Total: I'm thinking about giving these up. I've heard from quite a few blogs that they think rating systems are shallow. Frankly, I disagree. The OCD in me loves organization and all a numbered rating does is give a clean cut response. What do you think? Lose the "x stars"?
Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before by: David Yoo
Say what you want about this book, and I've read several scathing reviews, but I've definitely never heard this one before. It starts off as a fluffy, geek-boy-meets-popular-girl and subsequently, they fall in love story. Albert meets gorgeous Mia whilst working at the Bern Inn over the summer. Of course, the story doesn't end there. When Albert goes back to school in September, he struggles with the identity he's cemented and the identity Mia has.
Oh, and there's the little issue of Mia's ex-boyfriend developing cancer.
Throughout all this, Yoo's quirky voice remains true to the outsider teenager. Occasionally, the nineties references got a little tiresome, it almost felt like it was targeted to an adult audience but the ratable high school scenarios brought it back down to Earth.
Besides that, I found little faults in Stop Me.
It was interesting to hear about Albert's unique way of dealing with Mia's ex-boyfriend's illness. Rather than become comforting or distant or start abusing drugs, Albert remains exactly the same. Tongue-in-cheek comments and all.
I'd recommend this to someone who's tired of the typical cancer stories.
4 comments:
i prefer if book bloggers have a rating because it is a true indication of how much they liked the book. words can be misleading but those numbers give a clear picture. and great review. thanks for being honest (:
This one definitely sounds good. And what an interesting cover!
I think rating systems are great. I'm able to see how much you liked the book overall.
I have a hard time giving ratings. I just look at my list of 5-star books, and while I absolutely LOVED them all, you can hardly compare them to each other and it seems odd that a life-changing masterpiece gets the same rating as a really well-written and engrossing historical romance. I like the reason behind the rating more than the rating.
I am more interested in hearing "I liked/loved this book because _____" or "I didn't like this book because _____". Not everyone has the same taste in books. If the reason you liked/didn't like the book is something that sounds similar to my taste in books, then I probably won't pick it up. But if it's not something that would bug me, then I WILL try to read it (if it still sounds interesting).
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