ShakespeareZombie

ShakespeareZombie

Friday, October 27, 2017

Things I'm Seeing Without You by Peter Bognanni


"Find out what you want. Find out what you don't want. Screw up some more. Get your heart broken again. Try to be decent along the way. That's how you make a life..."

Tess is not okay. Her online boyfriend Jonah just committed suicide. Out of grief, she drops out of high school and moves in with her estranged father. One of her first actions upon arriving is to symbolically purge herself of Jonah by literally dumping her laptop in the lake, after which she jumps in the lake herself. So, yeah, the poor girl has some issues to work through.

Tess' dad used her college fund to pursue his latest career path: funeral planning. He has mixed results. There was a dog funeral that ended with explosives...it wasn't great. Tess ends up helping him plan a funeral for a prized race horse, and it's a massive success.

Tess partners with her dad with the agreement that he will pay back her college fund. Their newest venture: planning a life celebration for a former burlesque dancer before she succumbs to Alzheimer's. They grow closer, and things start looking up for her. Then she gets a Facebook message from Jonah. Impossible, right? Not so much. I'm going to spoil the plot twist, so look away if you don't want to know...

*MAJOR SPOILER AHEAD*
It turn out that part of the time that Tess had been chatting with Jonah online, she had actually been talking to his roommate Daniel. Obviously, this is deceptive and all kinds of messed up. Tess starts to talk to actual Daniel and together they work through feelings about Jonah and his sudden death, and it's kind of nice.
*SPOILER OVER*

 It was nice to be able to see Tess' journey as she went through the process of grieving Jonah. I also liked seeing her bonding with her father. Things I'm Seeing Without You definitely seemed to try its hardest to be quirky and unique. I wasn't always feeling it, but it was still a pretty good story. There was a lot of hope in the ending, and I liked that a lot.  

I received my copy of Things I'm Seeing Without You from the Goodreads Firstreads Program, courtesy of Dial Books. It's available for purchase now.

Thursday, October 26, 2017

Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia

"LadyConstellation is the hero who defeats Eliza Mirk once a week and celebrates with her many admiring fans. She is beloved by all, even the villain, because without her the villain wouldn't exist.
I am LadyConstellation.
I am also Eliza Mirk.
This is the paradox that can never be solved..."

Francesca Zappia's first book, Made You Up was a beautiful, funny, and weird. I absolutely loved it. Therefore, I was beyond excited to read her follow up, Eliza and Her Monsters.

Eliza Mirk is the Weird Girl. She used to be normal, but now she is either ignored or ridiculed. To be honest, she doesn't really mind. High school is just something to get through until college. Besides, Eliza doesn't need friends in real life...she has plenty online.

She is the creator of the incredibly popular webcomic Monstrous Sea. Under the username LadyConstellation, Eliza publishes the comics, sells merchandise, and chats about teen soap Dog Days. Only her closest friends, Emmy, a 14-year-old college student, and Max, a twenty-something Canadian, know her true identity. Her parents and brothers also know about the comic, but not how big it is, or how important it is to her fans.

One day Eliza uncharacteristically defends the new boy in school against some bullies. He was writing fanfiction about Monstrous Sea, so Eliza considers it her responsibility to help. The bullies grab some of her rough drawings, and she ends up bonding with the new boy, Wallace, over the comic. Wallace is tall and big like a football player, but he never talks. He prefers to write notes back and forth. It turns out that he is also a major player in the online fandom as rainmaker.

Eliza doesn't want to tell Wallace who she is, but they continue to grow closer. He is writing a novelization of Monstrous Sea, and asks Eliza to read it and offer critique. She doesn't want to, but it turns out that his writing is amazing. She urges him to share it online. Wallace invites her to a Halloween party at a bookstore where she meets his friends, who are all very active on the Monstrous Sea forums. They get so close that they hold hands, he even talks about kissing her...which makes it so much harder that she still hasn't told him she is LadyConstellation.

I definitely related with Eliza, especially her view of high school. My teenage years were spent alone, although I didn't create any massive online universe. Unfortunately, I also didn't bond with the new boy in school and start an adorable, nerdy relationship. Eliza and Her Monsters was another fantastic novel from Francesca Zappia, and I highly recommend it. It's got funny moments and moments that made me cry when I read them on my break at work (Awkward). I must confess that I couldn't quite understand what we were shown of Monstrous Sea, but it sounded pretty cool. And, as always, I love me some nerds in love.