Emily May's Reviews > Call Me by Your Name

“He came. He left. Nothing else had changed. I had not changed. The world hadn't changed. Yet nothing would be the same. All that remains is dreammaking and strange remembrance.”

I should probably issue a warning that this is a book I usually wouldn't like. I think. A summer romance up to its neck in purple prose and wandering introspection sounds like a nightmare. And yet, there was something so beautiful, awful, intoxicating and sad about Call Me by Your Name. Maybe I like it because - and I hate to admit this - there is a part of me that recognizes something of myself within it.

Either you have been this kind of person, perhaps still are this kind of person, or you have not, are not, and this book will seem overwritten and alien. I, unfortunately, have experienced that deep, all-encompassing infatuation with another person. I don't personally call it love; not anymore. Instead, it's a feeling of overwhelming, almost feverish, obsession with their existence-- their body, their laugh, and everything they do or say.

I’m not proud of it and I don’t think it’s healthy. But I do think this book captures it in all its intensity and sadness. Call Me by Your Name, for me, stands apart from other romances because it doesn't follow the usual formula of two people meet, cliche flirtations and angst ensue, and then finally they end up together. It's not a spoiler to say this isn't that kind of story; if you're reading it for the warm fuzzies then you're going to be disappointed.

It is about seventeen-year-old Elio, who falls into a deep romantic and sexual obsession with the twenty-four year-old Oliver when the latter becomes a summer guest at Elio's parents' Italian villa. If there was ever a perfect place to set a heady novel of this kind, then it must be the cliffs of the Italian Riviera. I can feel my cold heart melting just thinking about it.

We stay inside Elio's mind as he fantasizes romantically and sexually about Oliver. Aciman builds a novel based on innermost thoughts and the most painful of emotions. It is sometimes almost too much and I wanted to look away as Elio feels like he can’t get close enough; feels like he wants to crawl inside Oliver's skin. It’s an intoxicatingly romantic, intimate, physical, miserable experience.

There is one moment when Elio's wise father comforts him: “Right now there’s sorrow. I don’t envy the pain. But I envy you the pain.” Which I thought was deeply sad, though also perfect. It might not be my usual choice of book, but I think Call Me by Your Name is one that will stay with me. Sometimes it is the exceptions to my rules that I find myself remembering the most.

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