Book Review–Tell Me Three Things
Tell Me Three Things by Julie Buxbaum
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Like Alex, Approximately, but actually good!
Overall, I give this book 4/5 stars.
Seventeen-year-old Jesse moves to a new town after her mother dies and her father hastily remarries to a woman in LA he barely knows. Soon after her arrival, she gets an email from young man who offers her advice and friendship, and the two develop a connection that we see deepen over the course of the story. This young man calls himself “Somebody Nobody” and refuses to tell Jessie his real name.
I won’t say the actual identity of who “Somebody Nobody” actually turned out to be, but I will say THANK GOODNESS it was the guy I was hoping it would turn out to be. For about 100 pages near the middle of the story, Jessie convinces herself that SN is actually Caleb, a 2D carboard cutout piece of man meat,and I was just like
But then it turned out to be Ethan, and then I was like
As always, here are three good aspects of this book and three not-so-good bits.
The good bits
1. The romance
Well, for a book marketed as “romance,” the main romantic relationship has to be good. And it was. I wouldn’t call it swoonworthy by any means (manly due to my issues with Jessie, see my note below) but it was believable, clean, and healthy, based around the deep connection that two people share instead of sex or abuse or what have you. We got to know the real life SN at the beginning of the story, which was one of my main issues with the similarly-premised book Simon vs. the Homosapiens Agenda. As such, when we finally do get to know who SN actually is, it’s a pleasant surprise rather than a WTF like Simon.
2. It had a good, interesting plot with realistic, flawed characters
Yeah, this was just a really fun read start to finish. Never once did I get bored with the story or want to DNF it like I do with so many other books. Considering I have a very high standard for what constitutes a “good book,” I’d say this is one of those “good books.” The plot is interesting and easy to follow, the characters are unique, real people, it wrapped up perfectly (also to this book’s credit, it knew when to lower the curtain, rather than Simon, which dragged on its ending forever) and there’s just not much else to say on that front. I really enjoyed this book from page one to the end.
3. The friendship between Scarlett and Jessie is ADORBS
This book features a strong female friendship between Jessie and Scarlett, her BFF from back home in Chicago. While in LA, Jessie is in constant contact with Scarlett, and though Scarlett gets forgotten for about 100 pages in favor of Adrienne, I like how this led to a conflict between Scarlett and Jessie and Jessie had to come to terms with the fact that she’s kind of a needy friend, using Scarlett as a shoulder to cry on or a validation of her feelings instead of it being a two-way street and letting Scarlett occasionally steer the conversation or talk about herself.
The not so good bits
1. Constant sex/drug use by main characters
I won’t say that YA novels can never have sex or drugs in them, but this one had underage sex, drugs, and alcohol, all partaken of by sixteen year olds.
And all with no consequences, I might add. None of the adults find out what the kids are doing, they don’t come to realize the error of their ways, and the only consequence we ever see is that the girls are adamant about using condoms and going to the gynecologist, which I mean, promoting safe sex, I guess? *shrug*But it also promotes kids smoking weed without a prescription and drinking so much beer they get blackout drunk, so there’s also that.
2. Caleb (and a few other characters, but mostly Caleb) had no reason to exist
At one point, we meet a young man named Caleb who befriends Jessie, and he was literally stuck into the story to be a red herring. He had no personality, no presence, no motivations relating to the story, nothing. He was just there for Jessie to drool over. Why did we need him? We really didn’t.
3. Jessie is an annoying b*tch
Yeah, you read that right. She is literally the reason I gave this book four stars instead of five because she essentially ruined the story. At every opportunity, she was drooling over any cute guy she saw. She apparently loves reading, but we never see her actually taking part in this or any other hobby. She has no motivations or goals in the story apart from “Find Somebody Nobody and make out with him.” She didn’t really have an arc, for the most part. Oh, and here’s the kicker. Every single cute guy in the vicinity wanted to get in her pants because she’s just the ultimate Mary Sue. Caleb, the exist-for-no-reason hunk, wants her to go out with him. So does her poetry-loving cutie pie classmate Ethan. And it’s not as if Liam broke up with his girlfriend in order to ask her out… oh, wait, he did. This girl has no personality and I really do not like her. Her fawning over every single guy before actually figuring out who Somebody Nobody is was the single reason I didn’t like the romance as much as I should have.
In summary: A fast read that I couldn’t put down, ruined only by the presence of our Mary Sue protagonist and side Gary Stu possible love interest for her. Pick this one up if you’re looking for a good You’ve Got Mail retelling with a solid conclusion. If you think this book would be a good read for you, you can follow Julie Buxbaum on Twitter and add this book on Goodreads!
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What is your favorite trope in romance stories? Mine is the “online relationship turned real” one! I hope to see you back next Sunday for another book review!
