Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass by Meg Medina

Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass by Meg Medina

2 out of 5 Stars

Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass Review

Yaqui Delgado Wants To Kick Your Ass is about a young teen named Piddy Sanchez who finds herself in an uncommon and oppressing situation, where she is, unfortunately, the prey of a notorious bully. The story envelopes over her experiences at her new school, which are incredibly distraught: a girl who Piddy hardly even knows is on to her, her grades are dropping as she worries about her bully and her unknown father, her mother won't understand who she is, and the world just seems to be highly against her at any given moment. This book is about the effects of bullying on a young girl’s life, and the turns taken to prevent it, combat it, and in the end, overcome it (or in this case run away from it, kinda).

In contrast to a plentiful of reviews, Yaqui Delgado Wants To Kick Your Ass is not as daring and brave as it's title suggests. It's an eye catching title, yes. But it's story falls flat and isn't able to regain its full potential throughout the story-line. The story doesn't take chances, the audience is being treated to the same old-same old plot (this time with a mostly Latino/a cast). The outcome of the story seems flimsy and lazy, the main character is a bore, and an unintended juvenile glare is felt throughout the entirety of the story, even amongst the adults. Piddy’s voice is not strong; relating to her at times was a struggle.

The story fell rock bottom when an entirely unnecessary ‘romance’ (I don’t even know if it was worthy enough of being called a ‘romance’ due to its insufficiency, lack of reason, and complete bore). In all honesty, the book could have gone without all the kissy-kissy lovey-dovey nonsense between Joey and Piddy. It was so surprising when they kissed because it seemed as if the whole thing came out of nowhere.
If Piddy was trying to confide in a boy due to her undesirable circumstances for comfort and reassurance, that could have been elucidated better in order to fit the story. Romance isn’t bad. In fact, it’s one of the hardest stunts to pull off well in literature, film, and music. Romance in these three mediums should have the ability to communicate with itself and with the audience. We’ve all heard someone say that ‘for love to work there needs to be communication’, there is a reason for that you know. The potential for romance is always there, it is the way in which it is commonly used (especially in YA) that often creates a problem. After all, what is a story without any love? (And just in case anyone forgot, friendship is love too, by the way.)
Getting back to the book here; the romance wasn’t played off badly because it was meaningless, it was played off badly because it was dumb.

You’d think because the book if named after a specific character in the book, that the character would actually be a little significant. Well, Yaqui Delgado Wants To Kick Your Ass definitely doesn’t check that box. This is another great downfall of the book; it’s a little sad that we didn’t get to know about the bully at all. It was just that ‘the good person is good’ and ‘the bad person is bad’ and that’s all the audience gets. And the fact that Yaqui lives in the ghetto isn’t an explanation as to why she is mean and vicious. It’s just another stereotype that suggests that people are the outcome of their environments. The audience got to know absolutely nothing about Yaqui except for where she lived. The only times she talked were to defend herself, the only times she was included in the story at all was when she was being a relentless beast… It’s all too biased. The book didn’t cross boundaries, it played very strictly by the rules. The ending was absolutely pathetic. Everything ended up working out for Piddy, she made up with her best friend, her mother is loosening up, she got to know the truth about her father, she moved schools (I think I was most irritated by this. There was no standoff. I don’t even think Yaqui and Piddy even exchanged words in the whole book! Yaqui just moved schools. That’s it), Piddy got into the school she wanted to get into; her life was practically brought back together.

I was so excited to read this story (it was on my ‘I really want’ list). Although, as you can probably tell from my review, I was left greatly disappointed. It has a cool title, unfortunately, the story doesn’t manage to match.

Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher

Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher

2 out of 5 stars

Ketchup Clouds Review

This story just isn't strong enough in emotion, depth, and lacks greatly in the execution of the plot or writing.

The concept was good enough to be in this book's initial favour at least, and I would have imagined that Pitcher wouldn't even have the slightest of problems formulating a well written and enjoyable story. Sadly, this wasn't the case, the story felt thin, the characters felt trodden on and suffocated, not being allowed to properly breathe or express their full intentions and traits. The character development was absolutely nonexistent, and it was rather obvious that it seemed forced at some parts of the story. Especially in the end where the story just collapses on itself entirely.
You'd think a story about a girl who writes to a death row inmate about the murder that she herself just so happened to commit, and telling the story in recollections and in present day times would be at least somewhat enjoyable, but really it was not.

