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geekinthejeep 's review for:
Finding My Elf
by David Valdes
Thank you to HarperTeen and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!
Having departed from his hometown where he was the theatre prodigy with a scholarship to NYU, Cam has returned for the holidays with his tail between his legs. He's not popular on campus, he's about to fail out of his Very Serious Theatre Program and lose his scholarship, and his dating and social life are nonexistent. But he can't admit any of that to his father, who has sacrificed so much to get Cam where he is in life - so Cam panics and takes a holiday job to avoid spending time at home as, of course, a mall elf. And the good news is, if he can be the most popular of the elves, there's a $5,000 cash prize that could go a very long way toward rescuing his chances of staying at NYU... If he can just beat Marco, his obnoxious, festive, attractive competition.
Billed as a holiday romcom with mall elf rivals-to-lovers, this book is absolutely festive and very cute. The entire thing is set over the week around Christmas, full of elf-themed competitions, Christmas cookie parties, and the nightmarish experience of Santa's Village at the mall. It was all so genuinely ridiculous that I couldn't help but enjoy it, even if I never quite bought into the rivalry and the romance was a bit too instantaneous for me. It was just cute in a way that a good holiday book should be.
Cam is a delightfully complicated character, too. At eighteen-years old, he's discovering for the first time what the wider world is really like in a brutal way compared to the simplicity of hometown life, and that is something I see over and over with my own students. It's frustrating to read, but so true to life, and it's nice to see him develop over the course of the story and figure out what he actually needs to do with his future. Honestly, my biggest frustration with Cam - and with the story - was that for all of the claims that he was a Real Actor, he was a seriously terrible actor when it came to all of the elf competitions. The disconnect was difficult to reconcile.
Marco was precious, too. While he never got the development that I'd hope for to get really attached to him, he was just sweet and fun to read and learn more about.
Overall, this is a quick, festive, cute read for the holiday season.
Having departed from his hometown where he was the theatre prodigy with a scholarship to NYU, Cam has returned for the holidays with his tail between his legs. He's not popular on campus, he's about to fail out of his Very Serious Theatre Program and lose his scholarship, and his dating and social life are nonexistent. But he can't admit any of that to his father, who has sacrificed so much to get Cam where he is in life - so Cam panics and takes a holiday job to avoid spending time at home as, of course, a mall elf. And the good news is, if he can be the most popular of the elves, there's a $5,000 cash prize that could go a very long way toward rescuing his chances of staying at NYU... If he can just beat Marco, his obnoxious, festive, attractive competition.
Billed as a holiday romcom with mall elf rivals-to-lovers, this book is absolutely festive and very cute. The entire thing is set over the week around Christmas, full of elf-themed competitions, Christmas cookie parties, and the nightmarish experience of Santa's Village at the mall. It was all so genuinely ridiculous that I couldn't help but enjoy it, even if I never quite bought into the rivalry and the romance was a bit too instantaneous for me. It was just cute in a way that a good holiday book should be.
Cam is a delightfully complicated character, too. At eighteen-years old, he's discovering for the first time what the wider world is really like in a brutal way compared to the simplicity of hometown life, and that is something I see over and over with my own students. It's frustrating to read, but so true to life, and it's nice to see him develop over the course of the story and figure out what he actually needs to do with his future. Honestly, my biggest frustration with Cam - and with the story - was that for all of the claims that he was a Real Actor, he was a seriously terrible actor when it came to all of the elf competitions. The disconnect was difficult to reconcile.
Marco was precious, too. While he never got the development that I'd hope for to get really attached to him, he was just sweet and fun to read and learn more about.
Overall, this is a quick, festive, cute read for the holiday season.