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emjrasmussen's review against another edition
How can you tell if Colette is lying?
Well, it is pretty obvious.
After reading this book's synopsis, I was looking forward to a psychological story with a misleading atmosphere. I wanted to be kept guessing, searching for honesty, not knowing what to believe. But this is not what To Be Perfectly Honest delivers.
Colette's story reads just like any other, aside from a few untrue tangents jutting out from the plot and concluding with a confession of the fib and a return to the main storyline. Pointing out where the truth stops and the lies begin is a task so painfully easy that readers will be slightly offended when the narrator asks them whether or not they believed her little story because no, they did not. Her lies are flimsy, her tales transparent, and her narration does not touch the unreliability I craved.
Even more annoyingly, all her biggest untruths relate exclusively to her romance with Connor, which grows tiresome and hinders the reader's ability to see any aspect of her life other than the romantic one. This lack of variety when it comes to Colette's lies gives her a single-minded quality that does not evolve for many chapters. She drops everything for the boy she loves, complaining about how nothing can be fun without him and canceling any plans that conflict with meeting him. Seemingly unable to focus her energy on more than one thing at a time, she crushes the idea that To Be Perfectly Honest will be a book full of disorienting distrust, and it instead becomes a regular romance with a plain protagonist.
For the first half of the book, I could only think about the aforementioned annoyances, and I poked at every one, ready to write a critical review about everything that bothered me. However, about halfway through the book, something shifts.
As soon as Connor's secret mentioned in the summary comes into play, everything begins to look up. He is hiding mysteries of his own, but they are not what they initially seem. They charge the subsequent events with emotion, even making the somewhat unrealistic ending seem acceptable to readers who are cheering passionately for their protagonist. They aid Colette's development, and although she never becomes a vastly detailed character, at least her simplicity is focused not on a destructive relationship, but on a positive goal sparked by the fire that burns her.
Going into more detail on this would give away more than I should share, but readers who are struggling to get through the first half of To Be Perfectly Honest should know that things do improve. The conclusion is a little too good to be true and it does not nearly negate all the annoyances, but it is sweet, funny, and empowering, leaving readers with a smiling final impression. This book begins as a pain to push through, but the creative conclusion fades the glaring negatives, leaving them partially forgotten and making To Be Perfectly Honest a solidly okay story.
This review originally appeared at www.foreverliterary.blogspot.com.
Well, it is pretty obvious.
After reading this book's synopsis, I was looking forward to a psychological story with a misleading atmosphere. I wanted to be kept guessing, searching for honesty, not knowing what to believe. But this is not what To Be Perfectly Honest delivers.
Colette's story reads just like any other, aside from a few untrue tangents jutting out from the plot and concluding with a confession of the fib and a return to the main storyline. Pointing out where the truth stops and the lies begin is a task so painfully easy that readers will be slightly offended when the narrator asks them whether or not they believed her little story because no, they did not. Her lies are flimsy, her tales transparent, and her narration does not touch the unreliability I craved.
Even more annoyingly, all her biggest untruths relate exclusively to her romance with Connor, which grows tiresome and hinders the reader's ability to see any aspect of her life other than the romantic one. This lack of variety when it comes to Colette's lies gives her a single-minded quality that does not evolve for many chapters. She drops everything for the boy she loves, complaining about how nothing can be fun without him and canceling any plans that conflict with meeting him. Seemingly unable to focus her energy on more than one thing at a time, she crushes the idea that To Be Perfectly Honest will be a book full of disorienting distrust, and it instead becomes a regular romance with a plain protagonist.
For the first half of the book, I could only think about the aforementioned annoyances, and I poked at every one, ready to write a critical review about everything that bothered me. However, about halfway through the book, something shifts.
