This book has everything: - Christmas - siblings - road trips - New York City - an extremely low page count - a romantic subplot - banter - drama of the fun vThis book has everything: - Christmas - siblings - road trips - New York City - an extremely low page count - a romantic subplot - banter - drama of the fun variety - everything resolving happily - a misbehaving dog
If you like the show Normal People, this is the perfect book for you.
If you love Sally Rooney so much that it's like a spell has been cast on you to rIf you like the show Normal People, this is the perfect book for you.
If you love Sally Rooney so much that it's like a spell has been cast on you to read every single story, excerpt, postcard, or shopping list she has ever made publicly accessible, this is a book that will feel like obligatory reading to you.
I am part of the latter group.
I like Normal People, or more accurately I go back and forth on Normal People but usually lean toward liking it fine, but...
I do not like the show.
I find both of the actors to be well-cast and hot, and that's the nicest thing I have to say about it. Liberties the show takes from the book make the story feel totally different to me.
And that's a huge thumbs down!!!
I did like this slightly more than the show it's the script for, in that I was physically capable of finishing this, which I cannot say of the show.
And that, beyond objectifying the actors in it, is the only compliment I have in me.
Bottom line: I've been trying to only read books I actually think I might like this year. This is a loss on that front.
----------------- pre-review
to read this is to decide to be sad on purpose.
review to come / 2.5 stars
----------------- currently-reading updates
reading the script of a show i couldn't even make myself finish. my mind <3
clear ur shit prompt 11: last book you purchased follow my progress here
----------------- tbr review
that part in graceland too where phoebe bridgers sings "whatever she wants" except it's me singing "whatever she writes" and it's about sally rooney...more
I like approximately four things in this world. One thing is cookies, and even those have to pass an extremely comprehensive test which the vast majorI like approximately four things in this world. One thing is cookies, and even those have to pass an extremely comprehensive test which the vast majority of baked goods fail with flying colors.
Another thing is coffee, and this has to be consumed with so much care and precision that if I were dropped back into the Middle Ages, if I didn't immediately perish from boredom / lack of running water / people smelling bad and being annoying, I could probably enjoy a fruitful career in alchemy. Lead into gold all DAY.
The third thing is books, and, in case you are somehow, mercifully new here, I don't like those too often either.
Fortunately, the fourth thing is a small number of witty, dark-humor British TV shows, most of which are created / written by / starring / formulated from the angelic and god like brain of Phoebe Waller-Bridge.
When you combine two of those four things into one book, it is a goddamn gift the likes of which come once in a generation.
Bottom line: What is there to say? Watch Fleabag. Read this. Or don't and be substantially less happy than you could be otherwise. See if I care.
I am so pleasantly surprised by this book, which is thoroughly a 3 star read that I will probably never think about ever again in my life.
I guess I eI am so pleasantly surprised by this book, which is thoroughly a 3 star read that I will probably never think about ever again in my life.
I guess I expected to hate it?
Huh.
In truth, YA contemporaries and summertime just go together. When it is warm outside, I want to be reading a contemporary, and it being good or fun is almost beside the point.
Case in point: his main character is truly intolerable, and the guy she is dating does not seem to like her at all, but who cares? Whatever! They're teens and they're living life and that's what summer is all about, when it comes to me reading.
And for another example, is there simultaneously too much going on here and not enough? Yeah, there is. But again, who can be bothered.
I got what I came for, kind of, almost. No more and no less.
Can't complain too much about that.
Bottom line: Contemporary season!!!
----------------- currently-reading updates
reading an ARC 2 years late for character development
In truth I think I was put on this earth in order to balance out the Anglophiles Things I like: - books about books
Things I don't like: - British people
In truth I think I was put on this earth in order to balance out the Anglophiles who drink tea (which tastes like hot wet dirt) and wear Union Jack merchandise (red white and blue is a displeasing color palette) and enjoy teen pop sensations with accents way past their prime (I went through it too but let's face it, the golden age has passed).
Anyway. The long and short of it is that while British writers are good and the cities are pretty, contemporary books make me uncomfortable and I hate thinking about their food.
Anyway again: Onto this actual book.
I like these sweet chick-lit-type books (and I know I'm not supposed to call it that) from time to time. There's usually an almost too kind elderly character. A very mean elderly character. A friendly age appropriate male neighbor. Another mean guy or gal who turns out to be a nice guy or gal.
