I was just browsing through my local bookshop when suddenly, a wild book appears! The book is called Tape by Steven Camden and it looked very promising! I have a rigorous system when it comes to choosing books. Here is the brief version:
- Look at the title and front cover.
- Put the book back on the shelf.
- Pick the book up again.
- Read the blurb.
- Put the book back.
- Pick the book up again.
- Read the first sentence of the first page.
- Carry the book around the shop for a while.
- Put the book back.
- Pick the book up again and go pay for it.
And this book passed this system with flying colours! The book even had reviews on the cover saying it was incredible, an amazing debut etc. Everything is great, right? Right?!
*WARNING: SPOILERS*
The main character, Ameliah, is a bit of a wet blanket. She seems to be just a boring, generic, teenage girl. But wait, her parents are both dead! That means she’s relatable, yes? Well actually it hardly even mentions the death of her parents, and the dad just isn’t around until the last chapter where you find out he died of cancer. Although throughout the book there are weird random pages of italics which we later find out has some vague connection to the death of her dad.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention, the tapes that Ameliah owns allows her to talk to the past version of her dad. The reason I almost forgot this is because it is only brought up three times throughout the book. So let’s just get this straight. There’s a magical tape that allows you to talk to the teenage boy version of your dead dad, and that’s not the main focus of the book?!
Her nan has so many male friends, I’m starting to think that she may not be as innocent as you think! Seriously, Richard, Joe, etc. etc. I can’t get it all straight in my head. It’s so confusing! Plus the nan ditched her date and left him standing on her doorstep with a bunch of flowers, for no particular reason? Not cool, nan.
Main character meets a cute guy, they end up exchanging numbers and making the popular girl jealous (like every movie, ever!). But then nothing happens! They don’t ever talk or see each other again. Why did you get my hopes up, Steven, why?!
Joe, one of the random dudes Ameliah’s nan hangs around with, turns out to be Amelia’s dad’s step-brother. Confused yet? Yeah, me too. Even though Amelia’s dad doesn’t even like his step-brother, he asked the step-brother to look after his little girl after he’s dead. Right. So the dad asked a man he doesn’t like to look after his daughter, when she has a perfectly good nan who already looks after her?
The layout in this book is infuriating.
-I’m your daughter.
-Whaaat? No way, I’m like 15 you can’t be my daughter
-Nah, it’s me.
Do you see how frustrating this is?! No speech marks, no “said Ameliah” so I ended up re-reading conversations so many times just to try and keep track of who said what. Plus, the author sometimes indicates who’s talking (as it switches between the two characters) and sometimes he doesn’t. So I’ll be reading one page, turn to the next and suddenly I’m in a different time period. That’s not confusing at all.
I don’t usually dislike books this much but this one just annoyed me right from the beginning! Have any of you read this? Let me know what you think! And as always if you want to chat to me, just get in touch, and if you have any ideas for my future posts I’d love to hear them.
Thanks for reading!
I am so glad I read this as I have seen this book while I’ve been book shopping, but there have always been ones I wanted more. I hate it when it’s difficult to determine who is speaking, it’s a major turn off in a book!
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Same here, it’s one of the things I really hate. I understand him wanting to make his book stand out, but to use hyphens to show when someone is speaking, and to not use speech marks is just completely ridiculous 😦
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I know, and it’s even worse if you like the sound of the book and you’re really interested, but the thing putting you off most is the lack of punctuation.
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Oh wow this sounds really confusing! The dialogue is something they do in a lot of Spanish books I believe (at least it was like that in every book I had to read for Spanish. SO confusing, especially since I didn’t know the language that well!), but I’ve never seen it in English
Wait, so the tape isn’t even the main plot? But but… The title is literally ‘Tape’. That’s very misleading.
Great review! I’ll stay away from this book, as it sounds waaaay too confusing for me. So thanks for the warning haha
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Right?! Why would you name the book Tape then have the main characters wonder around being useless! It just seemed like he tried to put so much into the book, but didn’t focus or explain anything properly. Haha, no problem!!
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I read a book once when I was in high school, and I don’t really remember what the name of it was, but it was literally backwards. Everything in it was backwards. I tried to read it the way you’re suppose to and it made no sense what so ever.
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It’s so frustrating when you read a book over and over again and you still don’t have a clue what’s going on!!
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I get that! Books make me think, but I don’t want to think too much about what I’m trying to read.
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Exactly, I like a book that makes me feel and think about the characters. But I don’t want a book that makes me question whether I’m actually reading English or not 😛
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Exactly!! Oh and also one time-my school’s book club has this book that it was in like a slang language. The. Whole. Book. I had no idea what it was talking about or what I was reading. It kind of made sense in the end but all the way throughout it I was clueless.
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Oh my gosh no, I couldn’t deal with that!
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I really didn’t want to but I had to stay in the club. We were suppose to be meeting an author later in the year and I was excited for that. But she never came so I suffered through all of that for nothing.
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That really sucks! That’s such a disappointment 😦 Who was the author?
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I don’t remember honestly. I wish I could remember the book too but I don’t. I know it was kind of like the book Fallen. The same kind of stuff happening in it. Maybe I will ask my friend later and she may know.
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Ah okay, I remember reading Fallen ages ago, can’t remember anything about it though 🙂
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I’m so glad that I’ve read your blog because I was thinking about buying it but now I won’t. Thank you!!! Typical teenager x
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Give it a go if you want, but it was so difficult to read and it just seemed like the author wanted to cram as much stuff into a book as possible but didn’t actually elaborate on anything 😦 Thanks for reading!
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No problem! Please could you read my first blog?? It would mean the world 😀
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You don’t need to ask people to read your posts, most of us will go to your blog if you comment or like our posts. I completely get that you’ve just started and you’re excited and proud of your posts, and that’s awesome but you don’t need to ask, most of us will just do it anyway.
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Thank you I doesn’t really know that so thanks!! 😀
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It’s okay 🙂
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The cover looked really cute but… Now, I’m not so sure anymore!
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Right! I was so disappointed!
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I feel you! ;-;
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Books like that makes you wonder WHY it was even published.
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Exactly, I can’t believe this was read by editors and reviewers and publishers and they all thought it was good!
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Maybe they were bribed by the author with money lol
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That must be it 😛
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Gaaah! My brain just exploded. I hate it when I can’t figure out who is speaking. Hyphens? Ugh. At the same time, you have made me a bit curious too.
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Haha, yes, hyphens! Who does that?! Go for it, just let me know what you think 🙂
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I refuse to read this now simply because of the lack of speech marks. What the hell.
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I know right! I get the author wanted to stand out, but come on, getting rid of speech marks is just crossing a line!!
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YES! And not saying who spoke? That’s just rubbish writing!
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Ha thanks for the heads up, if I saw the book I’ll probably buy it because, just look at the cover?! It’s just too pretty 😄
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I know right, the cover looked so sweet! It was such a disappointment 😦
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Who the heck doesn’t use speech marks?! Ridiculous and infuriating.
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My thoughts exactly! Speech marks are just essential to a book, it was so weird reading a book with zero speech marks in!
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no speech mark seriouly….
”spoiler alarm”
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Haha, yeah it was so off-putting!
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hahhah it would hv been really good wd speech mark cuz it sound s good
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WHAT!? Lack of plot, lack of quotations, and who knows what else! We need to burn Tape…sorry I get angry about these types of things.
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I feel you, it’s so frustrating!!
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