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A review by jnikolova
Lying Out Loud by Kody Keplinger
3.0
Read on the WondrousBooks blog.
Verdict: Too high expectations.
I was preparing to absolutely love this one, since I loved The DUFF. When I read the latter, I had low expectations, it had been sitting on my to-read shelf for 3-4 years and I was like "Just read it already!". But I really liked it. it had spunk, a nice story, a feisty main character and it was also very sexy.
This book, though, seemed to be lacking in all of these departments.
At first the characters seemed like the ones from The DUFF had come back to life, only with changed names. I don't know, how many ways are there to writing a teenager? But with time the characters in LOL became flawed in different ways and their flaws lead to them being sort of unpleasant. Sonny(which FYI is a way worse name than Sonya) seemed like someone with multiple personalities, her actions were completely nonconsecutive, even towards the people she supposedly loved she'd act rude and weird and then go on and on about how much she loved them. Huh?! Amy was described as someone who kept to herself and was not loud about her opinions, but oh boy! She was a total doormat. There was not a second in the book where I actually cared about her. And Ryder was the craziest of all. I kept expecting that I'd get some insight as to his way of thinking but nothing really happened. He was a total jerk to Sonny, then after one forced conversation, BAM everything is forgotten. Because realistically speaking, they might have been trying to make him like Sonny throughout the entire book but it happened literally in-between two chapters. Also, absolutely nothing in this book was sexy. At all. Which on its own seems like a pointer to the fact that Lying Out Loud is a companion to PG-13 movie!The DUFF and not the actual book. It might be an attempt to continue the book version of Hamilton High's story, but the entire mood of the book is the reflection of the light-themed movie.
What I did like about Lying Out Loud was the way we got to see what was going on in Sonny's head, all of her secret shame, all of her fears. It was honest and realistic, so it won the book many points.
Verdict: Too high expectations.
I was preparing to absolutely love this one, since I loved The DUFF. When I read the latter, I had low expectations, it had been sitting on my to-read shelf for 3-4 years and I was like "Just read it already!". But I really liked it. it had spunk, a nice story, a feisty main character and it was also very sexy.
This book, though, seemed to be lacking in all of these departments.
At first the characters seemed like the ones from The DUFF had come back to life, only with changed names. I don't know, how many ways are there to writing a teenager? But with time the characters in LOL became flawed in different ways and their flaws lead to them being sort of unpleasant. Sonny(which FYI is a way worse name than Sonya) seemed like someone with multiple personalities, her actions were completely nonconsecutive, even towards the people she supposedly loved she'd act rude and weird and then go on and on about how much she loved them. Huh?! Amy was described as someone who kept to herself and was not loud about her opinions, but oh boy! She was a total doormat. There was not a second in the book where I actually cared about her. And Ryder was the craziest of all. I kept expecting that I'd get some insight as to his way of thinking but nothing really happened. He was a total jerk to Sonny, then after one forced conversation, BAM everything is forgotten. Because realistically speaking, they might have been trying to make him like Sonny throughout the entire book but it happened literally in-between two chapters. Also, absolutely nothing in this book was sexy. At all. Which on its own seems like a pointer to the fact that Lying Out Loud is a companion to PG-13 movie!The DUFF and not the actual book. It might be an attempt to continue the book version of Hamilton High's story, but the entire mood of the book is the reflection of the light-themed movie.
What I did like about Lying Out Loud was the way we got to see what was going on in Sonny's head, all of her secret shame, all of her fears. It was honest and realistic, so it won the book many points.