This had all that in spades. The romance was extremely bad, in my opinion, and I've seen the aforementioned cast o'characters done better, but overall this was fine and good.
Minus the Britishness.
Bottom line: Pretty good, even better if you're not a curmudgeon / Anglophobe. ---------------
challenging myself to read as many review copies as possible this month because i'm addicted to projects!
They say there's a first time for everything. I say I had to accidentally pick up a religious book sometime, and that time is now.
Or more accurately aThey say there's a first time for everything. I say I had to accidentally pick up a religious book sometime, and that time is now.
Or more accurately a month ago, when I read this.
I respond to the word "bookshop" in book titles the way runners respond to the starting gun, or swimmers respond to that weird beeping noise, or JK Rowling responds to hearing that her actions have consequences: I'm off to the races, no questions asked.
This turned out to be an overly sweet and moral and didactic read. Nice and fine, but not for me.
Bottom line: My actions have consequences (which is that I learned my lesson and will read synopses next time).
--------------- pre-review
honestly i'm surprised that it took this long for me to accidentally pick up a religious book. seems like something i would have done already.
review to come / 2.5ish
--------------- tbr review
books about bookstores ❤️
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challenging myself to read as many review copies as possible this month because i'm addicted to projects!
this booklonely old people: destroy me every time.
lonely children: destroy me every time.
sad pets: destroy me every time.
ALL THREE IN ONE? i'm ruined.
this book was very sad and sentimental in a very on-purpose way. it's part of that matt haig / fredrik backman / Be Kind And Empathetic And Embrace Life sort of cheesy novels with a moral subgenre that's been so all over everywhere lately.
The problem with books about deliberately annoying characters doing intentionally annoying things is that they're still annoying.
This, for example, isThe problem with books about deliberately annoying characters doing intentionally annoying things is that they're still annoying.
This, for example, is about an annoying teenaged girl who decides to use a gossiped-about mentally ill peer, deciding she will ~fix him~ in order to write a kickass application essay to...psychology school.
This is a not good thing. The author knows that, the reader knows that, the characters either know or come to know that.
That doesn't make it more fun to read about.
Likewise for the aforementioned teenaged girl assuming said to-fix boy (who is gay) is in (reciprocated) love with her boyfriend and attempting to hook them up.
And likewise for the expletive-ridden essay this girl ultimately writes about the whole thing.
Especially considering 90% of the book details these things happening, and the last little bit attempts to tie it all up and forgive it.
Bottom line: Annoying stuff is annoying!
--------------- pre-review
hm.
review to come when my primary thought isn't how annoying the audiobook voices were / 2.5
--------------- tbr review
thinking about stealing this title for my memoir
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reading all books with LGBTQ+ rep for pride this month!
The thing about this life is that the good comes with the bad.
Work (bad) in exchange for money (good). Cooking (bad) in exchange for food (good). ReadThe thing about this life is that the good comes with the bad.
Work (bad) in exchange for money (good). Cooking (bad) in exchange for food (good). Reading David Levithan's parts in this book (bad) in exchange for getting to read Nina LaCour's (good).
Basically what I'm saying is that this year I learned I love Nina LaCour (by reading everything she's ever written) and that I do not care for David Levithan (by realizing that I've never liked anything he's ever written) and then I read this book by both of them and found that to be correct.
The end.
Bottom line: The good, the bad, the mediocre!
--------------- pre-review
a lot going on here and i didn't like it all but i liked enough of it.
review to come / 3ish stars
--------------- currently-reading updates
i am reading this book set during pride month...WHILE IT'S PRIDE MONTH. leveling up.
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reading all books with LGBTQ+ rep for pride this month!
If you like: - very purple and try-hardy prose with a style that is immediately apparent, never lets up, and is what I would politely describe as "not If you like: - very purple and try-hardy prose with a style that is immediately apparent, never lets up, and is what I would politely describe as "not my cup of tea" - characters who call each other inexplicable...nicknames? Including girlfriends call each other by their full name, first and last, or parents who call their children by their last name, which is also their last name, or ex-wives and offspring and current wives all referring to their ex-partner/permanent father/present husband as their military title - adult novels that read like young adult novels but also don't - spending the first two-thirds of a book thinking it's a clear easy one star and then kind of liking the last third but not really and maybe you just like it because it's different and that's refreshing - cartoonish background characters with showy-not-telly relationships to the protagonist that don't make sense - cartoonish main characters with...marriage to the protagonist? but ALSO it's a showy-not-telly relationship that ALSO doesn't make sense? - 43 uses of the term "lonely creature" - disliking a book so much that even though a copy of it has been waiting for you to pick up your order in your favorite bookstore, you'd rather cancel the order entirely than get any pile of novels that includes this one then this is the book for you!
I, unfortunately, don't like any of those things.
Bottom line: Thank god I had my buddy read dream team to talk sh*t about this with. Otherwise I would have perished, probably. Or just been very annoyed.
Hard to say which is more likely.
--------------- pre-review
Tragedy Befalls Four Cutest Readers As Extremely Belated Buddy Read Called "Universally Disappointing"
review to come / 2 stars
--------------- currently-reading updates
if the contents of this book aren't as lovely as the cover i'm giving up.
buddy read it took us four months to get to with thedreamteam
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reading all books with LGBTQ+ rep for pride this month!
This was so bad that I immediately deleted it from my precious brain.
Immediately I remember very little of this, because I hated it desperately and I This was so bad that I immediately deleted it from my precious brain.
Immediately I remember very little of this, because I hated it desperately and I wanted to never think about it again.
I do remember that the romance was Bad Vibes, including sex pressure, and the friendships were Bad Vibes, including a lot of lying and a lot of dramatic departures at the reveal of said lying, and the family stuff was Bad Vibes, including a newly dead member and an oblivious member, and the protagonist was Bad Vibes, mostly due to the fact that he was intolerably annoying and unbearably full of himself.
So I guess I do remember more than I'd like.
Bottom line: Not my favorite!
--------------
remind me not to do that again.
review to come / like 1 star? yikes
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going into this blind just because i like the title.
life: i live it on the edge.
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reading all books with LGBTQ+ rep for pride this month!
For example: I would have thought I knew what I wanted from this book. Before I read it, I had an idea of it. WhiIt turns out I don't know everything.
For example: I would have thought I knew what I wanted from this book. Before I read it, I had an idea of it. While I was reading it, I thought I knew how it would go. And as I approached the ending, I thought I knew how I wanted things to finish.
I was wrong about ALL OF IT.
This was a million times cleverer and funnier and one-of-a-kind brilliant whatever than anything my dumb old brain could come up with.
For once I am not in the right, and for even rarer I am okay with that.
Bottom line: Listen to Kiley Reid, not me!
-------------- pre-review
literally, i'm sitting here silently typing this pre-review, but metaphorically and still in a very real way, i'm screaming forever because of this.
review to come / 4.5 stars
-------------- tbr review
love to read the book everyone was reading ages after everyone's already read it...more
Greetings, parallel dimension. Hello, population of an almost identical but ever so slightly eerie and incorrect existence. To the uncanny valley: salGreetings, parallel dimension. Hello, population of an almost identical but ever so slightly eerie and incorrect existence. To the uncanny valley: salutations.
This book is so persistently and unrelentingly off, so inexplicable in its emotional choices or lack thereof, that I have no choice but to believe I have been struck by lightning / tripped by a cosmic entity / caught up in some light rom-com style time travel and no longer exist in the dimension I formerly knew and tolerated.
This is so goddamn weird.
Let’s get into it.
THING I DISLIKED NUMBER ONE: Lame romantic plotlines.
Why is this a love triangle, first of all? Why bother going to the trouble of making our dear protagonist have a crush on the guy that her parents chose for her, only to say oh wait actually never mind? Why make that guy like her back for 0.2 seconds, only to get over the heartbreak and have a brand spankin’ new GF faster than you can say “wait what’s happening does anyone actually feel anything I’m so confused help.”
But more importantly, why make her ditch that objectively more interesting guy for a BORING SNOOZEFEST QUARTERBACK? Especially one who had interacted with her about as frequently and with as much enthusiasm before the start of this book as I interact with my neighbors? (Very little and only when absolutely forced.)
But not to worry: He inexplicably has a huge crush on her almost as soon as this starts, even though he has very recently broken up with his girlfriend of a million years and any non-robotic entity would probably need to take, oh, I don’t know, 1-2 business hours to get over that before purchasing a one-way ticket to poundtown with the next crush via highly flirtatious swim lessons.
