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HAPPY READING

May 11-14

A funny and timely debut YA about the toxic masculinity at a famous improv comedy camp

Seventeen-year-old Zelda Bailey-Cho has her future all planned out: improv camp, then Second City, and finally Saturday Night Live. She’s thrilled when she lands a spot on the coveted varsity team at a prestigious improv camp, which means she’ll get to perform for professional scouts—including her hero, Nina Knightley. But even though she’s hardworking and talented, Zelda’s also the only girl on Varsity, so she’s the target for humiliation from her teammates. And her 20-year-old coach, Ben, is cruel to her at practice and way too nice to her when they’re alone. Zelda wants to fight back, but is sacrificing her best shot at her dream too heavy a price to pay?

Equal parts funny and righteous, Unscripted is a moving debut novel that Printz Award winner Nina LaCour calls "a truly special book, written at exactly the right time."


Review: I loved this book it was a very emotional read but it was funny to . This is about Zelda she is going to a improv camp with her brother and his boyfriend. She meets her bunkmates and they are all very different but awesome girls . Zelda has to deal with a coach who is abusive asshole and her teammates are Jerks who don't think girls are funny . A lot goes on in this book Zelda also meets some great boy scouts Jesse namely is my favorite he is actually kind to Zelda and respects her. Ben is a monster he assaults her she kicks him to get away he yells at her tells her the only reason she's on the team is cause she's hot and she's a girl but he's 20 and she's 17 she's a minor yet he touched her inappropriately many times and when she tries to tell the two Paul's in charge they don't listen. She goes on a hike with Jesse and she tells him she likes him and then when she gets back at camp Ben is there and he hits Jesse and then she hits Ben where the sun don't shine and she gets kicked out of camp yep thats logic but she ends up staying with Karen the nurse at boy scout camp. And the police officer asks her if she wants to press charges she thinks about it for a second and then the Paul's say if she doesn't press charges she can come back to camp what a bunch of assholes so she presses charges. They ended up sneaking her back onto camp so she could meet Nina and they do her sketch she wrote . Everyone needs to read this book.

Quotes:

The situation should be if you two are happy together, everyone else should be happy for you. And not gross-happy.”

Lady doctor? I guess that makes you my gentleman patient.” I looked down at his “chart.” “Ah! I see you’ve had a series of brain injuries that make you say inappropriate things.

I was relying on books by Rainbow Rowell and Nicola Yoon and Maurene Goo and on movies like The Princess Bride and Love, Simon 

Hey, Ellie. Come on,” Ben said. “Smile.” “She doesn’t have to smile if she doesn’t want to.”

Is that what you want, Zelda-girl?” Hanna asked. She pushed my knee. “Someone who’s only nice to you sometimes?”

If I leave, they’ll have won.” “If you stay,” Sirena mused, “doesn’t that excuse their behavior?


Will stopped walking. “You know, I’m offended by that. Guys everywhere should be offended. ‘Boys will be boys’? What—we’re so out of control we can’t be kind? Thoughtful? Human? ‘Boys will be boys’ aligns us with wild animals. I can think about what I say before I say it. I can anticipate how someone else might feel before I do something. I can keep it in my pants.”

wow  everyone needs to read  this book 

Please note that I received this book via NetGalley. This did not affect my rating or review.

Ohh boy. This was a drag. I was hoping for a cute chick-lit to get me through a long weekend and I almost gave up a few times while reading. Also there's no damn Happily Ever After (HEA) that I could see so this being in the romance category of NetGalley and Goodreads ticked me off. The main character sucked (Nick) and I didn't really get a sense of Ellie at all. My main issue is that this book jumps around timelines so much I didn't have a great idea of what was going on. If this had been the published book maybe there would be more cues that would help me out. I don't know.

"Love, Unscripted" follows Nick who gets dumped by who he considers the love of his life, Ellie. Nick thinks of his life as a Classic Romance Movie at all times pretty much. Or at least the book is littered with those references. After Nick is dumped, he starts trying to re-examine his relationship with Ellie. Think of Nick Hornby's "High Fidelity" but less good. I didn't really enjoy Nick and Ellie was an enigma. 

The book is set up in three I think timelines. I can't recall. Thank goodness for the notes I jotted down. Timeline 1 is 2008 (When They First Met). Timeline 2 is (Present Day which I think may have been 2012 or 2013. I can't recall) and Timeline 3 starts to show the cracks between Nick and Ellie from 2008 onward. The flow was up and down and didn't go together very well.

As I already said, the ending was just a big no no in the romance world. 

This comes under the heading of women’s fiction so it probably serves me right if I don’t enjoy this much. Although I’ve not read it (but seen the film): it reminds me of High Fidelity but the references are all related to films this time with others about music with which I am not familiar. Nick, the narrator, takes us through his first “date” with Ellie, alternating chapters with their break-up and the end result. Because it’s a first-person narrative, there’s a lot of introspection. It’s straightforward but lacks humour. Not really my cup of tea but I’m sure that many will enjoy it. I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.