A review by rachelrreads
Cobble Hill by Cecily von Ziegesar

2.0

This read like Cecily von Ziegesar doing a poor imitation of Emma Straub. Much like Straub's novel Modern Lovers, von Ziegesar focuses Cobble Hill on a number of eccentric and incredibly privileged residents of Brooklyn's Cobble Hill neighborhood. Cobble Hill was rather light on plot and slow paced. The characters were mired with privilege comingled with weird personality traits, which on the whole made them rather unlikable. While the vibe was certainly different from von Ziegesar's famous Gossip Girl series, there were also some striking similarities in the insanely privileged and oftentimes ridiculous behavior of the book's characters. But when it comes to this kind of novel about privileged New Yorkers in which it's more about ambience and character study than it is about narrative, I still contend that other authors - like Emma Straub, for example - do it better.