The publisher asked us to hold off on reviews until a month before the publication date. So I will update this then. I will say these two things:
I read it in one sitting.
I am only giving it five stars because I can't give it ten.

Absolutely stunning and beautiful. It doesn't matter how long it's been since you've read Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - this companion will immediately draw you right back into the world. Filled with joy and sadness, the feelings are so big in this one and I couldn't be more honored to have had the chance to read it. This is, hands down, no questions asked, a necessity for every YA collection and an important novel that would absolutely incite the most wonderful, thoughtful and introspective discussion with teens and adults. Aristotle and Dante are forever with you characters and this book reinforces that. Highly, highly, highly recommend.

I liked this book better than the first in the series. It had more meat to it and was a little more fast paced. There was a lot of learning experiences and growth in the characters but I just don’t think YA/coming of age is for me. I felt like the characters were too “good” and their dialogue wasn’t relatable or true to teenage behavior. I was happy for the ending but felt like some things could have been cut to shorten the book to get to the point quicker. Still, I’m always happy to see LGBTQIA+ representation and hopefully people from this community feel seen and better understood.

What a wonderful and timely conclusion to the first novel. While the first novel is about self discovery, this novel takes us through the journey of being gay in the height of the AIDS epidemic.

This book is just as heartbreaking and inspiring as the first. It's amazing to watch Ari and Dante navigate life and the world around them while coming into their own and discovering who they are, both together and apart.

Thanks to Net Galley for an ARC!

I enjoyed the first Aristotle and Dante, as I listened to the audiobook performed by Lin Manuel Miranda. Reading the second Aristotle and Dante as an ebook was a different experience.

There are a lot of important themes - love, death, self-acceptance. But the way characters refer to each other by their full names was very One Tree Hill of them, and it grew tiring after awhile. I felt like the writing should be "show, not tell" but it often seemed more "tell." And the way dialogue is written with the least amount of identifiers had me retracing my steps more than a few times, trying to figure out who said what without LMM in my ear doing the different voices.

I didn't recall the time period of the first book, but in this book we're firmly in 1988/89 in the middle of the AIDS epidemic. It was important to draw on the time period for young Ari, who is thoughtful about his world and circumstances, and seeing him slowly open up to family and friends in ways he never did before was delightful.

The ending was corny and unrealistic compared to the first novel, but I'd still read a third book to see where the story might go next. The coming of age of Aristotle and Dante is still a great, important story, and I'd follow them to see where they go next.

Heartbreaking, touching, and poignant, this is a worthy sequel to the first book. Highly recommended for all libraries and for fans of the first book.

I preordered after 25 pages. The wait may have been long, but it was DEFINITELY worth it… this book is everything I hoped it would be and SO much more.

It's been a long time since I've read Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. The details are fuzzy, but the prose is familiar and comforting. There are a lot of short scenes and scene breaks, and every scene ends in a profound thought or a life lesson; it reads almost like a collection of connected short stories or comic strips. Really fluffy and happy at the beginning, no real outer conflict, just inner growth.

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World is the follow-up to the immensely popular Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. It was wonderful to see what happens to Dante and Ari after they find each other. Benjamin Alire Sáenz illustrates that love alone does not make all of your problems go away. However, love is essential when trying to cope with life's many tragedies. The writing is just beautiful - lyrical and poetic. Highly recommended for teens and adult fans of YA.

This book had so much to live up to. I was quickly reminded why I love this author’s writing so much and these characters. Now that Ari has admitted he loves Dante, he grapples with love in it’s many forms not just romantic. He starts to allow more people into his world. But also has to accept loss. I couldn’t love these boys or their family and friends more. I had forgotten it was set in the 1980s. I wonder how modern gay teens will read this in terms of the AIDS epidemic and Ari and Dante feeling like they can’t have a future that involves marriage or children.

