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A review by whitneymouse
Sam & Ilsa's Last Hurrah by Rachel Cohn, David Levithan
2.0
I read this book because I had liked other books by these two authors (Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares).
Man, does this not hold a candle to either of those.
This was not the worst book I’ve ever read, but it wasn’t great. It felt so frivolous through most of it. The relationships were ill-defined. Many characters were irritating as hell. And the majority of the “conflict” comes from really petty first world problems these characters unnecessarily put themselves through.
Sam was kind of a cotton candy character: looks fun on the outside but has no substance. His arc is about self-empowerment but his parts were putting me to sleep.
Ilsa is ALL. OVER. THE PLACE! She’s “in love” with this guy and then over the course of a couple of hours she isn’t in love with him suddenly and is starting another relationship that night. That seems unhealthy to me. Also, there’s this part where the authors have a character say something like “I don’t believe in labels” to avoid giving her a sexual identity, so it makes her seem like she’d be attracted to anything that moves. She also has this weird relationship with Sam where she loves him, hates him, resents him for being their grandmother’s favorite, etc. I had issues pinning them down.
KK was the standard Kim Kardashian wannabe rich girl. Irritating and boring at the same time. At one point, Ilsa says something like “if I don’t love her, I don’t think anyone else will” which is NOT a reason to be friends with someone!
Caspian/Frederyk would have been kicked out of my house immediately. He was so annoying and these characters just continue putting up with his crazy.
Johan, Parker and Li were more interesting to me than the other characters and I would’ve been more interested in their perspectives than the ones we got.
The issues in this book were so first world problem-y. “I didn’t get into this really expensive school I wanted to go to. I don’t want to leave the fancy apartment that my family won’t own at the end of the summer. My brother is our grandmother’s favorite and it makes me mad!”
I just was not impressed by this outing. I’ve only read one book by Rachel Cohn on her own (that I liked a lot) and one book by David Levithan on his own (that I despised) so I’m kind of inclined to blame him more for its issues. But, that aside, this was just not their best.
Man, does this not hold a candle to either of those.
This was not the worst book I’ve ever read, but it wasn’t great. It felt so frivolous through most of it. The relationships were ill-defined. Many characters were irritating as hell. And the majority of the “conflict” comes from really petty first world problems these characters unnecessarily put themselves through.
Sam was kind of a cotton candy character: looks fun on the outside but has no substance. His arc is about self-empowerment but his parts were putting me to sleep.
Ilsa is ALL. OVER. THE PLACE! She’s “in love” with this guy and then over the course of a couple of hours she isn’t in love with him suddenly and is starting another relationship that night. That seems unhealthy to me. Also, there’s this part where the authors have a character say something like “I don’t believe in labels” to avoid giving her a sexual identity, so it makes her seem like she’d be attracted to anything that moves. She also has this weird relationship with Sam where she loves him, hates him, resents him for being their grandmother’s favorite, etc. I had issues pinning them down.
KK was the standard Kim Kardashian wannabe rich girl. Irritating and boring at the same time. At one point, Ilsa says something like “if I don’t love her, I don’t think anyone else will” which is NOT a reason to be friends with someone!
Caspian/Frederyk would have been kicked out of my house immediately. He was so annoying and these characters just continue putting up with his crazy.
Johan, Parker and Li were more interesting to me than the other characters and I would’ve been more interested in their perspectives than the ones we got.
The issues in this book were so first world problem-y. “I didn’t get into this really expensive school I wanted to go to. I don’t want to leave the fancy apartment that my family won’t own at the end of the summer. My brother is our grandmother’s favorite and it makes me mad!”
I just was not impressed by this outing. I’ve only read one book by Rachel Cohn on her own (that I liked a lot) and one book by David Levithan on his own (that I despised) so I’m kind of inclined to blame him more for its issues. But, that aside, this was just not their best.