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A review by brokenrecord
Tell Me Three Things by Julie Buxbaum
4.0
3.5 stars. I didn’t hate this, but I did want to like it more than I did. I liked the romance!
The family stuff could’ve been a little better? I feel like more time needed to be spent on it, because her dad marrying someone he basically just met right after her mother died and moving them across the country and upending Jessie’s entire life is pretty huge, and I don’t think the book did a good enough job showing where he was coming from or making him sympathetic. I almost wish he and his new wife had broken up at the end just because it would’ve felt more realistic in a way? I also could’ve done with more of Theo and Jessie’s relationship because I thought them becoming friends was great, but there wasn’t very much of that. Also, there were a lot of obnoxious stereotypes about CA at the beginning. I mean, first off, CA’s actually one of the most diverse states in the nation, so no, not EVERYONE in CA is blonde. And secondly, it’s ridiculous for her to remark with surprise on seeing a woman with wrinkles for the first time — there are over 1 million women in LA alone, so no, NOT ALL OF THEM (or even most of them! Or even close to most of them!) HAVE HAD PLASTIC SURGERY. I’m probably just slightly overly defensive of LA because I’m from southern CA, but I find those kind of stereotypes lazy. Anyways, despite my complaints, there was a lot I liked about this, and most of my complaints are fairly minor, so I’m not sure why I didn’t end up enjoying this more overall. It was decent enough, though!
Spoiler
It felt fairly obvious who SN was from the start — basically as soon as Ethan asked to be Jessie’s partner, I was like “So he’s the dude, right?” It wasn’t a huge drawback, but I would’ve liked it to be a little less obvious so early on? But they were cute! I LOVED the scene where he comes to reveal he’s SN and Liam shows up first to ask her out and he’s like OH SHIT SHE’S GOING TO THINK LIAM’S SN but then texts to let her know it’s him and she’s THRILLED it’s him and not Liam. Their last three things to each other were also really cute.The family stuff could’ve been a little better? I feel like more time needed to be spent on it, because her dad marrying someone he basically just met right after her mother died and moving them across the country and upending Jessie’s entire life is pretty huge, and I don’t think the book did a good enough job showing where he was coming from or making him sympathetic. I almost wish he and his new wife had broken up at the end just because it would’ve felt more realistic in a way? I also could’ve done with more of Theo and Jessie’s relationship because I thought them becoming friends was great, but there wasn’t very much of that. Also, there were a lot of obnoxious stereotypes about CA at the beginning. I mean, first off, CA’s actually one of the most diverse states in the nation, so no, not EVERYONE in CA is blonde. And secondly, it’s ridiculous for her to remark with surprise on seeing a woman with wrinkles for the first time — there are over 1 million women in LA alone, so no, NOT ALL OF THEM (or even most of them! Or even close to most of them!) HAVE HAD PLASTIC SURGERY. I’m probably just slightly overly defensive of LA because I’m from southern CA, but I find those kind of stereotypes lazy. Anyways, despite my complaints, there was a lot I liked about this, and most of my complaints are fairly minor, so I’m not sure why I didn’t end up enjoying this more overall. It was decent enough, though!