The Infinite Noise

Ok, I feel like I should start off by saying I (unlike most reviewers it seems) have NOT listened to the podcast, nor had I ever heard of it prior to picking this book up. I'm not really a fiction podcast listener, sorry. However, I am a veritable champion of "reading books without knowing anything about the things they are based on", so this isn't a unique experience for me.

I'm going to offer something that appears to go against what most reviewers are claiming - I don't think you need to have listened to the podcast in order to enjoy this book. Do I think it would flesh out the story and add more to their world? Probably. I still haven't listened to it, so I can't really speak to that aspect. But I found that without having that show more background information, this book was comparable to most other average YA novels. At no point was I confused, or felt like I was missing integral plot details. This book is perfectly passable to the uninitiated reader.

What I can comment on: I think the first half of this book is definitely the stronger part. Meeting Caleb and Adam and understanding their respective troubles with high school, as well as Caleb's journey to understand his Atypical powers, is the storyline that is the strongest. As a person who also struggles with depression, I found many of Adam's experiences relatable and thought they were written about fairly well. The progression of their relationship is also quite cute, even if there was some semi-contrived speed bumps. I won't give this book points just for featuring queer / gay characters - at this point, there are plenty of queer books that I think we can start being a bit more critical than that - but it can be nice for readers to see Caleb try to understand his sexuality, as I think many of us can relate to that journey as well.

The second half of this book delves into more into what I believe is covered by the podcast: the world of the Atypicals and the secret experiments done by shadowy actors. To be fully honest with you - I hate these kinds of plotlines. I simply can never buy the stakes and am completely bored by the entire thing. If you like this kind of story, you're in for a (minor) treat. There's quite a bit of setup, but you never actually learn anything concrete about these shadowy actors outside of their interaction with one specific person. This didn't bother me because I would have dreaded having to read more about this, but perhaps a more interested reader would find this storyline lacking.

My last comment is on the writing and performance, as I did listen to this as an audiobook. The two narrators did a pretty good job, and were definitely enthusiastic about their performance. This book is also rather enthusiastic about its prose, in that it's rather metaphor and simile heavy and definitely trying to be deep and poetic. I think this writing style works in the beginning, especially as Caleb is coming to terms with his empathy powers and feels overwhelmed by all the different kinds of emotions and learns to identify them. However, as the book wears on, this style leans more melodramatic and leaves me rolling my eyes after every paragraph. I'm a cold-hearted critic, I know, but the combination of melodrama plus the voice acting creates a very...something...performance. I suppose it does fit the vibe of being a mentally ill highschooler, but as a (still mentally ill) adult, it begins to wear on the soul and sound a little...cringe.

TL;DR - Passably average, leaning towards above average and nice when we get to explore Caleb and Adam's relationship. Listening to the podcast that it's based on beforehand may enhance your reading experience, but I wouldn't call it a requirement. The audiobook performance was quite nice. show less

The Infinite Noise is such a delight, you’ll feel ‘green’ all the way through it!

I started off as a fan of The Bright Sessions podcast and was ecstatic to discover it was getting a book trilogy. Initially, I worried there would be too much involved for non-podcast fans to enjoy the book but that issue was nonexistent while reading it. There are callbacks and moments that make long-time fans like myself smile but the story of Caleb and Adam is completely welcoming to newcomers.

Lauren Shippen creates wonderful characters that really jump out and grab you. Caleb’s descriptions of feeling emotions are entrancing and paint a detailed picture in my head of a world filled with warring colors of piercing spikes, looming waves, and show more dripping sludge. The thorough portrayal of Adam’s depression hit close to home, and made me realize I’d never read a character with such a compelling depiction of a mental health diagnosis. The story is a great twist on a typical teen love story, with Caleb’s power and Adam’s insights feeding the reader vivid imagery that pulls you in all the more. Even knowing how their story plays out from the podcast, I was still tense with every scene where they clash, pleading with the book in my hands to let the boys have their happy moments together.

I did think the ending was a bit sudden and out-of-nowhere. Maybe it is because I know that their story goes on much further from there, and that even the ending presented here has more details that are fleshed out in the podcast, but the novel ending feels abrupt and disjointed compared to the rest of the well-paced story. Still, I think it’s a good conclusion to this high-school romance. I do highly recommend readers take up the podcast to see how the story continues, and to hear all of the amazing voice actors, expanded cast of characters, and addicting story that will make it impossible to take your headphones off.

