Tommy WallachRezensionen
Autor von We all looked up
Rezensionen
What did you think of the ending if you read it?
Here is my vide review of this novel and Simon verse the Homo Sapiens Agenda
My Thoughts:
We All Looked Up is a book I've been wanting to read because A. I love the cover, and B. I've heard good things about it. It was an interesting read and for the most part I enjoyed it... but it didn't GO anywhere for me. There was potential for this book to make me FEEL something, and that potential just wasn't reached. I liked the multiple POV's and I liked the characters, but when it was all said and done, this book fell a little flat for me. It's about a world dealing with an impending doom... and the unknown, but for most of the book it wasn't a desperate book. There wasn't a lot of violence or fear. Which is why towards the end when things took a turn in that direction, it didn't feel right. I've read a lot of apocalyptic books, and most of them had that common desperation and human nature at it's worst element... but this book didn't lead into that until really late on. It didn't feel honest with the rest of the book.
The biggest problems for me were the following things: First Up- The Science. I would think that with an asteroid 2 months away, they would be able to track it's trajectory better then 2/3 chance of hitting Earth. I would think they would know. They would also know where on the planet it would hit and start to have SOME sort of contingency plan. In this book, the president is like "maybe you'll die, goodbye". Other stuff- I hated that Eliza's dad was a major factor in her life in the beginning of the book, and then he just fell away without her even seeming to care. I hated that the other parents in the book were completely non-existent. Peter's parents were the only ones that were even present and they were such a non-factor they may as well have been wallpaper. I can't imagine wanting to spend my final moments on Earth away from my parents/family. Everyone is not like that, but I'd be willing to bet most high school kids are. I would have liked to see some people like that. I hated that the build up to the last days were SO blah. I thought the countdown to the end would be INTENSE... and it should have been. It wasn't. I hated that the couplings and uncouplings were so predictable. I hated that things that were important to the 4 teens (photography, singing, love, friendship) didn't hold through until the end in the least. I hated that they wanted to spend their last day at some giant festival. It's not like the asteroid was projected to hit Seattle... so it would be a WHILE before they died. They would probably starve to death before anything else. Panic would set in... you think being at a festival with thousands of people is going to be fun in any way when panic sets in??
What I did like about the book: SO much more than I'm making it out to be. I did actually did like this book up until it's halfway mark. I liked Eliza and how she just owned her sexuality. I loved Andy. Actually Andy is probably the only character I really did love the whole way through. I loved that he didn't know what friendship was until it dropped into his lap. I loved his positive attitude. He wasn't perfect, but in a way he felt innocent even when doing bad things. I never thought about putting this book down through all the things I wasn't wild about. I still wanted to know what would happen and I still cared about these characters.
I guess for the most part my disappointments lie in the way things turned out to be exactly as they seem. The good people are the good people... the bad are bad. There aren't shades of grey or people that you like and relate to, but happen to be flawed human beings. For a debut, I feel there's something there for this author to go on... but for a book about life and death, it didn't go deep enough.
The Ending: I don't know what to think about the ending. I'm not going to give it away, but I definitely didn't love it. I kind of knew it was coming, but I guess I was hoping I would be wrong.
OVERALL: An okay story about 4 teens at the end of the world. It had moments that I liked, but for the most part I felt like it didn't live up to it's potential. I ended up feeling conflicted about whether I would recommend this or not. I say read, but with low expectations.
My Blog:
The premise was interesting but application was nothing new. It's entirely a science vs. religion debate where you can only choose one side and the other side has to go away, to die and never come back. So really, nothing new. There is some decent world building.
About 200 or so pages in the story started to drag. I honestly didn't care much to finish but I did to see if it improved any. It didn't. Not a worthwhile read.
This book captured my attention. It's has the manic pixie dream girl trope, it has the one magical weekend, and it has someone learning about themselves at the shove of someone else's hand. It doesn't have a happy ending. It doesn't wrap itself up with a nice bow or make you feel tucked in with a warm cup of tea. Reason enough not to pick it up? Not for me. Because this book had enough heart to envelop the tropes, the strange, the heartbreak and the sad. I will pick this up again in the future.
I really was surprised by this book. I’m not sure why, but I was kind of expecting not to love this. But I did. It was amazing.
This book really got me thinking about what I would do if I had two months to live. I also felt like the characters were really realistic. I found myself entirely wrapped up in the story. It helped that the author created an album to go with it. I played the music while reading to become totally immersed.