Just like it's predecessor, Aristotle and Dante Dive Into the Waters of the World was heart-wrenchingly beautiful in a haunting way. This book was much sadder than the first because we're familiar with Dante and Ari, and we now see them struggling to be themselves in a world that doesn't want to accept them.

This is not a new story by any means, but Alire Sáenz has a way of writing that makes the words connect with your soul. While the first book had a lighter, more hopeful note, this book was filled with the insecurity and fear that came from the beginning of the AIDS epidemic. The lyrical quality of the writing helped smooth the harsh edges of the conflict, and it made the entire book feel familiar in the same way the first book did.

This book had me in tears almost the entire time, and I would gladly reread it to feel those emotions again.

"To live and never understand the strange and beautiful mysteries of the human heart is to make a tragedy of our lives."
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Thank you to Benjamin Alive Saenz, Simon and Schuster, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this eARC! IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY, GO PRE-ORDER THIS ASAP.
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This sequel was such an emotional roller coaster. My husband walked in on me sobbing my eyes out and I couldn't stop 😅 Just like the first book, reading from Ari's POV and seeing the world through his eyes has been quite an adventure. I just...LOVED IT.

The lovers meet, they get to know each other, they fall in love...but what happens after that? Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World explores just that. The story picks up where the first novel ends, with two boys in love laying in the back of a pickup truck in the desert. But, unlike many explorations of the love story, this book asks “What comes next?”. Aristotle confronted and admitted his feelings for Dante in the first story, now he needs to figure out how to map out the world of their love as well as the larger world as a gay young man. Are Dante and Aristotle a forever love? How will the world see him if he admits to being gay? With men dying throughout the world from the AIDS pandemic, will he have the strength to speak up or will he stay silent? If he gives people a visa into the country of his heart, will they hurt him or help him heal? Each of these questions is considered through the plot of this sequel.

Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s return to the world of Ari & Dante is filled with a number of the same techniques that made the first novel so interesting: strong dialogue, intriguing characters and honest self-exploration. This volume adds another way into Ari’s mind with the addition of journal entries he keeps throughout the story. The entries are directed to Dante, though not always centered on their relationship. This is a technique that leads to insights not only into his story, but his thoughts around specific incidents and internal conflicts. Ari develops a relationship with language and specific words including shame, forgiveness and love while weighing which words to carry within himself. New characters enter the narrative as Susie and Gina play larger roles and Cassandra is introduced along with a number of other peers from Ari’s school.

Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe is a truly special narrative of a boy learning to understand himself and his place in both the world and his relationships. While Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World does continue that exploration, much of the plot is driven by tropes that make the narrative feel contrived. I don’t want to share any spoilers, so although there are certainly difficulties faced by Ari and Dante both in and out of their relationship, they are often typical teenage dramas without the gravity of realistic consequences. Ari’s friendships develop on a whim after years of distancing himself from his peers, conflicts with teachers feel disconnected from the larger narrative and he is exempt from consequences, and even the love between the two boys seems to follow the expected script for a teen drama. Also, Dante’s character and experiences, which added layers to the original text are blunted by the focus on Ari’s new friendships while he takes a back seat, this minimizes the diversity of experience and feels counter intuitive to the claims that the second novel would focus more on his perspective. I was really torn in my experience with this novel since there are quite a few strong qualities and compelling techniques, but also a number of clumsy choices that pulled me out of the story as they did not feel organic. I’m sorry to say that my high hopes were overshadowed by disappointments.

Teachable Moments:
Once again, this book does have moments of interesting characterization and natural/engaging dialogue which would be useful in a classroom, but given a choice, I would lean into the first book in the series instead. An interesting exchange to use in the classroom would be an early conversation between Ari and his mother where the expected roles feel reversed. Ari’s journal entries would serve as strong models for the usefulness of journaling. Also, Ari’s examination of words to internalize or excise could inspire an interesting project for students to confront language in their own hearts, minds and lives.