The Infinite Noise was a joy to devour; the kind of book that left me staying up late, curled up in bed unable to put it down, thinking ‘just one more chapter’ with each page I turned. The story will be addicting to new readers, eager to see more of Caleb and his boyfriend and the world of Atypicals, and to old fans, keen to soak up more details about their favorite characters. Lauren Shippen creates an amazing story that will definitely have me first in line at the bookstore for her future releases. show less

I've been a fan of The Bright Sessions for years and was waiting forever for this book, and it did not disappoint! I loved getting to see more of Caleb and Adam's story, especially their specific view on things that are only briefly touched on in the podcast. They really deserved this dedicated love story and I'm so so happy! There were some less than ideal bits but all in all a wonderful book, perfect for fans of the show and readers who are new to the characters alike.

Negatives: Some of the drama in the second half of the book felt a bit manufactured. Having listened to the podcast I know there's more to the story, but without that extra information in the book I can see how new readers might not understand why certain things were show more written the way they were. The ending also just kind of petered out for me. Either the story should have ended about fifty pages earlier, or kept going to a less cliche resolution.

Also, the way the point of view changed from time to time seemed odd; we'd cut to Adam for about a page or two just to get his opinion on something, then cut back to Caleb for the action. I think more work could have been done to give them both equal voice, especially during times that were never touched on in the podcast at all (there's at least two time jumps in the book that match time jumps that happened in the podcast, and I wish events and details had been more filled out during those times).

Positives: I love Caleb! I love Adam! I love how Caleb's power is treated in the narration, how it's shown to cause problems and not just simplify everything. I love how Caleb isn't treated as 'less manly' for having an emotional 'superpower'. I love how we get to see appearances by different characters but they don't feel like we were missing out on another story there. I love that kids get to have cool queer love stories. Basically everything I loved about The Bright Sessions in general, but now in book format. I can't wait for the future books! show less

First of all, I might be a bit biased, I really liked this book, the characters the plot, the whole “having super abilities that others don’t have” really does it for me. I listen to the audiobook (thank you, Briggon Snow and James Fouhey for your wonderful voices!), not knowing anything about the whole story behind The Infinite Noise. I saw somewhere that the there was this book coming out about this High School student who could feel other people’s feelings and I was sold. After listen to the audiobook (couldn’t wait for the real book, so you know yo girl was desperate), I noticed that a lot of people were writing about how incomplete the story was, there were a lot of characters quickly introduced but never appeared again, show more etc. Me, too, noticed some mayor time skips, but ignored it, because some writers do that to move the plot faster forward. Then I saw a tag in Tumblr about The Bright Sessions and the podcast and everything went downhill (or uphill).
I binged listened to all of The Bright Sessions. It’s an amazing story about Atypicals, one that could be explored so much further, and I love all the things Lauren Shippen has done, and (hopefully) will do, with it. If you want to really, really, enjoy this book, with all the characters that are mentioned in here, you’d have to listen to the podcast to gain to whole experience.

What I want to say is, it’s not fair saying it’s not a good book because it has time skips, it has missing scenes, it doesn’t have the content one expected to have from The Bright Sessions about Caleb and Adam. I love the whole process of Caleb’s emotions; how the author describes them in so much detail, you feel them with him, an experience that one wouldn’t get in the podcast just by listening to his voice, no offence, still love you, Briggon!

All in all, I loved The Infinite Noise and The Bright Sessions, I love the complex characters with backstories, with families, friends and enemies that all at one point intertwine, I love that evil doesn’t look evil and good doesn’t always look good and that everything is gray and that it is making you question yourself what you would’ve done. I love that you feel what the characters are feeling, I love that Adam had a crush on Caleb long before, but Caleb knew who Adam was, and - ugh. Yeah, 5 stars, thanks for reading. Be nice. show less

The Infinite Noise was pretty much what I expected, as a fan of the podcast. I loved the look into Caleb and Adam’s respective relationships with their families; you got the sense that they had nice families from the podcast but you actually get to see them interact and their moms in particular were lovely. Also, getting to see the development of their relationship purely from their perspectives was great.

My only criticism is that The Infinite Noise is more of a companion to the podcast than a standalone novel/adaptation--there are parts that overlap with scenes from the podcast (whenever Caleb is with Dr. Bright following their first session) that assume you’ve already listened to the conversation that took place and so skips over show more it with lines like “I explain what happened.” On the one hand, it’s fine, because it means I’m not reading the exact same material over again, but on the other someone reading the book without any prior knowledge of The Bright Sessions might feel like it’s lazy writing.