Definitely recommend.
The story follows four high school students in the final 12 weeks before the collision (or near collision).
There is Peter (the jock), Andy (the slacker), Anita (the brain), and Eliza (the slut). Each of 10 greater chapters has a lesser chapter devoted to each of these four characters. The author imagines what would happen in society at large and to individuals up close, if we knew that we had only 12 weeks left to live. As in the movie "The Breakfast Club," each of the four stereotyped characters turns out to be much more than they seem on the outside at the beginning of the book.
I would almost give this a 4 star, but cut it back by a half because I found it impossible to believe Anita would ever, even with a coming apocalypse, be attracted to Andy, and because the ending wasn't quite satisfactory to me. There were a few extras that the conclusion needed that just weren't there. Still, this teen fiction tale does a nice job of creating an impossible (Ok... highly, highly unlikely) situation, and imagining what would happen in that situation.
one star, though, for the vague as heck ending that is driving me nuts as well as the love square.
Parker got a little tedious sometimes, but he was necessary, especially if this book was going to speak to people the way, I think, it does. At least it spoke to me and made me rethink some decisions, actions and emotions.
I'd highly recommend this novel to anyone and everyone, especially people who feel sort of stuck right now, like I do.
Although I usually avoid reviews before starting a new book, I’ve decided to look through what people say about this one. Now basically there’re two contrast opinions - nay, it is a typical boy meets a MPDG character, who teaches him how to embrace life and yay, it is not-not-not!, it’s totally unique, and lovely and relevant. So I was prepared to take sides, but, well, never had to.
As mostly every review has it, the story is about a teenage boy, Parker - a loner, a thief and a mute since his father’s death (trying to describe himself):
«He was just your average teenager. Or a little above average, actually. Like, you’d probably think he was cute, if you had to weigh in one way or the other. Or not cute, maybe, but not not cute either. Just, like, your normal level of cuteness. A solid seven out of ten. Maybe a B/B+ on a good day, in the right light, taking the most forgiving possible position on his too-thick eyebrows and his weirdly prominent dimples when he smiled and his slight butt chin . . .
Fuck me. This is turning into a disaster, isn’t it?»
...who meets a mysterious girl, Zelda - an old-fashioned, well-read, allegedly immortal (as described by Parker):
«She didn’t seem like a normal teenager—more like something between a space alien and a homeschooled kid. Or maybe she was just a lot older than she looked. There was this girl in my chemistry class named Laura who was half Dutch and half Native American, and she had these hands that I swear could have belonged to an old woman: weather-beaten, tanned like old leather, crosshatched with wrinkles. Basically, a palm reader’s wet dream. The silver-haired girl was a little like that, except instead of her hands seeming too old, it was her whole personality.»
Of course, he finds her enchanting, but, alas, she wants to end her enchanting self by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. As you can see, we have a whole book guessing, will he be able to stop her and will she help with his condition and is she or is she not a 246 year old granny in a body of a teenager.
So yes, it does feel much like your typical MPDG read. But Zelda's paranormal (or fantasised) immortality gives the story wisdom, experience and, hence, sadness, which just makes it so much more. And the fairy tales! Bestowing Parker with a gift for story-telling is such a great touch in creating a deeper, richer and bittersweet narration. I also quite enjoyed the mc’s sense of humor, which, though typical for this genre, is honest, cynical and, well, teenage.
Some jokes are rather straight and vulgar-ish:
«And did you know that, in the original “Sleeping Beauty,” there’s no handsome prince who rouses Sleeping Beauty with a gentle kiss? Nope! It’s actually a douche-bag king—one who already has a queen, by the way—and he rapes her. She wakes up pregnant, so the king’s wife tries to kill her, bake her into a pie, and feed her to the king. The happy ending? The king decides to have his wife burned to death so he can raise a family with Sleeping Beauty. Make a friendly animated film out of that shit, Disney.»
Others are gentler and more nuanced:
«Alana’s attention was suddenly drawn to Zelda’s right hand, which was poised to unleash a cascade of sugar into her coffee. “Hold up. You don’t drink it black?”
“Never.”
“But isn’t life already fake enough without watering it down with sugar?”
“Can something be watered down with sugar?”
Alana frowned. “Okay, that’s true. But just take one sip before you put that crud in.”
“I’ve had black coffee before.”
“I know, I know. Humor me.”
Zelda lowered her face to the rim of the mug and came up grimacing. “Yuck,” she said.
