actual rating 3,5
okay, so. going into it, i kind of thought i would love this more than i did, so i was maybe a little disappointed. i thoughthe beginning was pretty strong and interesting, but the second third of it didn’t really deliver as much as i had expected it to. then again, the last 50 to 60 pages were quite enjoyable so i’m feeling somewhat conflicted.
here’s some things i didn’t like so much:
1. tate was really rude to ellie for the first half of the book and even though i knew why and kind of understood, it was just a bit too much for me to truly be able to excuse it. i mean, it wasn’t THAT bad, but like, he was pretty hurtful in a not-so-funny way sometimes and when it comes to someone i’m looking at with a relationship in mind? i have a zero tolerance, so that fact that it wasn’t ”THAT bad” is not enough for me.
—> i did like how ellie actually took it up with him at one point, but also that brings me to pointer number 1,5.: why did ellie just take it for the most part and still go on in her pov about how much she was still infatuated with him? ick
2. the pacing felt a bit off to me somehow? if you’d ask me, i wouldn’t really be able to tell you how i think it should’ve been, but i feel like at some point it did feel a bit rushed (it is a quite short book so i guess that’s to be expected? idk)
3. i had expectations for the story and some plot points based on the synopsis, but i feel like most of what i was looking forward to didn’t happen. or at least, it wasn’t shown the way i had expected. and yeah ig, my bad for placing expectations, but when some of them are literally written in the description of the book, i think i wasn’t exactly wrong to expect to see them in the actual book.
4. i felt like i was robbed of the band action and scenes of them having fun touring and stuff, but i guess that’s one of the minor issues.
i did like the representation of dyslexia and other difficulties kids (and adults alike) experience in learning and just their day-to-day lives, and also mental health issues like anxiety and panic attacks, and societal issues like (youth) homelessness and some mentions towards poverty. tate was really good with the youth shelter kids and just in general very attentive to his small circle of loved ones and i loved that side of him.
i thought tate was also a very good example of ”you have to learn to love yourself before anyone else can”, not because no one else would be capable of falling in love with you, but because your walls wouldn’t let them until you love and trust yourself. but i liked how at the end he actually realized that he had to work on himself a bit first if he really wanted their relationship to work. (cuz another issue i had with him at times was how he never seemed to fight for ellie the way ellie did for him)