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3.1 AVERAGE
3.1 AVERAGE
This book is very interesting if you have been involved in college a'cappella. Having sung with two of the featured groups in the 90s, it was interesting to see how things have changed, and also how serious they are. Good read!
Interesting. This book is a non-fiction account of three a cappella groups that was fictionalized and turned into the movie "Pitch Perfect" with Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson. The movie was cute and funny, so I decided to read the book.
Overall, the book is interesting, but it does get kind of repetitive. It features Divisi, the all women's group at Oregon State, the Beelzebubs, the all male group at Tufts, and the Hullabahoos, the all male group at UVA. In real life, the groups don't meet in some epic battle, they all have their own struggles in different areas of the country. In fact, the Bubs (as the Beelzebubs are known) and the B'hoos (short for the Hullabahoos) only meet up once. The repetitiveness comes in from the author's depictions of the groups - the B'hoos are irresponsible, but loveable slackers, the Bubs take themselves WAY too seriously, and Divisi are struggling to find their identity after being robbed at the ICCA finals and losing most of their members to graduation. He flogs those themes a little too hard and it gets old by the end of the book.
Long story short, the movie is only VERY loosely based on this book. Don't expect the same story in more detail.
Overall, the book is interesting, but it does get kind of repetitive. It features Divisi, the all women's group at Oregon State, the Beelzebubs, the all male group at Tufts, and the Hullabahoos, the all male group at UVA. In real life, the groups don't meet in some epic battle, they all have their own struggles in different areas of the country. In fact, the Bubs (as the Beelzebubs are known) and the B'hoos (short for the Hullabahoos) only meet up once. The repetitiveness comes in from the author's depictions of the groups - the B'hoos are irresponsible, but loveable slackers, the Bubs take themselves WAY too seriously, and Divisi are struggling to find their identity after being robbed at the ICCA finals and losing most of their members to graduation. He flogs those themes a little too hard and it gets old by the end of the book.
Long story short, the movie is only VERY loosely based on this book. Don't expect the same story in more detail.
Closer to 2.5 stars. I wish this book — the non-fiction basis for the Pitch Perfect movie series — had stuck with one a cappella group and followed them to finals. Or stuck with one group per section, or had stuck with a linear timeline, or something that passed as an organizing principle. It's just this grab bag of names and anecdotes, of people who don't distinguish themselves at all except when they're misbehaving. I lost track of the players quickly — when you're covering decades of college-group history, and people drop in and out every year, the names start to blur quickly, and when so many of the stories are repetitive (arguing over trivia about musical arrangement or group direction or album production; acting out on gigs by drinking too much and acting unprofessional) the lines blur even more. Only a few of the details really stand out at the end, like the group that showed up to a David Letterman taping fully expecting to just walk in and be allowed to perform on his show — and eventually, after intense mocking, getting their wish.
YouTube wound up being a really useful resource as I read this book. There are SO many detailed descriptions of songs and sounds that are pretty meaningless in prose — including a ridiculous number of cases where the author spells out whatever deedle-dee dah dum dum dees or whakkita-chakkitas the group of the moment is singing in the baseline of a given song. But often it's possible to find the group in question performing the song in question, which clears up what Rapkin is talking about. Still, while it's clear that an immense amount of journalistic effort went into writing this book, it's easy to wish for a lot less meaningless name-date-event-songlist-sound detail, and more of a broad and approachable overview. This book is incredibly weedsy, and the repetition gets pretty grinding.
YouTube wound up being a really useful resource as I read this book. There are SO many detailed descriptions of songs and sounds that are pretty meaningless in prose — including a ridiculous number of cases where the author spells out whatever deedle-dee dah dum dum dees or whakkita-chakkitas the group of the moment is singing in the baseline of a given song. But often it's possible to find the group in question performing the song in question, which clears up what Rapkin is talking about. Still, while it's clear that an immense amount of journalistic effort went into writing this book, it's easy to wish for a lot less meaningless name-date-event-songlist-sound detail, and more of a broad and approachable overview. This book is incredibly weedsy, and the repetition gets pretty grinding.
I didn't realize the movie was based off of a book until I saw a mention in the credits during one of my many rewatches. So of course I had to get the book right away.
This book follows three different collegiate a cappella groups during one school year: Divisi, the Beelzebubs, and the Hullabahoos. I was most interested in Divisi's journey to get back to the ICCA finals. He also covered a lot of the history of a cappella which I really enjoyed learning about.
This book follows three different collegiate a cappella groups during one school year: Divisi, the Beelzebubs, and the Hullabahoos. I was most interested in Divisi's journey to get back to the ICCA finals. He also covered a lot of the history of a cappella which I really enjoyed learning about.
DNF at 26%. Interesting book but everything just kept going and going and I was not motivated to keep reading. Will try again in the future.
Struggled to get to the finish. Was hard to follow, non-chronological, and too many characters to actually care about any of them.
informative
relaxing
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Moderate: Transphobia
This novel does better as a film and I’m not afraid to state that. It’s enjoyable, but the writing style feels like every-other early-ya novel, meaning it gets boring fast.
I'm not sure I can explain it, or point to any specific passages, but it almost seemed to me as if there were a sexist undertone to the story in the way Rapkin wrote about Divisi versus the two male groups. It felt like the members of Divisi were ridiculed more, and weren't taken as seriously as their male counterparts. Not sure if anyone else picked up on this, or if I'm just reaching.
Also, the ending was kind of "meh." Like, I got to it, and I wasn't sure what either of the three groups had accomplished to make the particular year Rapkin chose (2006-2007) worth writing about.
Also, the ending was kind of "meh." Like, I got to it, and I wasn't sure what either of the three groups had accomplished to make the particular year Rapkin chose (2006-2007) worth writing about.