Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

After reading all the reviews here, I was expecting to read a beautiful, masterful, moving story. Instead, what I got was the distinct feeling that I was reading a Young Adult book geared towards the 12-16 year old female demographic. Warning: This may be the harshest review I've ever written about anything. Ever. So don't read on if you've decided you're going to feel personally offended by an opposing viewpoint. I understand that this tale is being told through the voice of a teen girl, hence the naive and youthful tone, but I really feel it could've been done in a more lyrical, artistic way. I was expecting something along the lines of Alice Sebold's "The Lovely Bones" -- which was literary art. It was transcendent. However, listening to Mia's "thoughts" was like nails on a chalkboard for me. Listening to a pretentious 17-year-old girl who lacks any real depth because her life has been SO charmed really grated on my nerves. I didn't care about any of the characters -- none were particularly likable because they were all so cliche'd and caricature-ish. I was irritated to the point of exhaustion by constantly hearing how awesomely fun and rad and liberal the parents were (it's like, WE GET IT ALREADY! The parents were ex-rock star hipsters! How surprising and unexpected!). And Mia's boyfriend is a handsome and famous rock star himself who -- gasp! -- surprises everyone by actually falling in love with her even though she's just a "nerdy" Juilliard-bound classical musician! Wow, what a hip dichotomy! Mia's backstory reads like a condescending junior-high romance novel, or a very bad Nickleodeon sitcom. The whole story came off as juvenile, amateurish, one-dimensional, incredibly cheesy (especially the parts that were meant to tug at the heart strings), way too obvious, and full of tired stereotypes. I couldn't get into it but forced myself to get to the last page, because I held out hope 'til the bitter end that this story might somehow redeem itself and resolve in a beautiful or unexpected way. I was sadly mistaken.