"Let's map out the year, Dante. Let's write our names and chart out some paths. And go see what we have never seen. And be what we have never been."

In this sequel to a quintessential YA coming of age romance, Ari has already recognized his love for a single person. Now he has to learn to love himself--and the messed up, pain-filled world.

It is hard to write a sequel to a perfect book, and Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe is just about perfect. The writing in this sequel is sharp and powerful, almost Hemingway-esque. Ari has long, monologuing encounters with fairly tangential characters that give his journey in this book an allegorical, pilgrim's progress feel. This really worked for me! I cried every other chapter from the intensity of the emotions the book is able to convey. That being said, it doesn't have the directionality or sweet simplicity of the first installment--with Ari's impending adulthood comes complication and.a widening of his world. I also think some plot elements might have been set up farther in advance to improve the flow of the narrative.

Dive in, reader. Ari and Dante are charting the stars.

I loved this one just as much as the first. I was skeptical because it's been so long in between the books I was afraid the writing would suffer. The first one was so good I wasn't sure how this one could be on the same level, but it was, It was so beautiful. I smiled, I cried, I felt a bunch of emotions and that is a sign of a good book for me. Absolutely loved it and will definitely be recommending it to everyone.

So here we are with Aristotle and Dante again. They are busy trying to figure out how to have a relationship in a world that doesn't like them. Aids is a big topic in this second book. They discuss why they call it an epidemic when it is really a pandemic and how silence = death. Aristotle and Dante complete their Senior year of high school and must wrestle with how their relationship will change when they leave for college.
Good coming of age story and how to deal with death and life. I enjoyed this one more than the first.

I adored the poetic prose throughout this book. It made the book easy and quick to read. I liked that both sets of parents were their own kind of supportive and it was bittersweet watching these boys learn how to love and navigate their world--is bittersweet the right word to use if tears were shed? A million words of thanks to the publisher and netgalley for letting me read this beautiful book. Public/social reviews to be posted closer to release date

This book, you all. This book...


I read the first one quite a long time ago, and so re-read it right before starting this one. Though I'd kept a fond memory of it, that re-read allowed me to remember why I liked it so much, but also made me see some things I didn't like quite as much.

And, honestly, it feels as if the author saw the list of things I didn't like and worked on them one by one.

I was awed at every single chapter, every single page, by how much more grown-up the sequel feels.
You know what? I'd actually compare it to Toy Story: though the first one is awesome, the third one really captures the spirit of the story and makes it so much better.

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World (that title is way too long) is exactly like this, and it was a true pleasure to get back to these characters right where I left them, but to find that they'd grown just like I did.
It's a book that's funny at times, but also really sensitive in talking about topics that are pretty heavy – AIDS and homophobia being two of them.
As in the first one, Benjamin Alire Saenz takes you with him on a wonderful trip, and it's hard to turn the last page – because damn, I don't want to leave these two boys behind.

Truly, thank you for writing such wonderful YA books. This one is a gem.

The original Aristotle and Dante book was a very late discovery for me, and I just read it last month. It was hard for me to believe that the rest of the world has been waiting 9 years for a sequel! It picks up exactly where they left off in the first book, so we get to see what happens as the relationship develops.
This book has many of the same positives as the original book. Aristotle and Dante, as well as all of their family and friends, are all extremely likable characters. You instantly want to root for them. In fact, one flaw I found with this book is the people around Ari and Dante, their family and almost all of their friends are almost TOO good, too kind. Almost everyone accepts them as they are, instantly. I think the reality of 1980's Texas would not have been so kind to these characters. It was also a bit of a slow burn, with Ari and Dante just sort of meandering through their last year of high school, a lot of side plots, all building toward Ari coming into his own. There was one very sudden and unexpected event that came out of nowhere, and I'm not sure served the story that well. I would have liked to see a little more focus just on Ari and Dante.


Overall, a good sequel that gives us more of these two lovely characters.