The Geography of Lost Things by Jessica Brody

Wildcard ~ June

geographyoflosthings

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

My opinion in three sentences:

So many times I am sucked in by the blurb of a roadtrip YA, only to not really gel with it or to be disappointed. Offering some niche presentation elements and a more (initially) relatable protagonist, Brody’s version proved better than most for me, and had its fair share of twists I didn’t necessarily expect. However, the romance soon took over, which wasn’t really something that held my interest (and certainly didn’t set it apart from its contemporaries), leaving a slightly disappointing and almost meaningless tie up to the original tale the blurb so dashingly promised.

(Without spoiling anything) the best bit:

When it’s a familiar trope, it’s always nice for a refreshing twist in the presentation to give it an extra bit of zing (as well as for it to have its own unique take, twists or theme). One of my favourite parts of this was the character trait from our protagonist that Brody took and ran with, embedding personality-style questions into the text, and adopting their ludicrous and bizarre phraseology. In fact, if I could have had more of this right through the book, I’d have loved it even more (because it did sort of peter out as the tale unraveled….)

A warning for the book:

It’s all change part-way through, with the sideplot suddenly coming front and centre and the main plotline being relegated – permanently, not just for a chapter or two. The romantic undertones between the two main characters took over, and the story I thought at the heart of it all (a journey to discovery better her relationship with her Dad, and to come to terms with/find a way out of losing her childhood home) got sidelined. I found this a real shame as it was the second of these that gave the book a different edge from its contemporaries in handling this trope, and I think that a continued focus on this would have delivered a better story overall.

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