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samrushingbooks's review
5.0
*Read as part of Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon - Oct 2018
This was the fun fandom feel good type story I needed with the day/week/month I've been having. All The Feels really does capture what it can be like to be a part of fandom. I especially enjoyed how Liv felt when she arrived at Dragon Con. It is a feeling like no other to arrive at a convention and realize that you are with your people. I always go through a sad period when I leave conventions because of leaving people who share similar interests.
This was the fun fandom feel good type story I needed with the day/week/month I've been having. All The Feels really does capture what it can be like to be a part of fandom. I especially enjoyed how Liv felt when she arrived at Dragon Con. It is a feeling like no other to arrive at a convention and realize that you are with your people. I always go through a sad period when I leave conventions because of leaving people who share similar interests.
michalice's review
4.0
When I first heard about All the Feels I needed to know more. I love the cover and how it represents the book, but was also drawn in by the synopsis.
After the death of her favourite character, Liv is heartbroken. She can't believe they killed him off, and she is determined to take matters into her own hands. Liv is a big part of the fandom for Starveil, she creates vids, mixing clips together. Her online friends are also part of this fandom, they write fanfic, or create manips. With the help of her real life friend, Xander, Liv creates a new vid, the possible return of her favourite character, with the tag #SpartanSurvived.
All the Feels is a book that mixes fandom, friendship, unrequited love, and seriously has you feeling All the Feels. Going into this book I didn't really know what to expect, and I quickly found myself falling into the story, eager to know what Liv and Xander would cook up next. I like that although these two have different fandoms, they make a really great team together. Their friendship is strong and real, and is something that Liv relies on a lot throughout the book, especially with her Mothers disagreement.
All the Feels is a book that really draws you in, and although I haven't been to DragonCon, it brought back memories from YALC/LFCC, the crowds, the cosplay, the overall atmosphere. I loved getting to see it through Liv's eyes as she experiences it for the fist time. The DragonCon itself was an experience, especially when thier identities are revealed.
One little touch about this book that I love are the movie scenes, we open the pages to the end scene of a movie, before joining Liv and meeting her. We also get to see a few of these throughout the book, either as Liv's vids, or as part of the movie itself and it just makes it feel more real.
Final Verdict
All the Feels was a book I really enjoyed, my only negative thought is that the ending could have been a bit longer, letting us explore this new situation more.
After the death of her favourite character, Liv is heartbroken. She can't believe they killed him off, and she is determined to take matters into her own hands. Liv is a big part of the fandom for Starveil, she creates vids, mixing clips together. Her online friends are also part of this fandom, they write fanfic, or create manips. With the help of her real life friend, Xander, Liv creates a new vid, the possible return of her favourite character, with the tag #SpartanSurvived.
All the Feels is a book that mixes fandom, friendship, unrequited love, and seriously has you feeling All the Feels. Going into this book I didn't really know what to expect, and I quickly found myself falling into the story, eager to know what Liv and Xander would cook up next. I like that although these two have different fandoms, they make a really great team together. Their friendship is strong and real, and is something that Liv relies on a lot throughout the book, especially with her Mothers disagreement.
All the Feels is a book that really draws you in, and although I haven't been to DragonCon, it brought back memories from YALC/LFCC, the crowds, the cosplay, the overall atmosphere. I loved getting to see it through Liv's eyes as she experiences it for the fist time. The DragonCon itself was an experience, especially when thier identities are revealed.
One little touch about this book that I love are the movie scenes, we open the pages to the end scene of a movie, before joining Liv and meeting her. We also get to see a few of these throughout the book, either as Liv's vids, or as part of the movie itself and it just makes it feel more real.
Final Verdict
All the Feels was a book I really enjoyed, my only negative thought is that the ending could have been a bit longer, letting us explore this new situation more.
pantsreads's review
3.0
Loved the fandom aspects, but the plot was overly contrived, and the love interest would have interested me much more as just a friend.
Check out my full review at Forever Young Adult.
Check out my full review at Forever Young Adult.
fishgirl182's review
Maybe I’m too old for this book but I just couldn’t get into it. I consider myself a fangirl of many things but I don’t hold a candle to Liv and her obsession with the fictional Starveil fandom. When her favorite character dies in the most recent Starveil film, she is devastated and spends weeks moping and moaning about it. Maybe I’ve just never been into anything this much but I couldn’t relate to what Liv was feeling and I really just wanted to tell her to grow up. There are so many worse things in life than your favorite fictional character dying. The writing itself was fine. It was the characters I had the most issue with. You might enjoy this if you are an intense fandom/fanfic person like Liv but it just wasn’t for me.
kawarwick's review
3.0
Need that half star again. Teenage fangirls will love this: cute, cheesy, story about girl who is obsessed with a movie character.
fishgirl182's review against another edition
Maybe I’m too old for this book but I just couldn’t get into it. I consider myself a fangirl of many things but I don’t hold a candle to Liv and her obsession with the fictional Starveil fandom. When her favorite character dies in the most recent Starveil film, she is devastated and spends weeks moping and moaning about it. Maybe I’ve just never been into anything this much but I couldn’t relate to what Liv was feeling and I really just wanted to tell her to grow up. There are so many worse things in life than your favorite fictional character dying. The writing itself was fine. It was the characters I had the most issue with. You might enjoy this if you are an intense fandom/fanfic person like Liv but it just wasn’t for me.
afretts's review
2.0
ARC received via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
This may be my biggest disappointment of the year so far. When I saw this book pop up on my goodreads feed I was SUPER excited. It seemed to have been written just for me. I'm a big nerdy fan of things too! I thought I would relate to this to the nth degree.
