Charlie Grant's older sister is getting married this weekend at their family home, and Charlie can't wait for the first time in years, all four of her older siblings will be under one roof. Charlie is desperate for one last perfect weekend, before the house is sold and everything changes. The house will be filled with jokes and games and laughs again. Making decisions about things like what college to attend and reuniting with longstanding crush Jesse Foster all that can wait. She wants to focus on making the weekend perfect.
The only problem? The weekend is shaping up to be an absolute disaster. There's the unexpected dog with a penchant for howling, house alarm that won't stop going off, and a papergirl with a grudge.
There are the relatives who aren't speaking, the (awful) girl her favorite brother brought home unannounced, and a missing tuxedo. Not to mention the neighbor who seems to be bent on sabotage and a storm that is bent on drenching everything. The justice of the peace is missing. The band will only play covers. The guests are all crazy. And the wedding planner's nephew is unexpectedly, distractedly cute.
Over the course of three ridiculously chaotic days, Charlie will learn more than she ever expected about the family she thought she knew by heart. And she'll realize that sometimes, trying to keep everything like it was in the past means missing out on the future.
Blurb taken from Goodreads.
✼
I've read several books by Morgan Matson before, and loved them, so when I saw Save the Date had been released, I knew I had to read it! I always find Matson's books so light-hearted, easy to read, and genuinely enjoyable. I can say happily that this book was no different!
It did take me a little longer than usual to get into the story, but when I did, I finished the book really quickly. As the plot revolves around a big family wedding, there were a lot of characters to keep on top of, but when I persevered, I found that they were surprisingly easy to distinguish between. The story was also very charming, and I loved the idea!
This wasn't my favourite of Matson's books, but I still adored it.
Rating: ✫✫✫✫
SPOILER ALERT
The Characters
First thing's first, there are so many characters in this book, and they all get introduced so quickly that I fully expected to struggle in distinguishing them. It was tough at first, but it took a surprisingly little amount of time for this issue to disappear. The cast of characters was also so diverse that the book felt very well padded. Often in stories like this, the author focuses on just a handful of important characters, and so the book doesn't feel very real, or it feels like it is lacking depth. However, Matson does not shy away from creating a huge amount of well-constructed, relatable characters. I really enjoyed reading about the life of the Grant family at this wedding.
If I'm honest, the main issue I had was with the heroine, Charlie. There was nothing at all wrong with her, but I felt at times that she was too immature to really like. The way she freezes out her brother's girlfriend out of jealousy, and how she pines for Jesse; both instances occur regularly over the course of the book and I found them very annoying. I did have to remind myself on multiple occasions that Charlie is still young, and so these feelings she has are very legitimate at this time in her life.
I must say, however, that these flaws did make Charlie feel more real. She wasn't the typical teenage heroine who is boringly perfect, and it was really great to see how she developed as a character over the course of the book.
The Story
The plot itself I thought was brilliant. The idea of a family wedding, with a number of dysfunctional guests, and all of the problems that modern day wedding planners deal with - all made for a really great story.
The first chapter had me a little confused, however. The first chapter is about the history of Charlie and Jesse, and although now I can see the necessity for adding this chapter in, it felt very detached and out of place with the rest of the book. As soon as this chapter was done,. I was very confused as to whether this had actually happened, or if it was a dream Charlie had had, or what. It took me a while to understand that it was reality, but it had happened previous to the events of the wedding by some margin.
Nevertheless, the story progresses rapidly after this chapter, and so I wasn't left feeling this way for long. And I thought the way the different elements of the wedding went wrong, the way Charlie and Bill handled them, and the way the Grant family generally existed in this story were very carefully put together. Not a scene was out of place, not an event came at the wrong moment. It must have taken a serious amount of planning to fit all the little details of this book in, and I think it was done very successfully!
The idea of the Grant family cartoon strip was very different, but I really liked it. I thought it added an additional element to the story, giving it even more depth. It was a silly little detail that actually worked remarkably well within the story. Little details like Charlie's dad's battle with his neighbour, and the disappearing newspapers, and the way they made it into the comic strip were also very funny. I enjoyed hearing about the family reactions to the strips, especially in regards to Charlie's brother Mike, who was very opposed to the feature. The way the family had disagreements such as this made the plot a lot more real.
Making it even realer still was the fact that the Grant parents are revealed towards the end of the book to be getting a divorce, breaking Charlie's heart, and surprising the rest of her siblings. This was a really sad moment, as the Grants are obviously painted up until this point to be a united front, and it is clearly very important to Charlie that her family continue to remain close. I thought this brought the book back down to earth, and showed just how a family can remain, even if it is not in the originally desired form. Although I appreciated that Charlie and Bill became close at the end of the story, I'm glad that her family was the main focus.
The Verdict
From the moment I got this book, I knew I would enjoy it. Morgan Matson has a great ability to write engaging, exciting, and yet very real young adult fiction, and this was no exception.
The characters were very diverse and engaging. More importantly, they weren't perfect, and that is a downfall of many books like this, which hold characters that are too perfect for the reader to really relate to. Although Charlie did annoy me in places, she had real growth, and I think that largely contributed to why I enjoyed her story.
The story itself was also full of content and detail, and I loved every minute of reading it. More importantly, I really appreciated that this book's endgame was not necessarily about young romance. Don't get me wrong, I love reading stories about that, but Save The Date was different in that it focused on family love, and togetherness, as a bigger priority. I think the story was very emotional and very real, and I liked this perspective within the plot.
Although Since You've Been Gone still remains my ultimate Matson story, this was far from a disappointment, and I would definitely recommend it.
No comments:
Post a Comment