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01 // All-American Girl
The first book of my restarted 47 books challenge. And since reading had been difficult for me for months on end, I decided to start with an easy read, to get back into it and to get my first book down in a couple of days. So I started with a Meg Cabot/Jenny Caroll.
I used to really like her books. “The Mediator” series were awesome. I loved the main character. Feisty, sarcastic, cool. The “1-800-where-r-u” series were fun too, but the main character reminded me a lot of “Mediator”’s Susannah. It was frowned upon. But with All American Girl I felt she was just repeating herself again and it got boring and actually quite irritating. Again a sarcastic, pop-culture referencing rebelling smart and really arrogant boy-awkward teen. Boring. I felt myself thinking, Meg Cabot or whatever your name is, grow up. In that aspect, I’m telling you to pick one of the books or series she’s written (I’d suggest “Mediator”), stick with that and avoid repetition and boredom by avoiding all her other work. The read itself wasn’t bad. I was concerned about the apparent patriotism but that ended up not being as insane. The book’s plotline was okay; a 15 year old stubborn sarcastic girl is at the wrong place at the wrong time (or right place right time, whatever floats your hoovercraft) and happens to save the president of the USA. She becomes a hero and her life changes. Etcetera. I didn’t mind the plot there. Definite fantasy aspect, definite escape from the real world, where 15 year olds care more about their hair and boys than someone else’s life. Mission accomplished; I was distracted from my own life. The rest of the girl’s thoughts – the endless pagefilling whining about being in love with her sister’s oh-so-hot boyfriend when it’s obvious to us and probably to herself as well that this isn’t the case (which only proves that while the girl tries to be rebelious she is just another shallow girl) was bo-ring. Of course when you read this you know she’ll end up with the president’s son. Which in itself was a nice addition to the story but how often have we heard about romantic stories where a plain girl/boy falls in love with the president’s spawn? Too often. Nothing original there. If Meg Cabot would stop writing the same in different words as much, the book would be twice as thin. Because the character kept. Repeating. Herself. It. Was. Insanely. Dull. But I knew what I was getting myself into. I wanted an easy read, a quick read, and I got it. But this will be one of the last times I read teenie novels. I’ve outgrown them, literally - they’re no longer my taste and I’d rather read a difficult novel in 30 days then this shallow sort of material in 6 days. Buh bye. |