As soon as Connor's secret mentioned in the summary comes into play, everything begins to look up. He is hiding mysteries of his own, but they are not what they initially seem. They charge the subsequent events with emotion, even making the somewhat unrealistic ending seem acceptable to readers who are cheering passionately for their protagonist. They aid Colette's development, and although she never becomes a vastly detailed character, at least her simplicity is focused not on a destructive relationship, but on a positive goal sparked by the fire that burns her.
Going into more detail on this would give away more than I should share, but readers who are struggling to get through the first half of To Be Perfectly Honest should know that things do improve. The conclusion is a little too good to be true and it does not nearly negate all the annoyances, but it is sweet, funny, and empowering, leaving readers with a smiling final impression. This book begins as a pain to push through, but the creative conclusion fades the glaring negatives, leaving them partially forgotten and making To Be Perfectly Honest a solidly okay story.
This review originally appeared at www.foreverliterary.blogspot.com.
sngick's review against another edition
4.0
Loved the lithsping little brother... Nice twists with the story line and main characters.
eatingfiction's review against another edition
2.0
The plot was terribly cheesy and predictable, but I liked the main character Colette,
and Sonya Sones writing is addictive.
Still, I wouldn't recommend. (unless you enjoy cheesy plots.)
and Sonya Sones writing is addictive.
Still, I wouldn't recommend. (unless you enjoy cheesy plots.)
kristalee's review against another edition
2.0
This book should have taken me hours to read but it took almost two weeks because it was so painfully dumb.
shogins's review against another edition
3.0
This was not my favorite Sonya Sones book - I thought some of the plot twists were pretty predictable - but that doesn't mean I didn't like it, as even a medium quality Sonya Sones book is still an awesome treat.
kerrithebookbelle's review against another edition
5.0
HOLY MOTHER OF GOD THAT PLOT TWIST LIKE WHAT THE ACTUAL THAT WAS EPIC SO GOOD OMG Y'ALL READ IT NOW
krismarley's review against another edition
3.0
I'm slowly phasing young adult out of my reading life but had to read this because it's Sonya Sones. I was disappointed. The 7? or 11? year old brother was super annoying. He was hard to understand..everything he said was "written in lisp." I'm not a fan of unreliable narrators though SS did a pretty good job of making it clear when Colette was jumping between reality and non-reality.
swill22's review against another edition
4.0
More like a 3.75 but overall a pretty good book. Really enjoyed the last few pages.
heykellyjensen's review against another edition
3.0
Colette's mother is a movie star, and this summer, she's shuffling Colette and her little brother away from their home and the promise summer in Paris to a small town in California where she's filming her next movie. Colette's beyond bummed about this, but when she meets Connor, she starts to sing a little bit of a different tune. Maybe it won't be so bad when there's a cute boy around.
Something to know about Colette: she's a liar. She lies about everything. And it's not that she's an unreliable narrator. She's completely reliable -- if you accept she's a liar.
Colette and Connor are in lovvveee or so it feels. And when Colette tells her mother she needs alone time with Connor, away from her brother, her mother grants this wish to her. She even leaves a box of condoms, in order for them to be truly safe.
But Colette's not ready for that quite yet. Even though she's told Connor she's 18 (she's not -- she's 15) and that she's experiences (she's not -- she's a virgin), when the time comes for them to take their relationship somewhere more physical, she takes a stand and says no.
That's when Connor gets back at her for her lies.
He wants to get with Colette so badly, he tells her he has cancer. He goes as far as to make himself look sick -- a slick little trick Colette herself has tried in order to get attention. As a reader, I had a suspicion he was lying about this. But Colette is none the wiser, nor would she be. He's convincing! His head is bald. He looks sick.
It's all a rouse so he can get her to sleep with him. And yes, it's a big charade for a sexual encounter, but as he tells her later, he's gone further. It was a conquest for him. To make it more disturbing, he's not 18 like he claims.
He's 21.
Since no sex goes down -- Colette figures him out before it could happen -- there's no rape, no charges. But she wants to get back and get even.
Except, Colette comes around before the big "gotcha" happens.
