Hello hello! We’ve crossed the halfway point in the Summer Book Club :(, I’m partially sad that summer is ending and partially sad that I didn’t have more time to read. I ended up completely powering through this book, I could not stop listening to it as soon as I started reading. It took me three days to get through the book. I would legitimately listen to this book any chance I could.
FIRST IMPRESSION OF TO ALL THE BOYS I’VE LOVED BEFORE: *sigh* I was not that composed, collected or remotely self aware in high school
Scroll down for my review and thoughts!
| Previous: Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan Rating: 9/10 Readability: 10/10 Would I recommend: Yes! Read my full review: https://hungryandwelldressed.com/summer-book-club-sex-and-vanity/ | Up Next: August 20th: P.S. I Still Love You by Jenny Han Length: 337 Pages Audible Amazon |
**** SPOILER ALERTS AHEAD ****
https://hungryandwelldressed.com/summer-book-club-sex-and-vanity/
To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han
| Rating: 8/10 | Readability: 9/10 | Would Recommend: Yes! |
I loved this book, it’s such an ideal of the high school experience where the main character ACTUALLY HAS A DECENT HEAD ON HER SHOULDERS. While her navigation of social situations is very mature for a high schooler (I know mature high schoolers exist, just my awkward self could never). How she handles the Gen mean girl situations are inspired and done with quite a bit of grace.
Ok, so the whole premise of the book is um.. well not so nice to be fair. It’s written really sweetly and Lara Jean is such a wholesome teenager BUT Peter and Lara Jean date to a) try to make Gen jealous (really mean) and b) make Josh think that Lara Jean isn’t into him (not mean, but she should have just had the conversation with Josh and told Margo what was happening). It was really mean spirited (even if slightly unintentionally) to date her former friends boyfriend (even though they aren’t friends at the time) knowing that it will hurt her and hurting her is kinda the whole point. Not nice. But it’s overall really feel good and it’s less about Lara Jean hurting Gen and more about her falling in love with Peter and discovering herself so I won’t digress on the concept being mean any longer.
I also really loved the fact that I got really really into the characters and the storyline, something about how it’s written and how Lara Jean’s life is portrayed that’s really got me. I’m not quite sure, but the best I can describe it as is when you have a TV show that you love and binge all the available seasons, watch any movie spinoffs and read any book source material (if available) just so you can spend a little bit longer in that universe. Call me weird, but I am after all a book nerd, and always have been.
Lara Jean and her sisters being half Korean, added another layer to the story for me personally. Like you guys know with Sex and Vanity, where the main character was also mixed (though Lucy was half British- America half Chinese-America, which is pretty close my my mix) ALOT of the added in experiences of them going through life as multi-racial really resonates with me. In this book, when Lara Jean stuck to Asian characters for Halloween so she didn’t get asked if she was a mange character was something that I’ve never personally experienced but could very easily see how someone who was more Asian passing would.
I can’t wait to keep reading through the trilogy… as soon as I finish this post I will be starting the second book so I can find out what happens… ok so I kinda know what happens because I’ve seen the first two movies on Netflix (and anxiously waiting for the third!!) but in the books there is so much more detail and the movies aren’t exactly verbatim so I’m counting it as different enough.
xoxo S
To Come:
Always and Forever, Lara Jean
