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A review by arieanstar
Roman and Jewel by Dana L. Davis
3.0
Thank you to Netgalley, Inkyard Press, and Dana L. Davis for providing me with an eARC of Roman and Jewel in exchange for an honest review.
This one is gonna be a tough one to articulate. I enjoyed maybe about 30% of the book? Okay, so here's the thing, I think I might be outgrowing the YA contemporary genre, because all the drama just frustrates me to no end! I also did not like that we have a book that is trying to uplift #OwnVoices peoples by putting Jerzie Jhames into the spotlight and making her this talented Broadway prodigy (with the help of years of training), but then the second we put another girl in that same situation, they have to be enemies. I know, I know, we needed an "antagonist" that would make it harder for Jerzie to get the guy of he dreams. But, really, the drama between the two girls just felt so petty and frustrating.
And then we have the mysterious Zeppelin Reid. He didn't feel like anything special to me and I didn't feel that spark that he should have had with Jerzie. So, personally, the romance felt flat and forced, and happened way too fast.
Now, for the next point, I'm definitely going to give Davis a pass, but it really irked me the whole time I was reading the book. There was so much, and I mean SO MUCH, telling instead of showing. I could see that most of the time, we were supposed to be following Jerzie's stream of consciousness, but I just needed more of the showing part. I wanted to feel how Jerzie felt when she would listen to the music in Jerzie Jhames, because it was established that that was her favourite part of the entire musical. I wanted to see New York and Broadway through her fresh eyes. I needed more of the bustling city or click-clacking of their DeLuca shoes on the stage, and her awe in actually being in a Broadway show, but we never got any of that.
This one is gonna be a tough one to articulate. I enjoyed maybe about 30% of the book? Okay, so here's the thing, I think I might be outgrowing the YA contemporary genre, because all the drama just frustrates me to no end! I also did not like that we have a book that is trying to uplift #OwnVoices peoples by putting Jerzie Jhames into the spotlight and making her this talented Broadway prodigy (with the help of years of training), but then the second we put another girl in that same situation, they have to be enemies. I know, I know, we needed an "antagonist" that would make it harder for Jerzie to get the guy of he dreams. But, really, the drama between the two girls just felt so petty and frustrating.
And then we have the mysterious Zeppelin Reid. He didn't feel like anything special to me and I didn't feel that spark that he should have had with Jerzie. So, personally, the romance felt flat and forced, and happened way too fast.
Now, for the next point, I'm definitely going to give Davis a pass, but it really irked me the whole time I was reading the book. There was so much, and I mean SO MUCH, telling instead of showing. I could see that most of the time, we were supposed to be following Jerzie's stream of consciousness, but I just needed more of the showing part. I wanted to feel how Jerzie felt when she would listen to the music in Jerzie Jhames, because it was established that that was her favourite part of the entire musical. I wanted to see New York and Broadway through her fresh eyes. I needed more of the bustling city or click-clacking of their DeLuca shoes on the stage, and her awe in actually being in a Broadway show, but we never got any of that.