Perfectly okay that it’s a companion piece, but it’s undoubtedly going to draw in new people who’ve never heard of The Bright Sessions and I feel like they might be let down. show less

The Bright Sessions is a podcast that starts as different characters being in therapy with Dr. Bright, a psychiatrist that specializes in people with superhuman or inhuman abilities that are all psychic in nature. You're basically a fly on the wall for the sessions. However, as the podcasts progresses, you start to hear more scenes outside of the office in these characters' day to day interactions and how their abilities hinder or not their normal lives. As a longtime fan of things like X-Men, this was a really interesting and fun podcast to listen to.
This book takes place alongside the first season of the podcast but focuses on Caleb as his ability starts to manifest in high school (a little later than typical of X-Men, which usually show more has the tipping point at puberty). He gets in trouble at school because he's an empath and the constant barrage of other hormonal teens' emotions has had him on edge, where he finally breaks and punches another student. As part of his punishment, he also has to attend therapy sessions. It's not really explained how his parents picked Dr. Bright but it's a "happy accident" that she's the perfect psychiatrist to help him with his unique problem. Caleb, despite being written as a pretty typical jock, is actually a really lovable and kind character. It could stem from his empathy but I don't believe that would overwrite his personality entirely. Caleb and Adam together are super cute as well. Adam is a normal teenager but has a real problem battling depression and self-harm. He doesn't seem to go to therapy even with neuroscience parents and a past suicide attempt (though he mentions having been in group therapy as part of the recovery) which I thought was strange. We read that he's not hurting himself often now and he's putting on a front for his parents to satisfy them, but it seems really unhealthy that he's basically lying to everyone. As Caleb is an empath, he of course can sense it immediately, but doesn't seem to actually help Adam that much either using outside resources.
So while I enjoyed the book immensely, I think it still had some head scratch moments when it comes to how it handles and details mental health problems and solutions. You definitely have to keep in mind that this is fiction and written by a screenwriter, not a doctor.

I'm kind of bummed with myself for waiting so long to read this, I even had an ARC I won in late 2019 I just never got around to reading. But maybe I was doing myself a favour because I was able to continue right into the sequel which has already sucked me in.

Note: It's hard to tell if you need to be a fan of the podcast before or not but as I was* I think that did add a bit to it for me. This book is written from a different character's point of view with some of the same scenes showing towards the latter part of the book but from that different perspective, but depending on how much of the podcast you've listened to, you have some insight into the questions non-listeners are going to have as they read. I would suggest listening to at least the first season or so first, just because all of that was written before the book but takes place at the same time.
*I kind of stopped listening sometime in 2019 when I went off of drama podcasts but it's sat in my subscriptions updating and waiting for my return. show less

The Infinite Noise by Lauren Shippen is a novelisation of The Bright Sessions podcast. More accurately, it’s the novelisation of one particular storyline, primarily following two of the characters. I initially thought it was going to be a sequel, but it actually goes into more depth on events from the first two (I think) seasons of the podcast.

In essence, this is a YA romance book, featuring two male protagonists. The speculative element is clear: one of the protagonists, Caleb, has an empathy superpower, which allows him (forces him) to sense other people’s emotions. So on the one hand, we have Caleb’s very unique view of the people around him. On the other hand, there’s Adam, who is a normal teen that happens to suffer from show more depression. Despite one being a it of a nerd and the other being a it of a jock, the two of them form a connection. I also want to be clear that it isn’t just through Caleb’s powers that we experience Adam’s depression. Adam has his own point of view chapters and was diagnosed long before the start of the book. It’s now just something he has to live with and, I think, a particularly good depiction of living with depression.

Since I have listened to the original podcast, I knew what was going to happen in this book. The fact that it’s a romance book cancels out the spoilery nature of being familiar with the podcast (because of how romance books work). The one thing I think might throw people who haven’t listened to the podcast is the sudden appearance of some of the other podcast characters (other than Dr Bright). They sort of fit into the story, but because Caleb and Adam weren’t directly involved in the most dramatic parts of the podcast events, they seemed very oddly tangential, despite triggering some personal issues for our protagonists. On the other hand, if you enjoy The Infinite Noise, it might be a good jumping off point for getting into The Bright Sessions podcast.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. I generally recommend it to all fans of YA, particularly spec fic YA. I hope we get more novels in this universe, although I’m not sure which bits of podcast would work best. You definitely do not need to have listened to the podcast to enjoy this book and, conversely, listening to the podcast first does not in any way ruin the book.

4.5 / 5 stars show less