What I think annoyed me the most was the COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY ROMANCE between Aaron and Zoe, who was also in likes with Aaron's brother, Max.
See how convulvated and disappointing that sounds?

Here we have a story about a teenage murderer who cannot come to terms with the present day because of what she had done, but then we find out later that her murder was obviously because of a LOVE TRIANGLE!
A FRICKIN' LOVE TRIANGLE!?!
Pitcher could have gone for anything but a stupid love triangle between a girl and two brothers. This book could have been much more mysterious, thriller-like, suspenseful, breathtakingly and exceedingly powerful in the meaning of morality, life, and murder.
Oh but who needs all those things when we could have a completely instalove-initiated love triangle between a useless main character and a pair of useless and forgettable siblings.

But nothing beats love right?
**eyes roll out of sockets**

I guess I just had such high expectations after the unconditional love I share for My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece, which I swear to God makes this book look like utter trash.

I have lowered my rating because the book was not the most enjoyable of rides. But I do hope that Silence is Goldfish (Pitcher's other novel) is as good as My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece which is still one of my favorite all time reads.

25 Love Poems for the NSA by Iain S. Thomas

25 Love Poems for the NSA

2 out of 5 Stars

What do you get when you mix a great concept plus a handful of awful execution?

This book.

Twenty-five Love Poems for the NSA has been on my list for so long; only special books get put on my birthday-wishes list, but this was a grave disappointment. Nearly as disappointing as Yaqui Delgado Wants To Kick Your Ass.

Here is a sample from the book, that not only caught my attention but made the whole thing seem rebellious, which I am shamelessly into when it comes to literature:

Warning: Every poem in this book has one or more words in it that have been taken from the NSA’s watch list. A full list of the words appears at the back of this book. By transmitting this book via email or other means, you are liable to be tracked by the NSA as a potential terrorist threat. This book is dedicated to how ridiculous that is.

Who wouldn't be into that?! It creates a great sense of suspense and danger, as if the readers are just as rebellious as the author. There is an imminent connection made within the contents of the first page between the reader and the author, a connection that falls flat and completely disappears as the book goes on.

My main problem with this book is that it kind of hyped itself. This isn't always a bad thing, and sometimes the book ends up living to or even exceeding that hype. Unfortunately, Twenty-five Love Poems For The NSA struggles immensely to live up to the high bar it set for itself.

It's a great concept. The premise is golden. The author wants to tell his audience how ridiculous the NSA is for making a connection between certain words and potential terrorists. However, the execution of this concept is horrible. The poems don't stick with you, there is hardly any insight, and the whole thing just seems like a sham of a show. Just because you have a great premise doesn't mean people are going to like your book.

It seems as if hardly any thought or care got out into any of these poem. It's like the author had a page filled with all the ‘banned’ words per say, and just filled in the blanks.

Although the concept might make you think that there author had something important to say, it seems as if he doesn't. The poems were not thoughtful; I was just so disappointed. I was so excited for this book to be risky and fresh, but it just ended up feeling like a big ‘meh’.

Great concept. Poor Execution.

One Man Guy by Michael Barakiva

One Man Guy by Michael Barakiva

1.5 out of 5 stars

Another boring and disappointing novel…

I'm new to LGBT+ literature. I mean, I come from a country that doesn't really ‘promote’ this side of literature. I never noticed before I came to America that there were no exclusively M/M romance novels, lesbian literature, or anything of that sort on shelves where I came from.

But holey moley was I surprised by how good these books could be!! Openly Straight, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, and just recently, How to Repair a Mechanical Heart, literally blew me away with their greatness and their poise. These books aren't only captivating, but they are single handedly making up for all those years when gay literature was frowned upon and shunned.

So this why I HATE reading bad YA LGBT novels.

Whenever I do it just feels like the world is going to combust, and explode into the vast multiverse of nothingness. I'm not even exaggerating here. When you love a genre so much, it gets terrifyingly unsettling to read a huge miss where there is usually so much greatness.

2 stars.

I didn't hate this as much as I hated The Great American Whatever, but this book is such a waste. There is so much potential here, the foundation for this is strong and fertile. The story is just a big flop.

Alek is from a very strict and traditional Armenian family. High expectations are set by his parents, and by his older brother who just seems to be smarter and better than Alek in a lot of ways. So it's no surprise that his parents force him to attend summer school in order to get back on the honor roll. This also means that he would be missing the trip his family is planning to make, however he reluctantly agrees.

