Posts Tagged: Weddings

Thursday, June 21, 2018

Really Funny and Over-the-Top: Save the Date by Morgan Matson

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I received this book for free from Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Really Funny and Over-the-Top: Save the Date by Morgan MatsonSave the Date by Morgan Matson
Published by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers on June 5th, 2018
Genres: Chick Lit, YA
Source: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
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four-stars

Charlie Grant’s older sister is getting married this weekend at their family home, and Charlie can’t wait—for the first time in years, all four of her older siblings will be under one roof. Charlie is desperate for one last perfect weekend, before the house is sold and everything changes. The house will be filled with jokes and games and laughs again. Making decisions about things like what college to attend and reuniting with longstanding crush Jesse Foster—all that can wait. She wants to focus on making the weekend perfect.

The only problem? The weekend is shaping up to be an absolute disaster.

There’s the unexpected dog with a penchant for howling, house alarm that won’t stop going off, and a papergirl with a grudge.

There are the relatives who aren’t speaking, the (awful) girl her favorite brother brought home unannounced, and a missing tuxedo.

Not to mention the neighbor who seems to be bent on sabotage and a storm that is bent on drenching everything. The justice of the peace is missing. The band will only play covers. The guests are all crazy. And the wedding planner’s nephew is unexpectedly, distractingly…cute.

Over the course of three ridiculously chaotic days, Charlie will learn more than she ever expected about the family she thought she knew by heart. And she’ll realize that sometimes, trying to keep everything like it was in the past means missing out on the future.

Save the Date is neither unpredictable nor does it really break any moulds. It is exactly what you would expect it to be and it is fucking amazing. If you, like me, are a connoisseur of rom-coms & chick-flicks and are upset by how few are being made lately, this book is what you deserve.

Charlie Grant’s older sister is getting married this week, her family home is being sold, and her brother who she nor her parents have spoken to in almost two years is gonna be coming back for the wedding. To add to the stress, Charlie’s long-time crush and her are feeling the sparks which makes things awkward because a certain brother is crashing with her crush instead of with the fam. Charlie just wants her family to have one last hurrah in their family home but the long line of disasters has only barely just begun.

At times, Save the Date is definitely over the top with its never-ending disasters but that just adds more fun and charm to the book. It is funny and hilarious to see how things you thought would go right just go wrong and Charlie trying to juggle it all so her family can have the perfect weekend together.

Of course, Charlie is really not the perfect female lead and that is 11110% okay. She is so busy trying to make everything go right that she misses a lot of the obvious things before her. She is so adamant in trying to save this weekend and spend time with her family that she forgets to pay attention to her best friend. Obviously, Charlie has some growing up to do and it is well-worth watching her manage that while trying to handle the wedding-stress.

My biggest issue with the book is that while I think the book places a lot of important on relationships with family and friends, those relationships aren’t really explored or pushed to their full potential? Like Charlie’s world is centered around her family and we don’t really get to see a lot of those relationships individually besides a few remarks and Charlie telling us how much they mean to her. This seems slightly counterintuitive given the book is really very much about family.

Also, the resolution happens pretty quickly and since I am occasionally garbage for drama, I really would have enjoyed seeing that dragged out a little bit more.

BUT, I think that neither of these issues were really big enough to take away from my enjoyment of the novel and I think that it is ABSOLUTELY 110% worth the read. Especially if you need to have a little bit of summer fun and read a light-hearted book about families, disasters, some cute guys and A PUPPY.

four-stars

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