A Field Guide For Heartbreakers by Kristen Tracy
My review:
I’m not really sure what this book was about, therefor trying to write a short and catchy synopsis proved to be not happening.
I literally cannot figure out what I just read. It was like the slowest moving, most random train ride to no where I’ve ever been on. It wasn’t a atrocious book, as far as the writing went, though I would have cut about sixty pages myself, but the book was just completely odd.
I am trying to split this review between, why is was so, so very, very, very weird and why I didn’t like the book, because after a while, the cooky became endearing. I began to feel like I was at a slumber party, it was three-thirty A.M and we were all punch-drunk and slap-happy, by we, I mean myself and the voices in my head. That is the best way to describe reading ‘Heartbreakers.’
Alright, so here goes the “editorial” review:
I didn’t like any of the characters, I mean, Corky aside, like, really, really aside, there was nothing critically unique about anyone. Well, Veronica was unique, but I really hated her, I would never be her friend if I knew her in real life and Dessy is boring, thus a pain to be in the mind of. All the boys blended together for me, except Waller, real name Walnut, because he kept acting ridiculous and was basically a louse due to his new ageist attitudes toward Dessy and the world. Roger so belongs with Dessy because he is boring. Frank is weird and bald. Kite, who was that again? Boz is the only guy I liked, not because of who he was, but because Veronica treated him like trash. The dialogue was forced, I would laugh at girls who talked and acted the way Veronica did, and Dessy’s intermonolouge was oppressively mind numbing.
I couldn’t figure out if the whole thing was some big universal joke, the way most of the English students essays were, or if the themes were meant to vaporize the way they did. I really cannot imagine the person who picked this up and thought, hey, let’s publish this, it’s so grounded and interesting!
And now, for the reasons you will look at the book sideways:
1) In one of the hot-dudes stories he tells a goat to “come” in a milking scene. It was metaphorical, and I’ll let you figure that one out.
2) Tick tock, tick tock
3) Corky is a roommate who has plans to murder both Veronica and Dessy because she writes a blog about maiming deer and Veronica stole her ankle bracelet
4) Fox sex, twice.
5) The fact that for the most part the characters just seem to evaporate
6) Veronica is always quoting clichés wrong which isn’t very funny
7) We know nothing about Dessy, we know less than nothing about Roger, the two never have any kind of connection, and yet we know all along they will end up together
8) Dessy’s ex laminates her three main flaws to make up for the fact that he was cheating on her with a girl who wears mallard earrings and that is why Veronica flips out and breaks up with her boyfriend Boz who was helping a foreign exchange student build a dog house. Oh, yeah, that seems like a great plot line to me.
9) The names Tracy picked are- Waller, Kite, Boz and Hamilton for guys. WHY?!
10) Random, unsolved “daddy issues” for both girls, it didn’t strengthen the plot (what plot?)
11) The back cover was a riot! The scene written on the back cover now reminds me of those movie commercials where the editors choose all the funny parts to make sure they draw a crowd to their dull, plotless movie.
12) One hot-dude shaved the head of another hot-dude and the now-balded former hot-dude shaved hot-dude two’s eyebrows in retaliation.
13) Dessy never hears any criticism for her story, I think the story was the point, wasn’t it? I don’t know
14) My critique for the writers group would have been, get over yourselves and stop being so stick-up-my-butt pretentious!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yep, I would have used that many exclamation points
15) There was no revelation, there was no motivation, there were no emotions, the plot made no sense and then it was over and you’re left thinking- what just happened to me?
Alright, so there you go, read at your own risk, you’ll be wondering what happened to your brain after it’s all over.
Thoughts on the cover: the only good part of the entire thing.
Notes on the names: I hate these names, I have a theory that in order to write a winning book you must put essential time and effort into naming the characters, because it will strengthen your relationship. Kristen Tracy is helping positively prove my theory. The only good name was Tabitha, I think an English professor named Tabitha is perfect, it doesn’t give you a sense of mothballs, or fire red lipstick, somewhere in between.
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