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charspages's review against another edition
1.0
Listen, if I didn't feel some weird moral obligation to point out problematic content in media - especially media aimed at teens and younger audiences - I would have DNFed this on page three. But alas, here I stand, 346 pages later.
Let's get right into it, folks.
PLOT: 1 / 5
The first note I made regarding the plot was this, scribbled on my review-notepad: "p. 44-45 outlandish turn of events". If I had known what was coming for me, I would have saved that comment, because if you think a kid who doesn't study at all and just shows up at Quiz Bowl because he is literally forced to then single-handedly saves the round and scores his team a win is outlandish, you're wrong. It's bizarre, yes, but outlandish is everything that happens after.
The plot of this novel read a little like a dumpster fire: out of context things piled on and on and on until it's too fascinating to look away from.
I'm not going to lie, I did like the set-up and the premise of this book: girl tries to find little brother with help from guy she doesn't like before getting in trouble with her super strict parents? This leads to all kinds of fun convention-shenanigans? Love that concept.
I was to be sorely disappointed, though. While this novel is set at a sci-fi convention, every single thing that happens there is just ... absolutely ridiculous. I didn't think it was possible, but this really took the fun out of conventions for me.
Every ten pages or so, [a:Brian Katcher|1233886|Brian Katcher|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1228261376p2/1233886.jpg] adds on another improbable and highly illogical plot twist. There's no end to the stupidity of his characters, and no resolution for their misbehavior. I mean, pulling the fire alarms costs a shit ton of money, because insurance does not cover that. Plus, the irresponsibility it takes to be so self-centered to waste the fire-fighting department's time and resources with a false alarm... oof.
CHARACTERS: 1 / 5
Man, when I tell you I hated these characters, that's not nearly strong enough to depict how I actually feel.
ZAK is the picture-book rendering of a geek-boy incel. Reading his POV made me throw up in my mouth a little more than once. He is demeaning, sexist, and a complete headass.
ANA is so self-righteous and bratty that I couldn't even feel sorry for the lost potential her character could have had. She's "not like other girls" and keeps looking down on every single girl she meets for whatever reason she can pull out of her ass.
The side characters are so non-descript that I don't even remember anything about them, except for the fact that they were usually pretty annoying.
WORLD BUILDING: 2 / 5
If you look past the mental gymnastics Katcher did to make this plot work (spoiler alert: he's not a world class gymnast), the setting of the story is a-ok. It definitely lacked atmosphere, though, so I just didn't really care.
WRITING STYLE: 2 / 5
Listen, Katcher's style isn't overtly terrible, it's just.... average. Like, a little below average. It flows easy enough, has some attempts at humor and tries to set up two different tones for each protagonist's POV. A lot of the times, Ana and Zak's tone overlap, but there were enough personal opinions and woe me!-moments thrown in to always be able to tell them apart.
Other than that, I did feel like Katcher's voice was a bit too immature for two eighteen-year old characters and quite heavy on the dialogue. It wasn't terrible by any means, but it for sure wasn't memorable, either.
DIVERSITY: 1 / 5
Oh, oh. Unfortunately, Katcher isn't a master of this category at all.
There are some mentions of POC in the story, but they're all minor side-characters who don't really matter to the plot a whole lot. The one person of color who has a bit of a more significant role, Warren, is a black man who wears a horrendously ugly alien mask 99 % of the book. Great look.
Then, there's the issue with Katcher throwing in two gay characters, Mark and John, who are getting married at Washingcon. This could have been Katcher's saving grace, putting in LGBT characters just because and like it's the most normal thing in the world, without commentary, without hesitation. But of course he had to ruin it:
"John and Mark appear from opposite wings, wearing matching tuxes. They join hands at the front of the room and smile at each other. Normally, their physical demonstrations give me the heebie-jeebies (yes, I know, not that there's anything wrong with that, but it does, okay?), but tonight I'm touched by how much in love they obviously are."
Um, no, not okay. You can't be a "gentle homophobe" or whatever. And being disgusted or creeped out or any of the likes by same-sex couples showing affection makes you a homophobe.
While we're still in Zak's wonderful head, let's take a look at the rest of him. And boy, did I ever wish to be able to unread something.
Aside from being homophobic, Zak is also a complete and total incel. Every single female character he meets is directly tied to him romantically, whether they're a past- or a wannabe-hook up. And he thinks about their boobs an unlawful amount. When he starts his classroom-porn-fantasy with one of his teachers, I swear to God, I almost threw up on the book.
Needless to say, he has a fedora and a goatee.
Ana, however, is not much better. She is big on the girl-on-girl hate and keeps being overly jealous of every girl to get within a ten foot radius of Goatee Guy. All the other girls irk her out because they're pretty or have big boobs or giggle or some shit like that. Also, she compares her strict parents to slavery, so it's like, really a no-brainer why this chick doesn't have any friends.
