Diary of a Baker’s Son: Cherry Danishes and Something about a Boy is the first book in the series, ‘Diary of a Baker’s Son’. It’s told from the first person pov of just about everyone who’s in the story, although mostly from Jeffrey Towler’s, and JP’s pov.



I don’t normally read YA stories, but the blurb sounded interesting and I like reading stories about food. I have to say I’m disappointed. This book was all over the place. It couldn’t decide what it wanted to be. We had povs from not just Jeffrey and JP, but also from JP’s dad, Roger, and even Van, the football player Jeffrey had a crush on at the beginning of the story who broke Jeffrey’s heart by turning him down. Not only that, but the author threw in just about all the sad things they could think of to happen to the characters. Jeffrey’s heart is broken by Van. JP was bullied at school plus his mother died so he moved with his dad to Jeffrey’s town. Not only that, he suffers from manic depression and it doesn’t sound like he’s on any meds or seeing a therapist. Roger lost his wife and is so lonely and now admits he’s bi and really wants to be a Daddy to a boy. Van lives in foster homes that don’t care about him and he wants someone, meaning a Daddy, to look after him. I could see the promo for the Daddy/Roger and Van/boy book coming a mile away. But when they meet, Roger perves on Van who’s only seventeen-years-old and in high school. That is creepy and doesn’t belong in a YA story. Not only that, but Roger tells JP about his first experience with a boy in detail. Is this a thing with parents nowadays to connect with their kids? It’s like everything but the kitchen sink is thrown into this story. It would have worked much better if the author focused on just Jeffrey and JP, because there was too much stuff happening to too many other people, let alone the main characters in the book, that it just made the plot messy.

I wasn’t a fan of the povs either. Even though it was in first person, it was confusing when it slid from past to present tense and then every character broke the fourth wall! Why was it necessary to add so much extra narratives to this story? An editor was needed to strip this plot down and tighten it up. Also, there were quite a few grammatical errors and one big inconsistency error when Van explains his age compared to JP. It totally didn’t make any sense. And one of my pet peeves, monologue. This story was almost all monologue of characters telling the ‘Reader’, as they called us, about their thoughts, feelings, what they were doing, about their past and about anything else you could think of. I want to feel a story, not be talked at, and the characters talked. What also needs fixing are the character voices. Too often they either sound the same or Jeffrey sounds like his mother when he talks to JP. So voices are inconsistent.

The author had Jeffrey and JP talk about why they liked the other person enough so that I could tell they liked each other, at least for now. They end up with a HFN I’d say. Roger opens up to his bisexuality and his desire to be a Daddy. All the characters who talked their pov always mentioned how lonely they were, so I’d say the theme of this book is loneliness. The only one who seems happy in the story is Jeffrey’s mom.

Overall, Diary of a Baker’s Son isn’t what I expected. It could do with a good editor and a rewrite. There are too many characters, too much monologue, mixed tenses and grammatical errors. I can’t recommend this book to anyone although some reviewers seem to like it. I give this book, 2 Stars.

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