Friday, December 28, 2012

Going Too Far by Jennifer Echols - Book Review

HOW FAR WOULD YOU GO? 
 
All Meg has ever wanted is to get away. Away from high school. Away from her backwater town. Away from her parents who seem determined to keep her imprisoned in their dead-end lives. But one crazy evening involving a dare and forbidden railroad tracks, she goes way too far...and almost doesn't make it back.
 
John made a choice to stay. To enforce the rules. To serve and protect. He has nothing but contempt for what he sees as childish rebellion, and he wants to teach Meg a lesson she won't soon forget. But Meg pushes him to the limit by questioning everything he learned at the police academy. And when he pushes back, demanding to know why she won't be tied down, they will drive each other to the edge -- and over....



This book is bad.  No getting around it, it was the worst read of the year for me, and one of my worst reading experiences ever.  I finished this novel weeks ago, but I was just too infuriated by it to attempt writing a review.  I think I’ve cooled off enough since then to not become a puddle of gooey rage and expletives, so here goes.

First off, let me address the rating; 4.02 average, as of the time I'm writing this review.  I'll be honest, it's what reeled me in.  And caught me like a fish on a hook, in for the same amount of torture.  Now I'll admit to being on the outside of a lot of book hype; I was one of the seven people in the entire world who didn't like Divergent.  But I would read a dozen Divergents, two City Of Bones, and top it off with an entire reread of the Twilight saga over subjecting myself to Going Too Far again.

Sound harsh?  Well, it is.  But this is a novel that prompted me to make a whole new goodreads shelf to showcase it's absolute crappiness.

Now, for the examples; From page one, it becomes evident that the writing is sub-par.  Sure, there are a few paragraphs, maybe even an entire page here and there, that don't make your eyes bleed.  But for the most part, the writing is overly obvious, the attitudes forced, the descriptions repetitive, and some of them just flat out don't make sense.  “I couldn't see his face, but I could tell from the way he walked that he was a teenager." "I knew it was too good to be true when it got even better." There is even an instance when Meg can hear John blush.  Not hear his blush in his words.  Hear John blush.  Now I'll forgive a lot, but that is physically impossible.

But Meg's sudden bursts of super-human senses weren't even my biggest pet peeves.  No, that goes to the most retardedly used, beat-the-reader-over-the-head-with-it metaphor I have ever read.

Meg has blue hair.  She dyed it a while ago to stand out or announce her rebelliousness or whatever.  And don't worry about forgetting Meg has blue hair or mistaking it for purple or green down the line, because we are reminded of Meg's blue hair.  A lot.  A whole freaking lot.  Even more than we're told about John's dark eyes, we're reminded about Meg's blue hair.  It got to the point where I would let out an audible growl of frustration every time I read about the color of her hair.  I was growling a lot by the end of this novel.

And the thing is, she acts like it's a freaking stamp on her forehead proclaiming her a lecher or something.  I don't know about you, but I actually think a chick with blue hair is kinda hot.  Especially when they're not, you know, thirty.  Meg constantly tells herself John can't like her because she has blue hair.  When his friends point out the proprietary way he watches her, Meg's internal reaction is this; But my hair is blue!

Who.  The.  Eff.  Cares?

See, there’s this thing that happened to Meg in her past, a very bad thing that is made totally unbelievable by the totally crappy writing of Echols’.  Anyway, this thing has led to an immaturity and rebelliousness in Meg, and her blue hair is supposed to symbolize said immaturity and lack of self-growth.  Hence the metaphor.  It is pointed out and shoved down your throat so much that by the predictable ending, it’s downright insulting.

Now, since Going Too far is supposed to be a contemporary romance, I should probably add something about Officer John After, or Johnafter as Meg calls him.  While he’s not as infuriating as Meg herself, he’s still an impossible character to like.  I didn’t care about him.  His big “reveal” seemed only slightly less forced and overdone than Meg’s, and there was not a single scene in the entire novel that made me feel the chemistry between the two.  And more than a few that made me actively dislike them together.

I do not get how this book got so many positive reviews.  I really don't.  It is one of only two books I've ever rated one star, which should prove that I don't give this rating out lightly.  It actually makes me angry to think about it, and that has never happened before.

Huh.  Looks like I couldn’t write this review without dissolving into a puddle of gooey rage.  At least I kept the expletives out.

Going Too Far – 1 out of 5 stars

11 comments:

  1. Hi, I love you. Seriously. This book is the worst. I read your goodreads review and immediately wanted to join just to be your friend. How can people love this book so freaking much?! The Blue Hair. And the whole he-must-be-50-years-old-no-actually-he's-19? And the everything else. Ugh.

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    1. Thank you so much! Your comment has officially made my day...er, night, since Google+ is always late on my comment notifications.

      You have no idea how refreshing it is to hear someone else hated this "book" as much as I did. I feel like the entire world has been infected with brain worms that don't do anything except make their host love this horrendous book, and somehow I'm one of the few who has been spared. It's the only explanation for why so many people go ga-ga over it.

      Don't even get me started on that whole "middle-aged cop who has a wife and three kids, but wait no he's 19 and we went to school together" thing. Ugh.

      Again, thank you so, so much for your awesome comment, and for restoring my faith in the reading community. I'm so glad you found my blog! :)

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  2. I had wanted to read this one but after reading your review I think I'm going to take it off my tbr list and save myself some money lol!

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    1. Lol trust me, that is money well-saved. Unless you were going for very expensive, very painful toilet paper.

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    2. Haha I'll just go buy myself a different book ^.^... or the new pokemon game, Yes I still play pokemon and no I am not ashamed! XD

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    3. Dude, Pokemon games are awesome! They were pretty much my gaming childhood. I used to be addicted to the Gameboy versions.

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  3. Oh wow, thank you!!!! That definitely put a huge smile on my face! :) You rock, Sarah!

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  5. ^_^ Well you were my first blogging buddy and your blog is amazing so I simply had to nominate you.

    (I somehow deleted my comment before...that's weird XD)

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  6. I had this on my TBR list too, now after reading this, I'm contemplating about taking it off as well. I think I will end up hating it as much as "Before I fall" (you can check out my blog for a review of it, although I tend to be a little overly diplomatic sometimes).

    I think a lot of times these books get high ratings because A. some of the readers/reviewers are relatively young (talking teenaged) and B. some people just tend to look past these annoyances and just look at the storyline and the romantic aspect and consider it a fun read (I admit that I've fallen victim to that quite a few times myself). Plus, some of the books that are put out these days are so low from a literary standpoint that people have learned not to expect much sometimes. We do, that's why its hard for us to understand their viewpoint.

    Yet another honest review. :)

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    1. Oh yeah, I definitely agree with that. It seems like any book high on romance becomes popular these days, even if the content...well, sucks, as with Going Too Far. :/ If you value decent writing, trust me, taking this off your TBR shelf is a good move.

      I'll definitely check out that review!

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As you may or may not know, life is eating up way too much of my spare time right now, so pretty please don't hate me if it takes me a few days to get back to your wonderful comments. I read each and every one from my phone, and they always make my day. <3