In summer school, Alek meets a bad-boy, skater dude, slacker kind of type named Ethan (Which totally isn't a cliché, **massive eyeroll**). Alek and Ethan quickly get in on, with Alek realizing he's gay along the way. They skip summer school to go on trips to New York, Alek gets a makeover, he gets into fights with his best friend Becky, blah blah blah boring boring, they fall in love. yippee.

Okay, that isn't really the full story, but saying more will mean giving away spoilers. And I'm kind of getting tired writing about how awful this was. The big conflict is totally expected, you can probably see it coming the moment Alek’s family goes on a trip, if you haven't already thrown the book into an oncoming truck or something.

WHY I DIDN'T LIKE THIS BOOK:

1) Alek's family were crazy dimwits: I swear to God, it's almost like being completely unreasonable and unnecessarily prejudicial is genetic in Alek’s family or something. His mom also keeps on saying: “These Americans” in a spiteful and ugly way. Which would actually be understandable if SHE WEREN’T AMERICAN!!! She's a second generation immigrant who was born in the States, yet she acts like she isn't even in the slightest bit aware of American culture. She doesn't even have a stated reason to be so spiteful towards the U.S, she just is. It's a trope that writers use all the time. They also completely abandon a family after learning that their Turkish, which probably registers on the scale of insanity as completely and utterly illogical.


2) The romance is a sham: It is such a boring love story. Just because two people come from ‘different worlds’ and have completely different ‘backgrounds’ doesn't mean that the romance is going to sizzle and pop as a result.


3) The plot was so obvious and plain: There is such an avid structure used in this book. And the book is completely boring. If this wasn't me while reading this book, I don't know what is:

WHY I LIKED THIS BOOK MORE REASONS WHY I DIDN'T LIKE THIS BOOK:

1) It's unnecessary: You'd think that a book about an Armenian boy coming to terms with who is and falling in love with his complete opposite would raise some questions, provide social commentary, and maybe even strike an essential conversation. But no. If there is a book that knows how to disappoint, it's this one. The same parents who literally left their friends abandoned during their holiday because they find out that they were are Turkish are the same people who absolutely do not mind their son being gay… Did I mention that this book is dumb? Because it is.


2) This book is dumb and actively mediocre: This book doesn't even try to be different. It's so ‘meh’, it's sickening.

3) These boys kiss like twice, or like once. I wasn't counting. Oh, and the one time they do kiss, they get interrupted by the whole family!!

Not recommended.

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood Review

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood

4 out of 5 stars

I'd like to thank Netgalley and the publishers down at Thomas Dunne books for giving me the opportunity to read an advanced readers copy of this book in exchange for an honest and original review.

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things Review

“...if you knew the constellations you would never get lost. You could always find your way home.”

Wavy, an emotionally abused and lonely eight year old girl finds love and home in the most unusual place, or rather, the most unusual person: an enormous twenty-six year old motorcycle rider who also, subsequently, finds home and love in her. 

Above all else, this is a tale about true and everlasting love, the kind that lingers after a first kiss, or impatiently jumps within the depths of your soul, the one that refuses to even think about going away… even after all this years…

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things does raise questions about what ’kind’ of love is real, what ’kind’ of love should and should not be allowed, and who gets to ’allow’certain kinds of love?

Can another human being tell you what you're feeling is or isn't love?

Do we feel love, the sudden dopamine rush, the electric feeling that runs down our skin, the sparkle that turns on in our eyes, in different ways?

And why is love, the one emotion that should equate to the feeling of freedom, often restricted?

Why are we afraid to just love each other?

What is holding us back?

Our past.

As humans we are doomed from birth to dwell in the norm, but some of us dedicate our lives to trying to make sense of the unusual, the weird, and the different.

And yes, sometimes the unusual can be dangerous, sometimes the weird can be irksome, and the different can be… wrong.
But we are so afraid of these outcomes that some of us don't even try.

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things does make you think. In fact, it makes you think across the barriers and boundaries of the norm. And that is what literature is for, to make you enjoy your story and to then think about it.

Written beautifully and with care, All the Ugly and Wonderful Things, proves that once again, we are just humans after all, and that after pain and hurt, some of us need someone to hold on to, to love and to care for, and some of us need that feeling to be reciprocated back.

You could tell by the ending that the author loves these characters more than the story-line itself. Don't be put off by the lovey-dovey ending (even though I lean towards the more dramatic, or the more simplistic), it does not take away from the struggle and pain these characters had to go through. In fact, I feel as if they earned that happy ending.

Whether the book is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ depends on the individual, but there is hardly any doubt that this book is important.