Christian's Reviews > Striking Distance

If you do not like miscommunication or lack of proper communication between characters which leads to them standing in the way of their own happiness - RUN.

Personally, I am so, so glad we're getting Fence content in novel format now, too, and I'm tempted to immediately ask, "When are we getting more?" To me, this whole universe is such a wonderful place of low stakes, stupid fun and just a cast of adorable, heartwarming characters. While the experience was definitely a different one from the graphic novel series, I think that aside from some characterisations that were, for my liking, a little exaggerated, the essence of the story was captured very well by Sarah Rees Brennan, and I am eager to see how these events influence the comics in the future.

I absolutely appreciated that this book was focused more on characters and personal relarionships than the actual fencing, which is the other way around with the graphic novel series, I would say. While a lot of their emotions and personal struggles are implied there, they were spelled out and expanded upon in this novel, and I thought that was wonderful. It didn't have a super elaborate plot, but the writing and understanding of the relationships were what really shone.

Another difference would be that where the comics are more focused on Nicholas and Seiji, this book surprisingly spent the most time following Aiden and Harvard. And that was such a pleasant surprise!! I loved getting to see more of them for a change, and oh my god, the drama they put me through. The pain. The happiness. The FRUSTRATION. I swear no one has more than two braincells but I love them still. I cannot wait to see where their relationship goes next. (Also, not to give anything away, but... the spicy scenes in this were a 10/10.)

Fence has very quickly become one of my biggest comfort universes ever. I highly recommend any and all content related to it if you want something light and funny set in a world where queerphobia doesn't exist and you're looking to yell at boys to JUST KISS ALREADY.