Written by another young adult author who will be attending LeakyCon Lit (along with John Green, Maureen Johnson, and Robin Wasserman among others), I picked up Friend is Not a Verb in order to get a taste of his writing.
Friend is Not a Verb is the story of Henry Birnbaum, a soon-to-be junior in high school whose sister disappeared a year ago without goodbye or explanation and the police on her tail. Now she's back and he has no more explanation than he had before, his girlfriend just broke up with him at the same time she kicked him out of her band, and his parents are (as usual) generally being crazy.
Henry (or Hen, as he is usually referred to) is slowly going crazy under all the stress and secrecy. It isn't until his sister convinces him to start taking bass lessons from her not-a-boyfriend/partner-in-crime, Gabriel, that he hatches a plan. He's going to find out for himself why his sister disappeared. He'll collect all the clues he can, run them over with his best friend, Emma, and solve the mystery himself . . . all while doing his best to chase his dream of becoming a rockstar.
Honestly, this book was only okay. I was initially pretty interested by the summary, but it all seemed to fall short for me. There never seemed to be a real climax in the story. Yes, there were little excitements and resolutions, but no real climax. It was a bit disappointing.
On the other hand, I have to admit that Ehrenhaft did manage to create some interesting characters. Each had their own quirks and passions, weird families and habits. I definitely appreciate that in a writer. His characters were three-dimensional, but there wasn't enough development for anyone other than Hen. That was another bit that was missing.
All in all, it wasn't a waste of time, but I don't see myself reading this book again any time soon. Go ahead and read it if you're interested, but don't get your hopes too high.
Rating: ♥ ♥
That's the wonderful thing about being so miserable: It allows you to see your faults with perfect clarity and still feel detached enough to be okay with them.
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