The turnaround in Colette is believable and I was appreciative of it. I didn't love her as a character but that's why I was compelled by her. In fact, when she was prepared to take Connor for a ride herself, I was really invested. Would she REALLY go through with her plans or was this a rouse on us, as readers?
I felt the end of this book was almost a cheap way out of the story. But I had to remember the main character is 15 -- just turned 16 at that point -- and so it was less of a cheap way out and more of a realistic way out of HER story. I believe her and it, even if it wasn't my favorite ending.
Sones masters verse novels. This is how verse WORKS. It plays with the story, and it tells enough, leaving enough UNSAID to make the reader wonder where and how Colette is leading us on. Her voice is spot on, and I thought the relationship she had with her learning-disabled younger brother was sweet and authentic. The wrap up with her mother and her mother's boyfriend was a little schmaltzy for me, but it was believable in context of the story.
This one is for YA readers who like challenging characters, who like verse novels, and who are good with "tough" topics like sex, drugs, and drinking in their books. Even though Colette is on the younger side, this is one to hand to younger teen readers only if they're ready and like those topics tackled in their books (and many do!). I wouldn't put this on the level of Ellen Hopkins in terms of content, but I'd say it's a stepping stone to readers who will go to Hopkins down the road.
Longer review to come!
Something to know about Colette: she's a liar. She lies about everything. And it's not that she's an unreliable narrator. She's completely reliable -- if you accept she's a liar.
Colette and Connor are in lovvveee or so it feels. And when Colette tells her mother she needs alone time with Connor, away from her brother, her mother grants this wish to her. She even leaves a box of condoms, in order for them to be truly safe.
But Colette's not ready for that quite yet. Even though she's told Connor she's 18 (she's not -- she's 15) and that she's experiences (she's not -- she's a virgin), when the time comes for them to take their relationship somewhere more physical, she takes a stand and says no.
That's when Connor gets back at her for her lies.
It's all a rouse so he can get her to sleep with him. And yes, it's a big charade for a sexual encounter, but as he tells her later, he's gone further. It was a conquest for him. To make it more disturbing, he's not 18 like he claims.
He's 21.
Since no sex goes down -- Colette figures him out before it could happen -- there's no rape, no charges. But she wants to get back and get even.
Except, Colette comes around before the big "gotcha" happens.
The turnaround in Colette is believable and I was appreciative of it. I didn't love her as a character but that's why I was compelled by her. In fact, when she was prepared to take Connor for a ride herself, I was really invested. Would she REALLY go through with her plans or was this a rouse on us, as readers?
Spoiler
And in the end, we don't really know.I felt the end of this book was almost a cheap way out of the story. But I had to remember the main character is 15 -- just turned 16 at that point -- and so it was less of a cheap way out and more of a realistic way out of HER story. I believe her and it, even if it wasn't my favorite ending.
Sones masters verse novels. This is how verse WORKS. It plays with the story, and it tells enough, leaving enough UNSAID to make the reader wonder where and how Colette is leading us on. Her voice is spot on, and I thought the relationship she had with her learning-disabled younger brother was sweet and authentic. The wrap up with her mother and her mother's boyfriend was a little schmaltzy for me, but it was believable in context of the story.
This one is for YA readers who like challenging characters, who like verse novels, and who are good with "tough" topics like sex, drugs, and drinking in their books. Even though Colette is on the younger side, this is one to hand to younger teen readers only if they're ready and like those topics tackled in their books (and many do!). I wouldn't put this on the level of Ellen Hopkins in terms of content, but I'd say it's a stepping stone to readers who will go to Hopkins down the road.
Longer review to come!
zoemig's review against another edition
Fifteen-year-old Colette is the daughter of a famous movie star, or maybe she’s the eighteen-year-old daughter of a movie star’s stand in. Depends who you ask, and Colette always has another story ready to tell. She’s addicted to lying, and who can blame her, it’s the most fun she can have while keeping her clothes– especially when her mom drags her away to spend her summer in the middle of nowhere on location. That’s where she meets Connor, gorgeous, older, funny, Connor, and so what if she tells a few lies? If he knew who her mother was, there’s no way he’d be interested in her. But as Colette’s fibs begin to pile up it’s not long before she realizes Connor may be keeping a big secret of his own as well.