“Exactly! See, coffee is supposed to taste bad. That’s what makes it coffee.”
“I prefer the illusion,” Zelda said, and went ahead with her cream and sugar.»
Lovely, right? Coffee will never me simply coffee for me from now on.
So the verdict is, this coming of age story does indeed follow a certain genre pattern, but in a way that still makes it pleasantly elegiac and entertaining.
Actual Rating 3.5
Meet Parker Santé. He’s medium cute, bad at writing in third person, and good at stealing shit from rich people. He’s not the best person you’ll ever meet, he’s also not the worst.
I mean, some things are obviously shitty, and some things are obviously nice or noble or whatever, but between the two goalposts of black and white, between punching a baby in the kidney and donating a kidney to save a baby, there’s a freaking football field’s worth of gray area.He’s hanging out in a hotel lobby, waiting for something to steal, when he sees her. She’s about his age, pretty, has a large wad of cash, silver hair, and wears a look of perfect sadness on her face.
People usually use that word – “perfect” – to talk about good things; a perfect score on a test, or a perfect attendance record, or landing a perfect 1080. But I think it’s a way better word when it’s used to describe something – even a totally shitty something – that’s exactly the thing it’s supposed to be. Perfect morning breath. A perfect hangover. Perfect sadness.He doesn’t speak. Can’t speak. He sees a psychologist regularly and had one session with a speech therapist, but he just can’t make the words come out. He can’t even moan or make noise when he laughs. So he writes everything in a journal. He has 104 completed journals at home, like a record of where he’s been and thoughts he’s had.
I stopped talking after my dad died, I wrote, then prepared myself for the usual things people said after I told them that.Zelda tells him that she’s waiting for a call, and once it comes she’s going to give all her money to the next needy person she sees and jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. She doesn’t say this on a whim; she’s given it a lot of thought. She means to go through with it.
“What a remarkably asinine thing to do.”
This was not the usual things.
There’s a word in Portuguese that my dad wrote about in one of his books: saudade. It’s the sadness you feel for something that isn’t gone yet, but will be. The sadness of lost causes. The sadness of being alive.Thus begins his mission to teach her that there are so many things to live for, his mission to change her mind. But how can you convince someone who thinks they’ve lived for hundreds of years that they haven’t seen everything.
In trying to show her it’s worth going on living, he might just get caught up in it all and realise that he hasn’t really been living, either. And that maybe it’s time to start.
The rest of this review can be found HERE!
“The best books, they don’t talk about things you never thought about before. They talk about things you’d always thought about, but that you didn’t think anyone else had thought about. You read them, and suddenly you’re a little bit less alone in the world. You’re part of this cosmic community of people who’ve thought about this thing, whatever it happens to be.”This is The Breakfast Club for a new generation… but where detention is replaced by an impending end of the world, and everyone is possibly going to die…
Okay, maybe not The Breakfast Club, but we do have four very different teens, thrown together by forces beyond their control. And their time together will stay with them for the rest of their lives… however long or short those lives might be.
There’s Peter: the sporty guy with jock friends and shallow girlfriend, who’s just been challenged by his teacher to make more of his life.
“Yeah, sorry. I’m having a weird day. Something a teacher said.”Eliza: the artsy loner type who likes taking pictures, and has been branded a slut at school. Her mother’s gone and her father is dying.
“You in trouble?”
“Not like that. It’s hard to explain.”
“Here’s my trick with teachers, right? Don’t ever listen to them in the first place.”
“Brilliant.”
“It’s got me this far,” he said, then popped a whole chicken finger into his mouth.
She believed photography to be the greatest of all art forms because it was simultaneously junk food and gourmet cuisine, because you could snap off dozens of pictures in a couple of hours, then spend dozens of hours perfecting just a couple of them. She loved how what began as an act of the imagination turned into a systematic series of operations, organized and ordered and clear: mixing up the processing bath, developing the negatives, choosing the best shots and expanding them, watching as the images appeared on the blank white paper as if in some kind of backward laundromat – a billowing line of clean sheets slowly developing stains, then hung up until those stains were fixed forever.Andy: skater, stoner, no-hoper musician who’s been pushed out of his mother’s life by her new man.
The chemo did end up slowing the growth of her dad’s tumors, but good news was a weird thing when you were dealing with a fatal illness. Instead of a few months, the doctors gave him a year. This was how you could be lucky without being lucky. This was how you could be a winner and still lose.