If you now fill in the gaps with a side-character whose name is literally the g-slur and a rampant amount of fatshaming, you've got a pretty good picture of what this book is like.
OVERALL RATING: 1.5 / 5
Please banish this to whichever reddit incel thread it came from.
Let's get right into it, folks.
PLOT: 1 / 5
The first note I made regarding the plot was this, scribbled on my review-notepad: "p. 44-45 outlandish turn of events". If I had known what was coming for me, I would have saved that comment, because if you think a kid who doesn't study at all and just shows up at Quiz Bowl because he is literally forced to then single-handedly saves the round and scores his team a win is outlandish, you're wrong. It's bizarre, yes, but outlandish is everything that happens after.
The plot of this novel read a little like a dumpster fire: out of context things piled on and on and on until it's too fascinating to look away from.
I'm not going to lie, I did like the set-up and the premise of this book: girl tries to find little brother with help from guy she doesn't like before getting in trouble with her super strict parents? This leads to all kinds of fun convention-shenanigans? Love that concept.
I was to be sorely disappointed, though. While this novel is set at a sci-fi convention, every single thing that happens there is just ... absolutely ridiculous. I didn't think it was possible, but this really took the fun out of conventions for me.
Every ten pages or so, [a:Brian Katcher|1233886|Brian Katcher|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1228261376p2/1233886.jpg] adds on another improbable and highly illogical plot twist. There's no end to the stupidity of his characters, and no resolution for their misbehavior. I mean, pulling the fire alarms costs a shit ton of money, because insurance does not cover that. Plus, the irresponsibility it takes to be so self-centered to waste the fire-fighting department's time and resources with a false alarm... oof.
CHARACTERS: 1 / 5
Man, when I tell you I hated these characters, that's not nearly strong enough to depict how I actually feel.
ZAK is the picture-book rendering of a geek-boy incel. Reading his POV made me throw up in my mouth a little more than once. He is demeaning, sexist, and a complete headass.
ANA is so self-righteous and bratty that I couldn't even feel sorry for the lost potential her character could have had. She's "not like other girls" and keeps looking down on every single girl she meets for whatever reason she can pull out of her ass.
The side characters are so non-descript that I don't even remember anything about them, except for the fact that they were usually pretty annoying.
WORLD BUILDING: 2 / 5
If you look past the mental gymnastics Katcher did to make this plot work (spoiler alert: he's not a world class gymnast), the setting of the story is a-ok. It definitely lacked atmosphere, though, so I just didn't really care.
WRITING STYLE: 2 / 5
Listen, Katcher's style isn't overtly terrible, it's just.... average. Like, a little below average. It flows easy enough, has some attempts at humor and tries to set up two different tones for each protagonist's POV. A lot of the times, Ana and Zak's tone overlap, but there were enough personal opinions and woe me!-moments thrown in to always be able to tell them apart.
Other than that, I did feel like Katcher's voice was a bit too immature for two eighteen-year old characters and quite heavy on the dialogue. It wasn't terrible by any means, but it for sure wasn't memorable, either.
DIVERSITY: 1 / 5
Oh, oh. Unfortunately, Katcher isn't a master of this category at all.
There are some mentions of POC in the story, but they're all minor side-characters who don't really matter to the plot a whole lot. The one person of color who has a bit of a more significant role, Warren, is a black man who wears a horrendously ugly alien mask 99 % of the book. Great look.
Then, there's the issue with Katcher throwing in two gay characters, Mark and John, who are getting married at Washingcon. This could have been Katcher's saving grace, putting in LGBT characters just because and like it's the most normal thing in the world, without commentary, without hesitation. But of course he had to ruin it:
"John and Mark appear from opposite wings, wearing matching tuxes. They join hands at the front of the room and smile at each other. Normally, their physical demonstrations give me the heebie-jeebies (yes, I know, not that there's anything wrong with that, but it does, okay?), but tonight I'm touched by how much in love they obviously are."
Um, no, not okay. You can't be a "gentle homophobe" or whatever. And being disgusted or creeped out or any of the likes by same-sex couples showing affection makes you a homophobe.
While we're still in Zak's wonderful head, let's take a look at the rest of him. And boy, did I ever wish to be able to unread something.
Aside from being homophobic, Zak is also a complete and total incel. Every single female character he meets is directly tied to him romantically, whether they're a past- or a wannabe-hook up. And he thinks about their boobs an unlawful amount. When he starts his classroom-porn-fantasy with one of his teachers, I swear to God, I almost threw up on the book.
Needless to say, he has a fedora and a goatee.