It’s probably expected given that the main character is a compulsive liar, but I didn’t actually like Colette very much. I found her judgmental and a tad bit selfish, but given what she’s going through–a 15-year-old with an absent mother falling in love for the first time–I think those traits are probably authentic. It just didn’t make me love her, which made it difficult to have sympathy for her at times. I kinda liked that though, not everyone is totally innocent.
I did feel like Colette’s voice felt so real and the story itself was smoothly told and easy to read. I haven’t read a YA novel by Sones before for some insane reason, at least not that I remember, so I’m glad I finally got a chance to pick up a book by this master of verse. I was so inspired by her skill and storytelling-ability.
I found the relationships between Colette and her family members very genuine. This is a book that plays with extremes at times, but I still think it was honest and realistic as well as entertaining. Some of the lies are pretty funny, but at its heart, To Be Perfectly Honest by Sonya Sones has an emotional core with a heartfelt message. That said, as much as I loved the book, I wasn’t 100% blown away by the ending, which I found a bit predictable and easy, even if it was believable. I did love the ambiguity of the very last page though!
For readers hesitant about verse (you shouldn’t be!) here’s a quote just to show the simplicity and impact Sones’ writing can have (quote is from an ARC and subject to change):
“Connor laughs–a deep, throaty laugh.
And the sound of it
vibrates all through me…
like I’m a wind chime
and he’s
the breeze.”
Ultimately, even though To Be Perfectly Honest by Sonya Sones wasn’t a flawless novel, it was one I really enjoyed and basically devoured in an afternoon. Sones’ writing is approachable and honest, even if her main character isn’t! If you’re interested in a an easy-to-read story with a surprising amount of heft behind it, I highly recommend this book. I’m so glad I decided to read Sones’ latest novel, and I know I’ll be reaching for her blacklist in the future.
It’s probably expected given that the main character is a compulsive liar, but I didn’t actually like Colette very much. I found her judgmental and a tad bit selfish, but given what she’s going through–a 15-year-old with an absent mother falling in love for the first time–I think those traits are probably authentic. It just didn’t make me love her, which made it difficult to have sympathy for her at times. I kinda liked that though, not everyone is totally innocent.
I did feel like Colette’s voice felt so real and the story itself was smoothly told and easy to read. I haven’t read a YA novel by Sones before for some insane reason, at least not that I remember, so I’m glad I finally got a chance to pick up a book by this master of verse. I was so inspired by her skill and storytelling-ability.
I found the relationships between Colette and her family members very genuine. This is a book that plays with extremes at times, but I still think it was honest and realistic as well as entertaining. Some of the lies are pretty funny, but at its heart, To Be Perfectly Honest by Sonya Sones has an emotional core with a heartfelt message. That said, as much as I loved the book, I wasn’t 100% blown away by the ending, which I found a bit predictable and easy, even if it was believable. I did love the ambiguity of the very last page though!
For readers hesitant about verse (you shouldn’t be!) here’s a quote just to show the simplicity and impact Sones’ writing can have (quote is from an ARC and subject to change):
“Connor laughs–a deep, throaty laugh.
And the sound of it
vibrates all through me…
like I’m a wind chime
and he’s
the breeze.”
Ultimately, even though To Be Perfectly Honest by Sonya Sones wasn’t a flawless novel, it was one I really enjoyed and basically devoured in an afternoon. Sones’ writing is approachable and honest, even if her main character isn’t! If you’re interested in a an easy-to-read story with a surprising amount of heft behind it, I highly recommend this book. I’m so glad I decided to read Sones’ latest novel, and I know I’ll be reaching for her blacklist in the future.