So what if Bobo was still pissed off at him? So what if Suzie O thought he was a dick? So what if Eliza was giving it up to some loser with an Afro when Andy probably wouldn’t get laid until he was thirty? None of it really mattered. Today was just another shit day in a life that sometimes felt like a factory specializing in the construction of shit days.And Anita: conscientious student constantly driven by her father towards a career path she doesn’t want, closet singer.
Afterward, her uncle Bobby had told her she ought to think about studying voice in college.They each have things going on in their lives. High-school things, real world things, things that could seriously affect the direction of their future… but then Ardor is discovered.
Anita had laughed. “I don’t think my parents would like that very much.”
“But you’d like it, wouldn’t you?”
“I guess.”
“So do it. You can make your own decisions.”
But that was easy enough for him to say. He wasn’t Benjamin Graves’s greatest investment. And investments weren’t supposed to make their own decisions; they were just supposed to mature.
But no one could stop her from singing in the closet. In the closet, there was no distinction between dreams and reality, no need to choose one path or another. There was just the heavenly lift of the strings, the sharp shriek of the horns, the twinkle of the guitar.
“Wicked, right?” Andy asked.The comet is eight miles wide at its thickest point, and if it collides with the planet it will unleash a force more powerful than one billion nuclear bombs. It’s headed right for Earth, is expected to arrive within 8 weeks, and the odds aren’t great…
Eliza knew what he meant by the word; it was one of a million different synonyms for “cool”: sweet, ill, rad, dope, sick. But for some reason, she felt he had it wrong. The star seemed wicked in the original sense. Wicked like the Wicked Witch of the West. Wicked like something that wanted to hurt you.
“What are they saying?” Misery asked again, and there was a desperate edge to her voice that sent a shiver down Andy’s spine. “Kevin, what the fuck are they saying?”
“I was hoping to find something different,” he said, looking up from the screen. “They’re saying two-thirds.”
“Two-thirds? Like sixty-six percent?”
“Yeah.”
“So two-thirds we all live, and one-third we all die?”
Kevin hesitated, checked the screen again, then slowly shook his head. “The other way,” he said.
The rest of this review can be found HERE!
Although I usually avoid reviews before starting a new book, I’ve decided to look through what people say about this one. Now basically there’re two contrast opinions - nay, it is a typical boy meets a MPDG character, who teaches him how to embrace life and yay, it is not-not-not!, it’s totally unique, and lovely and relevant. So I was prepared to take sides, but, well, never had to.
As mostly every review has it, the story is about a teenage boy, Parker - a loner, a thief and a mute since his father’s death (trying to describe himself):
«He was just your average teenager. Or a little above average, actually. Like, you’d probably think he was cute, if you had to weigh in one way or the other. Or not cute, maybe, but not not cute either. Just, like, your normal level of cuteness. A solid seven out of ten. Maybe a B/B+ on a good day, in the right light, taking the most forgiving possible position on his too-thick eyebrows and his weirdly prominent dimples when he smiled and his slight butt chin . . .
Fuck me. This is turning into a disaster, isn’t it?»
...who meets a mysterious girl, Zelda - an old-fashioned, well-read, allegedly immortal (as described by Parker):
«She didn’t seem like a normal teenager—more like something between a space alien and a homeschooled kid. Or maybe she was just a lot older than she looked. There was this girl in my chemistry class named Laura who was half Dutch and half Native American, and she had these hands that I swear could have belonged to an old woman: weather-beaten, tanned like old leather, crosshatched with wrinkles. Basically, a palm reader’s wet dream. The silver-haired girl was a little like that, except instead of her hands seeming too old, it was her whole personality.»
Of course, he finds her enchanting, but, alas, she wants to end her enchanting self by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. As you can see, we have a whole book guessing, will he be able to stop her and will she help with his condition and is she or is she not a 246 year old granny in a body of a teenager.
So yes, it does feel much like your typical MPDG read. But Zelda's paranormal (or fantasised) immortality gives the story wisdom, experience and, hence, sadness, which just makes it so much more. And the fairy tales! Bestowing Parker with a gift for story-telling is such a great touch in creating a deeper, richer and bittersweet narration. I also quite enjoyed the mc’s sense of humor, which, though typical for this genre, is honest, cynical and, well, teenage.
