By Marlow Tracy
After reading Anna and the French Kiss and being absolutely
blown away, I just had to pick up the sequel, Lola and the Boy Next Door by
Stephanie Perkins. Although my impressions of romance books were changed for
the better by Anna and the French Kiss, I didn’t know if I would be able to say
the same about its sequel. Luckily, it turned out to be just as much of a page
turner as the first one, and I may or may not have stayed up until midnight
finishing it the same day I picked it up.
The book follows the story of Lola, a 17-year-old costume
fanatic with a 22-year-old boyfriend named Max that her dads do not approve of,
a detective-loving best friend named Lindsey, and a mysterious history with the
Bell twins living next door. Lola navigates through family troubles, guy
troubles, costume troubles, friend troubles, and more on a
coming-of-age/slice-of-life journey. Although the plot line is seemingly
simple, the amount of detail Perkins puts into it makes every page
entertaining. I also liked how she included characters from her previous book
without having them take a central role, providing just enough to show that the
story takes place in the same universe, as well as creating a sort of epilogue
for Anna and St. Clair.
The only (tiny) issue I had with the book was that sometimes
the characters were a bit too labeled in their styles and behaviors. Everyone
seemed to have one or two quirks that defined their personality: Lola wore
costumes, Lindsey liked detectives and wore red chucks, Cricket wore cool pants
and tinkered, Max led a band and had tattoos, Andy baked pies. Although I
appreciated the attention to detail, it seemed a bit unrealistic compared to
real life. Sure, everyone has their quirks, but they aren’t defined by them. If
not for the detail paid to each character’s reactions and dialogue, it would
seem like the author just pinned a couple points of interest onto flat
character models and called it a day. Despite not pertaining to real life,
however, the characters still had more development than one would expect to
find in a romance-type novel and made for an interesting (if not incredibly
lifelike) read.
Perkins’ extraordinary sense of detail paints a picture with
every line. Her vivid description, quirky (in a good way) characters, and witty
dialogue work together to make the book a captivating and entertaining read
that I would recommend to anyone who liked Anna and the French Kiss, likes
romance, doesn’t like romance, or just wants a good book to read. 10/10
couldn’t put it down.
**on a side note, I probably won’t be reading Isla and the
Happily Ever After (the third book in the trilogy) because it got pretty bad
reviews and the preview seemed terrible (unless anyone has read it and can state otherwise?).
It's always good to hear when a sequel actually lives up to the first book. It's hardly ever the case, which is extremely disappointing. I have yet to read either of these books, but I think I might check them out as I'm slowly running out of book recommendations. I really liked this review, the words worked really well together and the sentences made sense to read. Even though you ended up giving it a 10/10, I still appreciate that you mentioned its flaws. No book is perfect, and it's always good to know the less amazing parts of a book when you go into it with the assumption that it's perfect. Anyways, I really liked reading this review and I think I might go check these books out, though I'm not normally drawn to romance. :)
ReplyDeleteHaving read this novel and the previous novel in the series, I would say you perfectly captured the contents of Lola And The Boy Next Door. Although at the time I did not realize the character flaw (each character being assigned a specific role), looking back I can think of at least a few instances in which Stephanie Perkins remained rigid when creating her characters. Pertaining to your last sentence, I would advise against reading Isla and the Happily Ever After, as I did not particularly enjoy the unnecessarily complicated plot and quite frankly annoying characters.
ReplyDeleteA lot of the times with sequels you often hear that the first books are better and there is no point in reading the sequel at all. I have read this book before and I totally agree with you, this is a sequel worth reading. I like the way you carefully and clearly describe the book. I do agree with you when you take about how the characters only have a few quirks to define them making it a little unrealistic. Nice job! - Also to answer your question Isla and the Happily Ever After can get kind of confusing because it has a complicated plot and lots of things going on at once so, I did not particularly enjoy it.
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