Songs About a Girl, by Chris Russell

Songs About a Girl is the debut novel from Chris Russell, and also the title of the debut album from hot new superstar boyband Fire&lights. The book opens with Olly Samson, a formerly ordinary 18 year old from Reading, who went to school and liked singing and had a lot a friends. Olly Samson has just got in touch with protagonist Charlie Bloom; a shy, retiring nobody, a year 11 student and amateur photographer that is invisible to the majority of the school population. That’s fine by her because she prefers to go unnoticed. Olly Samson is also a member of Fire&Lights and he’s just messaged Charlie on Facebook asking her to attend one of their sell out arena gigs as a backstage photographer.

Initially freaked out, she declines and shares the news with her computer nerd best friend Melissa (incidentally a hardcore Fire&Ligts obsessive) who talks her into changing her mind. Charlie attends the gig with her battered, second hand camera and bonds with the band. They get friendly, her candid shots are good, they go down well with the fans and the management. She becomes something of a regular at their shows, travelling around the UK to different cities, growing closer to moody Gabe and nice guy Ollie. But when a photo of her and Gabe is leaked onto a fan blog, her identity is revealed by online trolls and Charlie gets plunged into the paparazzi filled world of celebrity and anonymous, online abuse.

There’s also a bit of mystery thrown in when Charlie realises that a lot of Fire&Light’s lyrics bear a striking resemblance to snippets of poetry in her dead mother’s notebooks, lifted word for word from the pages. How can that be? Are the songs about her? Are her and Gabe connected in ways deeper than rock star and a girl ‘not-like-other-girls’?

I must guiltily confess, as bad and as awful as it probably makes me, that I really did not get on with this book. I’ve thought hard about whether or not I should review it or just let it go- but I want to be properly honest. It falls into quite a few of the YA pitfalls (Kooky best friend, at least one deceased parent, love triangle, not like other girls) and I found the prose style quite disjointed and bitty and a bit too propped up by adverbs.

Firstly, I found the characters incredibly one dimensional. As the reader, I wanted to get in Charlie’ s head more, really connect with her insecurities and fears. I love the introvert character type, identify with it hugely. But there was nothing here. I wanted to go with her on a journey somewhere, be there when she realises her true worth. Unfortunately she is characterised mostly by a beanie hat. Her only worth seems to come from having lads punching each other in the face over her. I was just wistfully remembering Toria from Juno Dawson’s All of The Above and what an EXCELLENT hipster loner weirdo she is.

The members of Fire&Lights were also flat, stock characters that were more annoying than anything else. Yuki was immature and irritating, throwing food literally ALL THE TIME, engaging in lame, cringey banter that I guess was supposed to be funny and endearing but just made him seem like an overgrown child. Aiden, the blonde Irish one (wonder who that’s supposed to be?) was just straight up dull. The sensitive one, has a guitar, the one that seems really normal. Gabe and Olly. Fire and light. One a lean, intense feisty bad boy, the other a muscular nice guy and impulsive protector. Points two and three of the love triangle.

Speaking of which, the Young Adult audience has had more than its fair share of love triangles, and this book just delivers another average arc. The steamy, volatile bad boy; dangerous, exciting, sexy. Or the guy who’s just really nice. The one that treats you well, is there when he says he will be, and doesn’t let you down. Lots of to-ing and fro-ing, while still quite being convinced that *neither* of them could possibly like her.

I get that I’m not the target audience for this. I know that Boy Band Lit is alive and well, and that this will almost certainly be a welcome and much enjoyed addition to that genre. Fans of Girl Online are going to love it; girl with camera forms unlikely relationship with sex god rock star. Internet fandom launches hate campaign against girl. Girl regroups.

This book will probably be very popular, and I hope that it is a success. It’s wish fulfilment fame fantasy of the highest, most fulfilling order. It’s Cinderella for the tumblr generation. I just really didn’t like it- but I’m going to assume that won’t have any impact on its popularity.


Thank you to @HachetteKids for the review copy- I'm sorry I wasn't feeling it on this occasion

Dandelion Clocks, by Rebecca Westcott

Throughout Dandelion Clocks Liv narrates us through her life from "Thirteen Weeks Before" to "Six Months After". The book begins with a scene that many 11 year olds can relate to; after sneaking out to get her ears pierced, Liv is discovered. then yelled at by her super embarrassing mum in the accessory shop, in front of all the cool girls from school who are going to assume she's a loser. Correctly, because she's nearly 12 and has never had a boyfriend.

When we first meet Liv, she is quite selfish and immature. But she is only 11, so we can forgive her. She spends most of her time avoiding Moronic Louise at school, daydreaming about Ben, taking photographs and keeping her older brother Isaac out of trouble, who has Asperger's Syndrome and gets very agitated if his carefully planned routine is disturbed. Liv doesn't see why she can't have her ears pierced and why she, the younger sibling, has to be the responsible one. Her parents are so uncool and strict and unreasonable.

However, Liv has to grow up fast, and all of her little problems and petty complaints suddenly seem unimportant. It starts with her mum out of the blue showing her how to cook a bolognaise and how to put on make-up, she takes her to buy her first bra (unnecessary as of yet), and loads of new clothes. She takes her to get her ears pierced. Something is wrong- though they're having fun, Liv keeps catching her mum looking sad and she keeps crying all the time- not proper crying, but Liv notices the silent, single tears slide down her cheeks.  We learn, along with Liv, that her mum is really, really ill and is unlikely to get better.

It's through this tragedy and upheaval that Liv's character really starts to develop. We see how much she loves her mum and dad, what good care she takes of her big brother and the talent and passion that she has for photography. It seems contradictory, but it their family seems to grow closer and more united in the face of Rachel's death, and in a way it forces them to really make the most of their strong bonds. Obviously, it also makes everything seem all the more tragic and unfair. Liv is gifted her mum's diaries from when she was 12, in the hope that there might be answers in there when her mum isn't around to ask...These diaries give us (and Liv) insight into the life of a pre-teen Circe 1989 and it shows us that being 11 is stressful and excruciating and full of the same embarrassments and anxieties, whether its in the 50s, the 90s or the 00s.

I love how relatable this book was and how ordinary all its characters seem. The sudden loss of a family member is something that can and does happen to anyone, and the ordinariness of Liv's home life just reinforces that, Losing somebody so important at such a young age must be impossible to deal with, but I think that she handles it well- hitting rock bottom where even getting out of bed seems impossible and working up from there. I like that it shows that you don't have to have led an extraordinary life to have an impact on the lives of the people around you.

All in all, it's an emotional but heart-warming story about grief, bereavement and friendship that would appeal to fans of Jacqueline Wilson  and Annabel Pitcher and readers of A Monster Calls. It is sad, there's no getting away from it, but it's also a touching story of picking up the pieces and resolving to carry on with life. There are lots of themes of memory, loss and family and in places it's genuinely funny. Liv's friendship with BFF Alice is well portrayed (Alice is incredibly supportive and gives Liv space when she needs it, but she's there waiting when Liv is able to continue with her life) and I liked that while the book does give Liv a love interest (she is 12 after all, it would be weird if she didn't have some sort of crush) .