Ana, however, is not much better. She is big on the girl-on-girl hate and keeps being overly jealous of every girl to get within a ten foot radius of Goatee Guy. All the other girls irk her out because they're pretty or have big boobs or giggle or some shit like that. Also, she compares her strict parents to slavery, so it's like, really a no-brainer why this chick doesn't have any friends.
If you now fill in the gaps with a side-character whose name is literally the g-slur and a rampant amount of fatshaming, you've got a pretty good picture of what this book is like.
OVERALL RATING: 1.5 / 5
Please banish this to whichever reddit incel thread it came from.
dilchh's review against another edition
4.0
To be completely honest, I read this book back in early February and I can’t seem to quite remember how it felt for if it not for some notes I took. I remember that I had a hunch that I was going to like this book, the directness of this book made it easy to digest but does not feel like it would a cheap book. I just like a direct YA book, straight to the point without so much as a pity party and beating around the bush about the main storyline.
Why I liked the most about this story was it went from this fluffy mild teenage stuff to a real talk slap your in the face stuff about how life sucks. And even then, it did not sound condescending, it just went straight up, “yo, life sucks.” It’s not a class A research finding to be told that life sucks, but it still is a nice feeling to read a YA and/or a coming of age book going around without so much as being pretentious about laying it out that, yeah, life sucks.
I kind of had a thought at the back of my mind that the author was picturing a movie out of this book, because, tell you what, the amount of adventures (or misadventures, depending on how you see it) never (and I mean, never) ran out. Think about it, had this book adapted to a movie, I can see myself enjoying and, possibly, growing tired of the adventures (depending on the actors who would be playing, though). Point is, the amount of adventures that both Ana and Zak go through was a nice surprise, I really didn’t expect myself to be pleasantly engage so much to the story. If ever you find yourself in the company of this book, stick around for the last part of the book. That’s the best part, at least for me. You first read the book, thinking that this was going to be a story of two teenagers coming of age, but you sure didn’t expect to have it ended with you getting slap in the face as the story unwinds and tells you how at the end of the day life just sucks, how no matter how hard you work, you can always be miserable. Tell you what, I’ll be 28 this year, and having read a YA book and stumble upon this gem inside it was a pleasant surprise and an eye-opening experience for sure. At the end of day, life is just as simple as, you’re in or you’re out.
Why I liked the most about this story was it went from this fluffy mild teenage stuff to a real talk slap your in the face stuff about how life sucks. And even then, it did not sound condescending, it just went straight up, “yo, life sucks.” It’s not a class A research finding to be told that life sucks, but it still is a nice feeling to read a YA and/or a coming of age book going around without so much as being pretentious about laying it out that, yeah, life sucks.
I kind of had a thought at the back of my mind that the author was picturing a movie out of this book, because, tell you what, the amount of adventures (or misadventures, depending on how you see it) never (and I mean, never) ran out. Think about it, had this book adapted to a movie, I can see myself enjoying and, possibly, growing tired of the adventures (depending on the actors who would be playing, though). Point is, the amount of adventures that both Ana and Zak go through was a nice surprise, I really didn’t expect myself to be pleasantly engage so much to the story. If ever you find yourself in the company of this book, stick around for the last part of the book. That’s the best part, at least for me. You first read the book, thinking that this was going to be a story of two teenagers coming of age, but you sure didn’t expect to have it ended with you getting slap in the face as the story unwinds and tells you how at the end of the day life just sucks, how no matter how hard you work, you can always be miserable. Tell you what, I’ll be 28 this year, and having read a YA book and stumble upon this gem inside it was a pleasant surprise and an eye-opening experience for sure. At the end of day, life is just as simple as, you’re in or you’re out.
mooonyaa's review
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
abbyreads2's review against another edition
3.0
I'm not sure what to star this book. I'm stuck. It was a sweet book and a great distraction. I wanted a break from the average romance books you can say and this book definitely distracted me. It was definitely a ride. I was not expecting all that to happen. The ending was adorable. I wished we'd met her sister though and gotten the chance to get to know them. This book isn't too intense, it isn't in your face, and it's not focused too much on the romance aspect of things which was adorable. They were adorable. The book is focused on the storyline as their relationship progresses. It was enjoyable. I have no complaints.
xlovelylaurencalistax's review against another edition
3.0
More like 2 stars but I gave it 3 for making me laugh out loud a few times.
uyiosa's review against another edition
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
1.0
Lacked depth, and the characters were just bumbling idiots.
paginasdealex's review against another edition
5.0
4.5 mañana escribo completita la reseña
Al final no la escribí, la grabé. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qu-3ENUnMw
Al final no la escribí, la grabé. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qu-3ENUnMw
nina_rod's review against another edition
3.0
A book set in my own state at a Comic Con type event, score! The events that happened in this book would make a great 1980s slapstick type of movie. And the loser gets the unattainable girl in the end. I can picture it and the soundtrack already.