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3.18 AVERAGE
3.18 AVERAGE
emotional
funny
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
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
In a manner of two minutes, what was supposed to be the greatest proposal of all time instead lands Josh evicted from the apartment he owns with his now ex-girlfriend, who was cheating on him, sole owner to the rabbit he just bought her for Christmas and jobless as well because of course he shares the same job site as his ex. He’s now living at home with his parents (been there) and utterly defeated by life, wondering what to do. Clearly the only way to deal with this situation is to flip a coin. Literally. Josh decided that for every single decision he makes for a year, he will flip a coin to decide what to do. Will Josh find clarity from the chaos? Okay this book was cute. It reminded me a lot of a male Sophie Kinsella book. Josh is hapless, clumsy and adorkable. It was really fun to see his journey from being down in the dumps to finding himself at the end. If you’re a fan of Sophie, then you’ll love this easy to read, romantic tale.
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
fast-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
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
relaxing
slow-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
Fun romantic read
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Down-on-his-luck, Josh, loses his girlfriend, his flat and his job all in one night. He decides he can't be trusted to make his own big life decisions and entrusts them instead to the flip of a coin.
It's a premise that interested me, but the story itself is executed poorly and the coin flip plot device is under-utilised to the extent of being pointless. Unfortunately, there's not a lot I liked about this.
What I (sort-of) liked:
It's a premise that interested me, but the story itself is executed poorly and the coin flip plot device is under-utilised to the extent of being pointless. Unfortunately, there's not a lot I liked about this.
What I (sort-of) liked:
- An interesting premise. The synopsis certainly drew me in.
- A good hook in the first chapter with Josh losing everything within 2 pages and having to start again.
What I did not like:
- So many decisions plot and structure wise, it would be hard to cover them all. There are so many places in the book where I thought I'd hit a 'transition point' in the story, a point that the climactic moments start to build from, and then I'd turn to the next page and it would be more of the same thing. The story structure feels like a series of ludicrous events strung together with no sense of purpose - Josh goes from proposal, to coin flipping, London Underground themed birthday parties, to quiz shows all with no real sense of purpose. It just reads like, 'this happened, and then, and then, and then.'
- Structure-wise as well, we get into the real meat of the book way too late -
if you're going to give me a story about someone chasing a girl all over the globe (or, Europe, just Europe) based on limited information give me that story from the start! Don't give me 50 pages of that story slapped onto like 300 pages of unnecessary nonsense beforehand. - Even if everything else about this book had been wonderful, I still think I wouldn't have enjoyed it based entirely on the romance.
It's basically bare-bones, insta-love. There's no clear reason why these two characters would be so into each other so immediately. And the fact that I'm supposed to care about this guy's journey through various European countries to find a girl he's spoken to for like 1 to 2 hours at most - I just don't find it interesting and I'm not rooting for these characters in any way. - Speaking of the characters! Where do I begin. The POV character Josh has basically been given three characteristics, awkward, bad at decisions and I guess his coin flipping gimmick could be considered a characteristic? Literally everything is filtered through this character, it's all through his lens, so I should know something about him other than these things. I should see his internal world, but he has no internal world. He's just boring and awkward in a supposed to be funny but really just cringe way. The side characters suffer a similar fate, though it's not as obviously badly done because I'm not seeing everything through their bland point of view. It's like each character was given one personality trait and that's all you're going to hear about every time you see them. Dad's stingy, Mum cares what the neighbour thinks, Jessie is quirky I guess (she wears unusual clothes is basically the extent of what I know about her), Jake has a boyfriend also named Jake and works at a terrible hotel (that last one's not even a personality, it's just literally the only thing I know about Jake).
- The humour as well, is just bad. I know it's subjective, but it felt like every single thing happening in the book was designed to lead up to a punchline, but the punchlines were always bad! The nude portraiture bit is what's springing to mind immediately for me - just this incoherent joke that's completely unnecessary and that the characters don't react to in any relevant or realistic way. Also, he keeps going back to this joke about their rival quiz team being called the Quizlamic Extremists, beyond this just not being funny in general he never explains what the joke is supposed to be - are the guys in the Quizlamic Extremists group Muslim guys who think it's a funny play on stereotypes about them, or are they a bunch of white guys who think that's a funny name. Based on the lack of detail I'm guessing it's the latter.
- There's so much more, but I'll end with just a note on the coin-flip. This is clearly a plot device that could have been hugely interesting. It's purpose is to force Josh out of his comfort zone, so it should be used in a way that it's making decisions Josh wouldn't usually make, or it's making decisions we as a reader wouldn't expect it to make and Josh is having to navigate his way around them. But, when it's actually used, the coin just reinforces all of Josh's decisions - it's only purpose seems to be to make Josh do what he would have done anyway (which means it has no actual purpose narrative wise). And this is when it is used! Half of the time I think the author forgets it's there and then will randomly throw it in like, 'Josh sat with the chocolate muffin he'd picked with the flip of his coin'. Like, yep, cool, I don't care.
This is such a mean review, but I cannot think of anything that redeemed this book for me! I guess if you're looking for some reasonably fast-paced, light-hearted humour you might like this, but it's a big no from me.
funny
lighthearted
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes