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cgreens 's review for:
Why We Broke Up
by Daniel Handler
This book was disappointing.
It was okay, but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. Maybe a high school girl going over a breakup.
Like others, I felt that the “quirky” tone was more obnoxious than impressive and detracted much more from the story than it added. Sorry, but Handler didn’t pull off Min’s heartbroken voice whatsoever. Instead, the story became annoying to read in parts, the plot was confusing, and the characters were poorly developed.
I understand the idea behind not offering physical descriptions of anyone, except Min being not-blond and Ed being oh-so-handsome. That’s fine. I also understand making Min an everygirl, one who doesn’t have any hobbies besides drinking coffee. It’s easy for the target reader to impose herself onto Min and pretend that SHE’S dating the co-captain of the basketball team, and SHE is the envy of all the popular and unpopular girls alike, as well as the talk of the school. The only problem with this is . . . I never felt bad for Min. It was obvious that this was just a short-lived high school romance, and Min came out of it with her family, friends that immediately took her back even after she ditched them, and a new love interest intact. Min simply isn’t that interesting or likeable—she seems self-centered and dramatic, especially because I’m not at all interested in her one defining feature: an interest in old movies, all of which Handler made up.
I got sick of this book the same way I got sick of the Series of Unfortunate Events when I was younger: the schtick got old, fast. I’m not that interested in films, and I’m especially not interested in made-up films, which seemed like a cop-out excuse for Handler not to put any more thought or research into this book than he absolutely needed to.
Ed wasn’t a well-developed character, which didn’t add up because he was supposedly rendered by someone who’s in love with him. His character was too much of a bumbling oaf for it to be believable that Min enjoyed spending quality time with him.
There are so many ways this book could have been better: The relationship should have lasted longer, with the notable events more spread out. While the relationship is believable, their declaration of love isn’t. The characters should have been better fleshed-out, with unique voices and interesting personality features (not just jock + film buff = unlikely romance). The film stuff just wasn’t interesting, but I understand that it was crucial to the plot. I would have been more impressed if Handler referenced REAL films less often, and the writing style shouldn’t have been as ambitious, because Handler can’t pull it off well. As for the illustrations, I read this on a Kindle, so maybe I didn’t get the full force of them. I agree with another reviewer who mentioned that the illustrations didn’t match the tone of a heartbroken girl and were too cartoony for the story. I didn’t need a big surprise ending, but the end was almost ludicrously predictable, and I think it would have benefitted from a little more of an internal change in Min through the process of writing her story. Overall, this story came off as more fluff and poorly executed writing tricks than substance or even enjoyment.
It was okay, but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. Maybe a high school girl going over a breakup.
Like others, I felt that the “quirky” tone was more obnoxious than impressive and detracted much more from the story than it added. Sorry, but Handler didn’t pull off Min’s heartbroken voice whatsoever. Instead, the story became annoying to read in parts, the plot was confusing, and the characters were poorly developed.
I understand the idea behind not offering physical descriptions of anyone, except Min being not-blond and Ed being oh-so-handsome. That’s fine. I also understand making Min an everygirl, one who doesn’t have any hobbies besides drinking coffee. It’s easy for the target reader to impose herself onto Min and pretend that SHE’S dating the co-captain of the basketball team, and SHE is the envy of all the popular and unpopular girls alike, as well as the talk of the school. The only problem with this is . . . I never felt bad for Min. It was obvious that this was just a short-lived high school romance, and Min came out of it with her family, friends that immediately took her back even after she ditched them, and a new love interest intact. Min simply isn’t that interesting or likeable—she seems self-centered and dramatic, especially because I’m not at all interested in her one defining feature: an interest in old movies, all of which Handler made up.
I got sick of this book the same way I got sick of the Series of Unfortunate Events when I was younger: the schtick got old, fast. I’m not that interested in films, and I’m especially not interested in made-up films, which seemed like a cop-out excuse for Handler not to put any more thought or research into this book than he absolutely needed to.
Ed wasn’t a well-developed character, which didn’t add up because he was supposedly rendered by someone who’s in love with him. His character was too much of a bumbling oaf for it to be believable that Min enjoyed spending quality time with him.
There are so many ways this book could have been better: The relationship should have lasted longer, with the notable events more spread out. While the relationship is believable, their declaration of love isn’t. The characters should have been better fleshed-out, with unique voices and interesting personality features (not just jock + film buff = unlikely romance). The film stuff just wasn’t interesting, but I understand that it was crucial to the plot. I would have been more impressed if Handler referenced REAL films less often, and the writing style shouldn’t have been as ambitious, because Handler can’t pull it off well. As for the illustrations, I read this on a Kindle, so maybe I didn’t get the full force of them. I agree with another reviewer who mentioned that the illustrations didn’t match the tone of a heartbroken girl and were too cartoony for the story. I didn’t need a big surprise ending, but the end was almost ludicrously predictable, and I think it would have benefitted from a little more of an internal change in Min through the process of writing her story. Overall, this story came off as more fluff and poorly executed writing tricks than substance or even enjoyment.