Review: Being Sloane Jacobs by Lauren Morrill

Title: Being Sloane Jacobs
Author: Lauren Morrill
Publisher: Delacorte
Release date: January 7th 2014
Pages: 352
Genre: Young Adult contemporary
Source: Bought

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Meet Sloane Emily Jacobs: a seriously stressed-out figure-skater from Washington, D.C., who choked during junior nationals and isn’t sure she’s ready for a comeback. What she does know is that she’d give anything to escape the mass of misery that is her life.
Now meet Sloane Devon Jacobs, a spunky ice hockey player from Philly who’s been suspended from her team for too many aggressive hip checks. Her punishment? Hockey camp, now, when she’s playing the worst she’s ever played. If she messes up? Her life will be over.
When the two Sloanes meet by chance in Montreal and decide to trade places for the summer, each girl thinks she’s the lucky one: no strangers to judge or laugh at Sloane Emily, no scouts expecting Sloane Devon to be a hero. But it didn’t occur to Sloane E. that while avoiding sequins and axels she might meet a hockey hottie—and Sloane D. never expected to run into a familiar (and very good-looking) face from home. It’s not long before the Sloanes discover that convincing people you’re someone else might be more difficult than being yourself.

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars

I was really excited for this one - Being Sloane Jacobs sounded like such a cute read! And it did end up being cute. But... cute is about all Being Sloane Jacobs has going for it. The story is really cheesy, and the characters are not developed enough, so Being Sloane Jacobs turned out only okay for me.

The whole set-up is a stretch of reality. The two girls with the same name randomly run into each other on their way to their respective skating camps, which is fine. But they also have the same color hair and eyes and wear the same size clothes and shoes, which is where I think it just got too convenient. The fact that no one has seen them before at their camps - even though they're supposedly such great stars in what they're doing - didn't seem too realistic, either. I also don't get why they wanted to switch places at all - I understand their reasons, but they're not emphasized enough to justify doing something so risky.

I tried to ignore the unrealistic and cliched parts, though, and to just enjoy the story. Both stories have really good set-ups: they're unique and interesting. Despite all my other problems with the novel, you can't deny that it's fun. Being Sloane Jacobs reads really quickly and is entertaining throughout.

But despite enjoying it on this very basic level, I had issues with the characters and their development. Honestly, part of it is that I just couldn't tell the two Sloanes apart. With the same name, the voices would have had to be very distinct in order for me to differentiate, and sadly, they're not, and I had to keep reminding myself which one I was reading about. Most of the secondary characters are pretty unremarkable: they're very much the stereotypical types, with the cute guy, the enemy, and the friend roles that don't go much deeper than that.

Being Sloane Jacobs is a quick, cute, entertaining read, but it's lacking the depth and the dynamic character development that would have made me really love it. If you're just looking for a quick, fun read, give Being Sloane Jacobs a try - just don't expect anything more than that.

Review: Meant to Be by Lauren Morrill

Title: Meant to Be
Author: Lauren Morrill
Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Release date: November 13th 2012
Pages: 304
Genre: Young Adult contemporary romance
Source: Bought

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It's one thing to fall head over heels into a puddle of hazelnut coffee, and quite another to fall for - gasp - the wrong guy. Straight-A junior Julia may be accident prone, but she's the queen of following rules and being prepared. That's why she keeps a pencil sharpener in her purse and a pocket Shakespeare in her ... well, pocket. Julia also believes in fate, and that Mark, her childhood crush, is her MTB - her meant-to-be.
But this spring break, Julia's rules are about to get defenestrated (SAT word: thrown from a window) when she's partnered with her personal nemesis, class clown Jason, on a school trip to London. After one wild party, Julia starts receiving romantic texts ... from an unknown number! Jason promises to help discover the identity of her mysterious new suitor if she agrees to live a little along the way. And thus begins a wild-good chase through London, leading Julia closer and closer to the biggest surprise of all: true love.
Because sometimes the things you least expect are the most meant to be.

My rating: 2 out of 5 stars

The cover of Meant to Be is adorable. With the cute couple, the radiant colors, and the cool London skyline, I'd figured I'd love this book; I was expecting fun travelling experiences and heartwarming romance. But sadly, the actual book can't keep what the cover promised, and I ended up being very disappointed by Meant to Be.

What bugged me most about this novel is the main character Julia. She is just so annoying! She's an uptight, rigid pushover who thinks she's better and smarter than everyone around her. I'm a rule-follower, too, and not exactly spontaneous, but she just takes it way too far. Everything about Julia frustrated me throughout the novel, especially because I didn't see the character growth I'd been hoping for.

I didn't like our other main character, Jason, either. If there's one thing I can agree on with Julia, it's how she sees Jason in the beginning - he's an annoying, obnoxious, immature jerk. Seeing as how I didn't like either of the main characters, I obviously did not like the romance between them, either. It especially bugged me how the only character growth was for Julia to change from her obnoxious self to become more like also-obnoxious-Jason.

The plot is predictable and unoriginal - after reading the description, you can already know everything that's going to happen. That's true until the very end, when we get some more original revelations. But those revelations, I didn't enjoy either - they just made me go... WTF? There were way too many random surprises, it felt like the author was trying too hard to make it unpredictable, and a lot of it didn't even make sense. The phone thing, for example, I found very unrealistic.

The only attempt at depth is the topic of Julia's dad's death, but I found the whole family storyline to be underdeveloped. That doesn't necessarily mean I needed more development of that aspect - I think it could have just been left out. Since the novel is just about Julia's class trip to London, we don't get to see a lot of interactions with her family, and the way it is, the dad's death didn't really add much to the story.

One more thing that bugged me is the portrayal of love and romance. Julia thinks there is one Meant to Be (MTB) for each person, who you'll stay with for the rest of your life. The idea that the first person you love - or even just have a crush on, like in Julia's and Mark's case - has to be the person you stay with for the rest of the life frustrated me, especially with the way Julia talks about how doing something with another person would ruin her chances with her MTB forever. And Julia's views don't really change over the course of the novel - she has a different MTB now, but she still assumes they'll be together forever, and such an unrealistic portrayal of love just bugs me.

The only redeeming aspect of Meant to Be is the writing. Despite all the things that annoyed me, Lauren Morrill has a light, sweet, humorous style that read really nicely, making Meant to Be a quick read, at least. So I might still give Lauren Morrill's next book a try - maybe, if there's a main character who doesn't make me want to strangle her 99% of the time, I'll be able to make more of her enjoyable writing style.