A review by leigh_reidelberger
Made You Up by Francesca Zappia
3.0
Alright.
I picked up "Made You Up" from a Goodreads Deal of the Day. the summary sounded interesting.
I read some reviews, many glowing, many damning.
here's what I'll say- Made You Up is a pretty cookie cutter YA formula. it's like Zappia had these columns of predictability that she chose from to build the story.
Mental illness? check.
Dark, mysterious love interest? check.
Misunderstood protagonist? check.
the list goes on and on.
So, she builds this story with all the common ingredients. it was easy from the get go to see what was going to happen. one particularly glaring disappointment was the "mystery" the author tried to create between the principal, Celia, and her mother. if that didn't scream obvious, I don't know what would.
the Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys side theme with Alex, Miles, Tucker, etc, was poorly thought out. it was kind of a shell.
The schizophrenia storyline... honestly, while I'm not an expert in the field, it did kind of feel like the author read a couple psychology books and picked out the aspects she liked the most and inserted those into Alex. I can see why that would upset people. it's not the greatest portrayal of schizophrenia.
I didn't hate this book, but I'm definitely whatever about it. I'm sure it's a big hit with its target audience - YA.
I picked up "Made You Up" from a Goodreads Deal of the Day. the summary sounded interesting.
I read some reviews, many glowing, many damning.
here's what I'll say- Made You Up is a pretty cookie cutter YA formula. it's like Zappia had these columns of predictability that she chose from to build the story.
Mental illness? check.
Dark, mysterious love interest? check.
Misunderstood protagonist? check.
the list goes on and on.
So, she builds this story with all the common ingredients. it was easy from the get go to see what was going to happen. one particularly glaring disappointment was the "mystery" the author tried to create between the principal, Celia, and her mother. if that didn't scream obvious, I don't know what would.
the Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys side theme with Alex, Miles, Tucker, etc, was poorly thought out. it was kind of a shell.
The schizophrenia storyline... honestly, while I'm not an expert in the field, it did kind of feel like the author read a couple psychology books and picked out the aspects she liked the most and inserted those into Alex. I can see why that would upset people. it's not the greatest portrayal of schizophrenia.
I didn't hate this book, but I'm definitely whatever about it. I'm sure it's a big hit with its target audience - YA.