6 pages in, I knew- Houston, we have a problem.
The writing style throughout this is super pretentious. Paired with Xander's orotund (the irony of my using this word to describe him is not lost on me) way of speaking, it's nearly unbearable. I lost track of the number of times I had to google a word I've never even seen before. It's like the author wrote what Xander would have said if he was a normal person and then used a thesaurus to douche it up. The biggest problem wasn't that the author used these words, it's that she seemed to think they were part of a normal person's vernacular. No context clues were offered as to their meaning and I was left to google or wiki if I wanted any idea what was going on. Regardless of Xander using words like "rapscallion," the author also assumed her reader had an awareness of what I'll refer to as "tumblr-speak." I had no idea what AU and vidding were and had to open my laptop to research them before I could carry on with the story.
I didn't like any of these characters. As mentioned previously, Xander was unbearable. He spoke like a 19th century Darcy-wannabe and dressed like he was in a permanent state of cosplay. He repeatedly referred to things as "delicious" (including Liv's figure. *shudders*). He may be the most unintentionally creepy male love interest I've ever encountered in fiction. Liv was also totally obnoxious. She was supposed to be in college, but had the emotional maturity of a 15 year old girl. She aggravated me almost as much as Xander did.
TL;DR This book is trying entirely too hard to be the next Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell. It reminded me of an insecure teenager. It's trying SO hard to be quirky and unique that I want to yell at it, "JUST BE YOURSELF!"
I think this book is targeted at an extremely niche audience that even I am not a part of. I thought I was a fangirl, but I'm not fangirl enough to love this book. There's a 98% chance you aren't either.
This may be my biggest disappointment of the year so far. When I saw this book pop up on my goodreads feed I was SUPER excited. It seemed to have been written just for me. I'm a big nerdy fan of things too! I thought I would relate to this to the nth degree.
6 pages in, I knew- Houston, we have a problem.
The writing style throughout this is super pretentious. Paired with Xander's orotund (the irony of my using this word to describe him is not lost on me) way of speaking, it's nearly unbearable. I lost track of the number of times I had to google a word I've never even seen before. It's like the author wrote what Xander would have said if he was a normal person and then used a thesaurus to douche it up. The biggest problem wasn't that the author used these words, it's that she seemed to think they were part of a normal person's vernacular. No context clues were offered as to their meaning and I was left to google or wiki if I wanted any idea what was going on. Regardless of Xander using words like "rapscallion," the author also assumed her reader had an awareness of what I'll refer to as "tumblr-speak." I had no idea what AU and vidding were and had to open my laptop to research them before I could carry on with the story.
I didn't like any of these characters. As mentioned previously, Xander was unbearable. He spoke like a 19th century Darcy-wannabe and dressed like he was in a permanent state of cosplay. He repeatedly referred to things as "delicious" (including Liv's figure. *shudders*). He may be the most unintentionally creepy male love interest I've ever encountered in fiction. Liv was also totally obnoxious. She was supposed to be in college, but had the emotional maturity of a 15 year old girl. She aggravated me almost as much as Xander did.
TL;DR This book is trying entirely too hard to be the next Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell. It reminded me of an insecure teenager. It's trying SO hard to be quirky and unique that I want to yell at it, "JUST BE YOURSELF!"
I think this book is targeted at an extremely niche audience that even I am not a part of. I thought I was a fangirl, but I'm not fangirl enough to love this book. There's a 98% chance you aren't either.
golden_lily's review
1.0
My dad's a huge sci-fi fantasy fan and a lot of my childhood memories are intrinsically linked with Wars, Trek, and Galactica. I remember the 20th Anniversary Special Edition and my dad and Uncle Ed screaming that Han Shot FIRST. I was nine. But my first fandom was The Wheel of Time, when my dad stuffed the first half of The Eye of the World into my hand on a car ride and told me read it. And then he told me to persevere (three times) when the first 50 pages turned out to be the dullest in literary history. This was in the early Thousands, before Tumblr or blogs. Instead we had bulletin boards and chat rooms. My nick was golden_lily, (the personal sigil for Elayne Trakand,) and I was obsessed. If my dad had died at the height of my fandom? I don't know what I would have done, but I doubt it would be pretty.
