I’m a couple of days early with this post, so I’ve only got three books down this month! I am however in the middle of two, both of which may make an appearance in next month’s post. But for now take a gander at the books I blitzed through in April.
Why We Broke Up? | Daniel Handler
The clue of what this book is about is in the title, told through the eyes of Min Green, this is story of how and why she broke up with Ed Slaterton. Min details their relationship from start to messy finish in letters to Ed that she’s putting in a box along with trinkets and ‘souveniers’ from their time together. Such items include a movie ticket, a box of matches, books, and a pair of ‘ugly’ earrings, and each item has a story to go with it.
The story itself is slow, Min – writing in the present tense throughout the novel – is emotional and sometimes those emotions come out as her words spilling out all over the page. Ed is also a hardly likeable character to me. He’s co-captain of the football team, a notorious ‘player’ and actually quite rude. It’s hard to see what Min even saw in him and by the end of the book she’s left thinking that too. On one hand I understand that this is a story of young love and how fast it can escalate and drop in a heartbeat, but I just couldn’t feel a thing for these characters in the end.
The one thing I did love about the book were the illustrations by Maira Kalman. You are shown each item before you’re told the story, so you’re left wondering what it’s significance is in the plot. The illustrations themselves are beautifully done, and made me wish I bought the actual book instead of the Kindle copy!
If you’ve read any of these let me know what you think! And don’t forget to follow Blogger’s Bookshelf to see mine and the team’s reviews!
R.xoxo