Shannen Crane Camp

The storyline was promising and rather interesting. The actual execution leaves much to be desired.

The books lures you in and then - BAM! And things become a little surreal. For me anyway. Believability slipped and toppled and crashed and burned. I didn't feel connected to the characters or the story, at all, in any way. In the end things have become so ridiculous that I resorted to skimming.

Perhaps this book will finds its audience in someone else.
Not in me though.
And in all honesty, I cannot recommend this book. Not when there are so many better written ones around.… (mehr)

Silly high school caper about a pair of girls on the cheerleading team, one of whom is 'secretly' massively inot online gaming, but can't afford the loss of status that this would bring were it to be generally known. A boy from her gaming clan moves into her school and suddenly she has a much greater risk of exposure, but she can't stop gaming either.

I'm very much not the target audience forthis I think, and hence I've no idea if all the US high school atmosphere was at all realistic. It felt massively contrived and unbelievable to me. But then we didn't have cheerleading teams where I went to school. I didn't really recognise the gaming structure either.

But it was kind of fun. In a silly sort of way. I'm sure it will be much enjoyed by the target audience of YA american gaming girls - a fairly niche market though.… (mehr)

The Break-Up Artist was a quick and enjoyable little read from Shannen Crane Camp. I was in the mood for some light reading and this story delivered some wonderful laugh-out-loud moments, especially in the first half. While the book kept up a spritely pace, I did think the two main characters - Amelia and David - were slightly uneven. Amelia started out so confident and secure, but after meeting David she really began to doubt herself. Since she spent all her time pretending to be other girls (in her job as a "break-up artist"), she did not have a clear idea of who she was herself; before she could determine that, though, she was suddenly in a relationship and starting to define herself in respect to David. There were moments when the "real Amelia" would show her face, but I felt a little more growth for her character was needed to bump this story up in my rating. Basically all the characters felt unfinished to some extent, while some interesting threads (David's writing, Nate and Karen, Amelia's relationship with her mom) never really went anywhere. I think a little more depth in the story and characters would have made The Break-Up Artist sing. Like cotton candy, however, this is light, fluffy and sweet, with some great scenes involving Amelia's "work" that had me laughing out loud. Cute.… (mehr)