boxes, and it’s this messy complexity that makes life so rich and beautiful.

I received an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Release date was January 9th, 2018.

A Taxonomy of Love had ALL the feels. It was cute, it was happy, it was sad (omg, was it sad!), it had me tearing up, it had me laughing, there were times I was annoyed, and times I was angry. Like I said, it had all the feels. I think all that makes for a good book, especially if you’re able to connect with the characters and experience all of the feelings and emotions they are going through. I felt that when I was reading this book and Rachael did a good job with writing it.

The book stars off with Spencer and Hope being in just seventh grade and it following them all through high school. It was really cool getting to see all the characters in this story grow and navigate life and high school. It wasn’t always easy for Spencer (especially in his younger years) since he has Tourette Syndrome. I felt so bad for him a lot of the time and I was rooting for him every page. It felt like he had to try 100 times harder than everyone. Hope had her own struggles through the years as well. It wasn’t always easy for her, but I think in ways both Spencer and Hope got through things because they had their friendship.

There were also times where Hope made me pretty angry as well. I felt so protective of Spencer, so anything that was against it made me mad or annoyed me though. So many other great characters in this story as well as the MC; like their families, although Dean (Spencer’s brother) was questionable at times. There were also times I did think things were a little weird or didn’t make sense to the story. It also jumped around quite a bit without warning. Like first they were in seventh grade and then all of a sudden it would be months or a year later without warning. So had to figure that out. I’m also not sure if that’s just the way that the e-ARC was setup, because there weren’t always breaks or headers other than “chapter numbers” or when Spencer created a taxonomy list.

Overall, I really enjoyed this story. I am really happy that I was given the opportunity to read it. There were a lot of things to take away from this and it was interesting to learn a little about Tourette Syndrome. I haven’t read any books that had a character with TS, so that was also cool about reading this one. New experiences and learning things I don’t know a whole lot about. It was just released earlier this month, so definitely go check it out!

In case you missed it;
WWW Wednesday #45.
Photo A Day|| January 9-12.
Thoughts|| The Cruel Prince.

I hope you have a great day!