Some jokes are rather straight and vulgar-ish:
«And did you know that, in the original “Sleeping Beauty,” there’s no handsome prince who rouses Sleeping Beauty with a gentle kiss? Nope! It’s actually a douche-bag king—one who already has a queen, by the way—and he rapes her. She wakes up pregnant, so the king’s wife tries to kill her, bake her into a pie, and feed her to the king. The happy ending? The king decides to have his wife burned to death so he can raise a family with Sleeping Beauty. Make a friendly animated film out of that shit, Disney.»
Others are gentler and more nuanced:
«Alana’s attention was suddenly drawn to Zelda’s right hand, which was poised to unleash a cascade of sugar into her coffee. “Hold up. You don’t drink it black?”
“Never.”
“But isn’t life already fake enough without watering it down with sugar?”
“Can something be watered down with sugar?”
Alana frowned. “Okay, that’s true. But just take one sip before you put that crud in.”
“I’ve had black coffee before.”
“I know, I know. Humor me.”
Zelda lowered her face to the rim of the mug and came up grimacing. “Yuck,” she said.
“Exactly! See, coffee is supposed to taste bad. That’s what makes it coffee.”
“I prefer the illusion,” Zelda said, and went ahead with her cream and sugar.»
Lovely, right? Coffee will never me simply coffee for me from now on.
So the verdict is, this coming of age story does indeed follow a certain genre pattern, but in a way that still makes it pleasantly elegiac and entertaining.
When he spots a silver haired girl with strange eyes sitting in a hotel dining room, he's intrigued. After stealing the wad of cash from her purse, he tries leaving, but something makes him return and give back the money. This out of character act is the beginning of one of the more unusual literary journeys you will encounter. It involves secrets, belief, lots of sadness, some unexpected growth and is an impressive and memorable adventure, one that's perfect for teen readers who have suffered loss or really like stories which stretch their imagination while inviting them to reflect after closing the cover. A definite suggestion for all libraries both school and public.
Okay, maybe the teens will love this book. I didn’t. There is an awful lot of bad sex, too much drug usage, gratuitous violence, an absent society, clueless parents, messed up kids, a dying father and, oh yes, buried in all the dreck is a rather sweet love story. The actual mechanics of the writing is fine. The story is awful. If you want a good “end of the world” story, read Pat Frank’s ALAS, BABYLON. Skip this one.
1 of 5 stars
We All Looked Up has a wonderful cover. I think it’s one of the first things that drew me to the book. I’m pleased to say that I was not fooled by a pretty cover.
I found this story quite enjoyable, first of all, because it really makes you think. It’s about the end of the world, and what would you do if you knew exactly when it was going to end. I like how it was explored and I think it was very realistic.
The writing is so beautiful. Seriously. I would just stare in awe at a lot of paragraphs because the author really has a way with words.
"The best books, they don't talk about things you never thought about before. They talk about things you'd always thought about, but that you didn't think anyone else had thought about. You read them, and suddenly you're a little bit less alone in the world."
The book is narrated in 3rd person with the point of view various characters . Each character is completely different, but I really really enjoyed Eliza’s point of view most of all. I think that she was one of the most cynical voices of the lot. She had a view of the world that made her POV all the much more tragic. It made the book much more heartbreaking.
Eliza thought about all the things she’d hoped to do in her life, all the lives she’d wanted to live. She could see them now, jagged paths cut into the shadowy future, lit up in small bursts of light.
My only issue with this book is that it tried so painfully hard to be teenage. In some POVs, the word “like” was added to almost every other sentence. (I.e. “He, like, wrecked my life.” “I’d be, like,…” “Because, like…”). There was also some really obvious jargon that was meant to sound teenage (totes, totally, dude, bro) but came off as forced most of the time. There was also some chaos (and I mean chaos) at the middle of the book, where everything felt sort of disjointed and not really going anywhere. I had to force myself to get past that part.
However, once we get past that little rough patch, the book uses the wonderful and brilliant writing to end it on a very beautiful and poignant note. It’s an open ending, but in the very best way. It made the book feel almost alive.
Overall, Tommy Wallach uses wonderful prose and writing to deliver a story that’ll make you think about the preciousness of life and the importance of living.
“People talked about their days being numbered, but really, everything was numbered. Every movie you watched was the last time you’d watch that movie, or the second-to-last time, or the third-to-last. Every kiss was one kiss closer to your last kiss.”
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What did you think of the ending if you read it?
Here is my vide review of this novel and Simon verse the Homo Sapiens Agenda