Liv lives for fandom, particularly Starveil. When the fourth movie kills off the main character, she can't cope. After weeks of depression, she convinces her best friend Xander to make a few fan videos with her showing that #SpartanSurvived. The fandom runs with it and soon she'd be the toast of the community - if she wasn't anon.
My biggest problem with All The Feels is its lack of commitment. Liv's father was a massive fan of the cult series turned phenomena and it's obvious in the two paragraphs about him, that her reluctance to let Spartan go is directly tied to her unresolved grief over his death. Her mom talks about a time fandom almost destroyed Liv's life in high school, but the book doesn’t actually go there. I don't know if we're supposed to think her mother's concern is rational or not. I do know that Liv would benefit from some real therapy, not a job on a movie set.
Characters are flimsy and supremely underdeveloped. Xander's involved with the Steampunk community, but he dresses as a Regency rake at all times. Why? We know he met Liv at college and he wants to be an actor, but not what he's studying or his hobbies. His bisexuality is dropped casually into a conversation, which I did like, but we know nothing about his home or family or interests outside of fandom. Liv's lack of motivation or interests is part of her - can I say arc when there's no actual growth? - but the rest of the cast shouldn't be able to be described in single words.
Arden - X's girlfriend, preppy and annoying
Joe - Loud, bossy, fat
Step-Dad - Asshole
Brian - Asshole
Actor dude - Asshole
Hank - Hot and sweet, until asshole
This is not good! If the only way you can make your main character and her love interest seem nice is by making everyone around them not, you need to revise.
The book is a cliche mess full of girl hate, abuse, and easy to guess plot lines, but the one thing it does right is the fandom voice. The tweets/chat/IMs are authentic and capture the feeling of squealing with friends who love the same things as you. When Liv talks to Joe and Brian online, you absolutely understand they’re “real” friends, even if they haven’t met IRL. Of course, once Liv goes to the con and meets everyone in person, that’s no longer true.
I don’t understand the audience for this book. It reads far too juvenile for the characters ages or the proposed market. There’s no growth; there’s barely a plot. It makes men, women, and fandom look bad. It’s not funny or even particularly romantic, something I need from an imprint called SwoonReads. The main character learns that Hollywood is a corrupt place, but ends up happily working for it with her love interest. It’s bizarre. In all, I’d rather read the novelization of the Star Wars Holiday Special.
Liv lives for fandom, particularly Starveil. When the fourth movie kills off the main character, she can't cope. After weeks of depression, she convinces her best friend Xander to make a few fan videos with her showing that #SpartanSurvived. The fandom runs with it and soon she'd be the toast of the community - if she wasn't anon.
My biggest problem with All The Feels is its lack of commitment. Liv's father was a massive fan of the cult series turned phenomena and it's obvious in the two paragraphs about him, that her reluctance to let Spartan go is directly tied to her unresolved grief over his death. Her mom talks about a time fandom almost destroyed Liv's life in high school, but the book doesn’t actually go there. I don't know if we're supposed to think her mother's concern is rational or not. I do know that Liv would benefit from some real therapy, not a job on a movie set.
Characters are flimsy and supremely underdeveloped. Xander's involved with the Steampunk community, but he dresses as a Regency rake at all times. Why? We know he met Liv at college and he wants to be an actor, but not what he's studying or his hobbies. His bisexuality is dropped casually into a conversation, which I did like, but we know nothing about his home or family or interests outside of fandom. Liv's lack of motivation or interests is part of her - can I say arc when there's no actual growth? - but the rest of the cast shouldn't be able to be described in single words.
Arden - X's girlfriend, preppy and annoying
Joe - Loud, bossy, fat
Step-Dad - Asshole
Brian - Asshole
Actor dude - Asshole
Hank - Hot and sweet, until asshole
This is not good! If the only way you can make your main character and her love interest seem nice is by making everyone around them not, you need to revise.
The book is a cliche mess full of girl hate, abuse, and easy to guess plot lines, but the one thing it does right is the fandom voice. The tweets/chat/IMs are authentic and capture the feeling of squealing with friends who love the same things as you. When Liv talks to Joe and Brian online, you absolutely understand they’re “real” friends, even if they haven’t met IRL. Of course, once Liv goes to the con and meets everyone in person, that’s no longer true.
I don’t understand the audience for this book. It reads far too juvenile for the characters ages or the proposed market. There’s no growth; there’s barely a plot. It makes men, women, and fandom look bad. It’s not funny or even particularly romantic, something I need from an imprint called SwoonReads. The main character learns that Hollywood is a corrupt place, but ends up happily working for it with her love interest. It’s bizarre. In all, I’d rather read the novelization of the Star Wars Holiday Special.
belellcollins's review against another edition
4.0
After reading and LOVING Internet Famous I found this book and immediately dove in. Liv and Xander's friendship was so wonderful (especially since there was so much potential for them). I didn't realize all the fandom things that I wanted to read about until this book. It felt true and interesting and fun. I loved the depiction of Dragon Con cause I went to my first DC a few years ago, and while my experience was a little different the vibe was real. If you like romance, fandom, or both check out this book!