Solitaire by Alice Oseman; a Review by Emily Shunk
Solitaire
Written by: Alice OsemanReview by: Emily Shunk
Tori Spring hates herself. Her favorite activities include blogging, watching films on her laptop, and drinking diet lemonade. With the beginning of a new year at Higgs, strange post it notes lead her to an empty computer lab where she runs into Micheal Holden. Both of them were driven by their curiosity of the post it notes, which declared the existence of a blog named Solitaire.
As the first semester goes on, Solitaire continues to make more and more elaborate pranks, pledging to the students of Higgs to make the year a little more interesting. As these pranks continue, Tori realizes more and more that there are way too many coincidences tying herself to these elaborate and cruel pranks that Solitaire is pulling. As these pranks escalate further and further, so is the drama among Tori's peers. With no one else seemingly paying attention, Tori realizes its up to her to figure out who is behind these pranks.
Solitaire is very much a coming of age story. It goes through a typical high school's life, as well as having the elements thrown in by solitaire. I originally picked it up hoping it would be a good mystery- maybe a horror as it was placed in that section of books. I was fairly disappointed within the first few chapters that it was very much not. The plot moves very slowly, and honestly it was kinda hard to find the motivation to read it. Normally I finish a book the day I pick it up, (although it is often 2-6 am when I finish it). However, I finished this book over a month after I first checked it out from the library. I can't remember the last time it took me so long to read a book, and it isn't even that long. It was a fairly good book, it just was lacking that extra spice that makes it good. It was simply 'meh'.
As to the actual plot of the book, the huge plot twist/climax was just boring. There was a whole cringy romance plot- which didn't seem to fit very well. The main character, Tori, is a depressed teenager and the entire book it kinda frustrating to read because it's just a circle of the same exact theme. Tori gets mad at one of her friends. Tori is depressed, drinks diet lemonade, and stays up watching movies and scrolling on her blog all night. Tori goes to school begrudgingly, and sees her friend. There is an awkward, weird apology. This cycle repeats. After maybe the second time, it gets very old very quickly.
I feel like a lot of this book is boring. The twists are boring. The romantic subplot has about the quality of a stale piece of bread.The main characters are dull. Overall- just boring and not worth the month I spent reading this. I would much recommend One of Us is Lying (my review here: https://blogfrogclogsmog.blogspot.com/2019/10/one-of-us-is-lying-by-karen-m-mcmanus.html). Out of ten, I would give Solitaire a 5/10. It''s not good, but it's not the worst book. Read it if you want to, but be aware that it's a very slow book that isn't always that interesting.
I like how you prepare the readers that are going to read this book for the good and bad sections of the book. That way, the reader can know if the elements of the story that interest them are in this book. At first when I started the review, I thought the book was really interesting. I might've even read it if you hadn't told me about the boring and "spiceless" parts of the book. It seems like you gave a very accurate description of the book. Nice job on the review!
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