But again: this is the emotionless dimension.
Anyway. Why do we have to care about this bozo? Everyone has a crush on the popular boy in high school and then he never talks to them but if he did it’d be revealed what a dumb crush choice he was. Do better.
THING I DISLIKED NUMBER TWO: Coverage of...domestic terrorism?
For most of this book (if not all of it - I honestly don’t remember), the perspective between our normal, fun-loving, boy-enjoying high school girl alternates with the perspective of...an Unknown Terrorist.
At first, you are meant to believe that this is the kind of terrorist that all American news media assumes terrorists are - i.e., from the Middle East, radicalized, Muslim, and so on - rather than the kind of terrorist it usually is - a white dude with a gun who hates Black people / brown people / gay people / women / etc.
It turns out to be the second kind, but either way, including the point of view of this flat and stereotypical terrorist character is so pointless.
Islamophobia coverage is so important but this felt relegated to the side.
THING I DISLIKED NUMBER THREE: Boys, college decisions, and being the victim of a hate crime, in order of importance.
Enough said, baby! There’s more weight placed on a crush and on college decisions than there is on racism and Islamophobia and it just feels strange!!! Very much “it’s okay that I was physically assaulted and the victim of multiple hate crimes but what about NYU???”
This is not to say that Muslim teens can’t also have normal teen problems, but to not flesh out the full emotions of something so horrible seems to defeat the purpose of even including it.
THING I DISLIKED NUMBER FOUR: Please take me back to my home dimension, where things make sense and people feel things.
The lack of emotional depth in the relationships (see Thing 1 - not to be confused with the creepy Dr. Seuss gremlin) is mirrored in our view of our protagonist (who constantly says she doesn’t understand what’s happening, what she’s doing, or what she’s feeling).
It makes everything feel cheap and silly, and I will be blaming this lack of connection for the fact that I cannot remember anyone’s name. And not my own dumbness.
Thank you and goodnight.
IN CONCLUSION This book was well-intentioned, and it’s important that we have stories like it, so I’m two starring it and not one starring it even though it filled me with rage and confusion (my two least favorite emotions).
But including such important topics and relegating them to emotional footnotes is...damaging. You feel me?
Bottom line: Thank you, universe, for returning me to my home dimension with normal emotional impacts, presumably in exchange for this review.
------------ pre-review
i take that back. i found this neither lighthearted nor heartbreaking.
review to come / 2ish stars
------------ tbr review
obsessed with picking up books i think are lighthearted only to find that they are completely heartbreaking
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taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
In an ideal world, I would not be writing this review without fulfilling the pho craving that I have had ever since I picked this book up, but consideIn an ideal world, I would not be writing this review without fulfilling the pho craving that I have had ever since I picked this book up, but considering I'm coming to you live from 12:40 pm in the suburbs, that is a feat I cannot pull off.
Never forget the sacrifices I make to bring you mediocre book reviews.
Speaking of: This book was fine.
I never know how to write middle of the line book reviews. Everyone has been cursed with the knowledge of how prepared I am to write rants (hello, character-limit-hitting one star reviews, how are you doing), and I at least get to enjoy the fun of sharing good books when I write four star reviews (or five star ones, when there's a full moon and an eclipse and a meteor shower and humidity is at exactly 54% and so on), but three stars?
Who knows.
This was just okay, for me. The characters were all right. Their arcs were acceptable. The food descriptions were excellent, obviously, but otherwise I have been reading so many YA contemporaries lately with the exact same I Need To Figure Out What I Want To Do With My Life But I Know For Sure It Isn't That Thing My Parents Insist I Do plotline lately, and this one...well, it's not a standout.
Again, excluding those food descriptions.
Bottom line: I am so hungry. This can apply both to my still as yet unfulfilled pho situation, or the number of dissatisfying contemporaries I have read in this, the season of contemporaries. Pick your poison.
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well. can't say i didn't warn myself.
review to come / 3 stars
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honestly so brave of me to read this book knowing it will cause a weeks-long debilitating pho craving.
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taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
Do you ever start a book a lot of people hated and you're like I don't get it! This is good! And then slowly, increasingly, over the course of hundredDo you ever start a book a lot of people hated and you're like I don't get it! This is good! And then slowly, increasingly, over the course of hundreds of pages, it's like..."oh. I understand."
