theconorhilton's review against another edition
3.0
A classic love story dressed up with delightful insights into some of the quirks of BYU & Mormon dating. The relationship and interactions between Dave and Curses felt real and like a great reflection of interactions I had with friends. It took me awhile to really get into this book, but there's some witty humor and delightful details--the sections of text from Dave's journal, friend book, excerpts from the play, etc etc are wonderful and I would have loved to see more of them or at least to see them more fully integrated into the novel. Dave felt frustratingly clueless about the connection he shared with Ref (though in thinking on it & seeing another review refer to his libido-less quality, it'd be interesting to read Dave as ace and that could have been fruitful ground for exploration, but I digress) and it was inevitable from fairly early on that Dave and Ref were going to end up together, which is somewhat a feature of the genre (or at least one of the sub-genres) at work here, but not what I was expecting, which threw me off.
Anyway, an interesting experiment and some fun BYU commentary, fully realized characters, & great witty asides and details hiding in plain sight. Also, I'm really glad for the commentary on some of the more insidious iterations of BYU's dating culture.
Anyway, an interesting experiment and some fun BYU commentary, fully realized characters, & great witty asides and details hiding in plain sight. Also, I'm really glad for the commentary on some of the more insidious iterations of BYU's dating culture.
lightmillspy's review
2.0
Let me just start off by saying that I feel bad giving this book only two stars. I recently received this book on a goodread's First Reads giveaway and was very excited to read it. I didn't enjoy reading it that much however for several reasons, mainly because I didn't feel related to the plot. I have to feel somehow involved emotionally with a plot to read the book, and I have to say I couldn't feel that involved with the book, for reasons completely my own. However, this book reminded me a lot in its style of Will Grayson, Will Grayson, which I didn't enjoy either. So please don't take this review too seriously if you're considering buying it. You might enjoy it a lot. Will Grayson, Will Grayson was a great book for many people, I just couldn't enjoy it, and I feel like with this book, it might also be something I can't get into. It definitely seems like a lively, funny read especially for a young readership that many people may enjoy. Also a very quick read.
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