Is that relatable?
That's me and this book.
Just hundreds of pages of this:
[image]
This started out, well, fine. Normal contemporary. Maybe nothing to write home about but a-okay. But then...
CASUAL RACISM FROM OUR PROTAGONIST THAT IS NEVER REALLY ADDRESSED.
CASUAL RACISM FROM THE PEOPLE AROUND HER THAT DEFINITELY IS NOT.
CHEATING. FROM ALL SIDES. FROM MULTIPLE PEOPLE. OVER AND OVER.
Plus, like. Insta-friendships and insta-love and insta-resolutions.
And no fun whatsoever.
Bottom line: I am a dog inside an on-fire apartment. But also, I have a cool little hat.
1.5ish
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if i go longer than a few days without reading a young adult contemporary in the summertime, i cease to exist.
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taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
Sometimes, to enjoy a piece of content, you have to suspend your disbelief.
I'm not very good at this even at the best of times - I'm far too much of aSometimes, to enjoy a piece of content, you have to suspend your disbelief.
I'm not very good at this even at the best of times - I'm far too much of a grump to be capable of the level of whimsy and imagination it takes to forget reality on command - but for this book, I had an even more difficult experience.
Maybe I could have suspended my disbelief for the sake of Morgan Matson, my most ride-or-die YA contemporary author.
But I can't also suspend my desire to be entertained.
This book was not good.
First, and perhaps most detrimentally, it's about theater kids, a subpopulation of people so irritating and loud that only those within their number can find them charming. I spent most of my high school years in a friend group of theater kids, and while I was able to tolerate and even like them at the time, my comeuppance was living out the rest of my days with a debilitating vendetta against them.
Relatedly, this book has two main characters, each of them more mind-bogglingly unlikable and not relatable than the last. The things these people do...nonsense.
I really appreciate the recognition in the last few years that teenage protagonists should be flawed, but I also believe there should be a scale. I will debut it now: The High School Emma Scale. See, no one could hate a teenager more than I hate my teenage self, so if I find any character even less likable than myself at their age, we've lost everything.
And I'd sign up for a sleepover with fifteen year old me before I'd get on board to hang out with either of these bozos.
I also really like when Morgan Matson's books focus more on friends or family than on romance. In fact, I prefer it: one of my favorites of her books doesn't even HAVE a real love story (but it does have approximately 62 family characters), and the other has a friendship plot that's way more tropey and romantic than its actual romance counterpart.
But this felt more like a (failed) attempt at two coming-of-age stories in one novel than it did a friendship story, a family story, or a romance.
In other words, a lose/lose/lose.
And do not even get me started on the kidnapping / FBI subplot.
Bottom line: Everyone cross your fingers Morgan Matson's new book comes out soon and we can all forget this ever happened.
---------------- tbr review
new morgan matson??? out now??? AND I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW IT WAS COMING?!
who am i? what have i become?
clear ur shit prompt 6: steal a book from someone's tbr follow my progress here...more
It's true that I am CAPABLE of loving things. Sometimes I enjoy stuff. My average rating for this year mIt's possible that I am fundamentally a hater.
It's true that I am CAPABLE of loving things. Sometimes I enjoy stuff. My average rating for this year might turn out to be a touch over 3, which would at least kind of imply that I'm more inclined to like books than hate them.
But maybe my natural inclination is to detest.
Regardless, I did not like this book.
It has three totally separate plotlines (as in, one after the other like acts of a play), and not even one of them worked for me. While that may seem like a point toward me being a hater, I must inform you that not one but TWO of them include some form of instalove, so this entire book manages to be instalove-infused, like it's a themed party or a flavored frosting.
This unfortunate three-act system also contributes to the fact that this book rivals the Bible for sheer length and repetition. The lack of tissue paper pages is the only saving grace. (Does that count as a pun?)
And in the final link in the if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-style series of connected reasons I did not like this, the voice is so goddamn exhausting.
In conclusion: three unlikable plotlines leads to a really long book which leads to burnout from how annoying the voice is over so much time.
The end.
Bottom line: Not for me! But what is.
------------ tbr review
i'm a sucker for a title with a pun. who isn't? monsters, probably.
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taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
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