A wickedly comic feminist mystery about the dark side of a hopeless romantic's seemingly perfect love story—for readers of Jessica Goodman and Kara Thomas.
Alyson is a romantic, and sometimes it gets her into trouble. Like last summer, she thought her co-worker was into her, when in reality he found her flirting pathetic.
Then she meets Brenton Riggs Jr., and right away she knows that their connection isn’t just in her head. When he swoops in to save her one night from a less than savory party encounter, she falls head-over-heels. Finally, someone Alyson likes who likes her back!
But when she finds out about the King’s Cup—a competition the guy’s at their boarding school started to see who has the most sexual prowress—she’s put on edge. Does Brenton really want to be with her, or is he just trying to win? Then Alyson and the other girls at the school start a competition of their own: The Queen’s Cup. It’s all about reclaiming their power. But as the compeition heats up, Alyson’s relationship begins to fall apart—and it isn’t long before the cracks in her perfect love story start to show through.
Alyson is a romantic, and sometimes it gets her into trouble. Like last summer, she thought her co-worker was into her, when in reality he found her flirting pathetic.
Then she meets Brenton Riggs Jr., and right away she knows that their connection isn’t just in her head. When he swoops in to save her one night from a less than savory party encounter, she falls head-over-heels. Finally, someone Alyson likes who likes her back!
But when she finds out about the King’s Cup—a competition the guy’s at their boarding school started to see who has the most sexual prowress—she’s put on edge. Does Brenton really want to be with her, or is he just trying to win? Then Alyson and the other girls at the school start a competition of their own: The Queen’s Cup. It’s all about reclaiming their power. But as the compeition heats up, Alyson’s relationship begins to fall apart—and it isn’t long before the cracks in her perfect love story start to show through.
Title: The Revenge Game
Author: Jordyn Taylor
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Expected Publication Date: 11/7/23
Review:
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children's for providing me with a copy of this book to read and give my honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own. Thriller, mystery, wicked comedy, let me at it! I was excited to start this one and see where it went. A girl who wants romance and then meets the guy of her dreams. It all seemed so perfect, until it wasn't. What I liked: I really like the cover of this book. Once you start reading, the symbolism of it definitely pans out. Plus it gives me a bit of an 80s vibe (though there is nothing 80s about the book at all). The news reports and interviews interspersed with the flashbacks that lead up to the tragedy. I think the former did a great job building up the mystery and kept you wondering just what would happen. I enjoyed the feminist theme for the most part. The concept of reclaiming their girl power was also very enticing. I love to see a book where the female characters aren't afraid to stand up for what they believe. And to believe in themselves. This book definitely had that vibe going. The MMC, no, I didn't love him but I did see right through him from the beginning and that made me like him more than any of the other characters in the book. The author's potential is there. I think her writing could use a bit more fine tuning but overall I can see future books will be fun to read. What I didn't like. Alyson, ugh. She was just so wishy washy for me. And super naive. I just don't find that to be the case with teens her age. I wanted to love her and cheer her on, hope for the best because I love romance. But she spent the whole book worrying about whether or not she was coming off too strong, or not strong enough, or looking like a nerd, or anything else than seeing what was right in front of her. I pinned what would happen from the very start. It never sat right for me and I just could not see how she didn't see it. It made me mad for her ad at her! And I hated how she justified how it was ok that she didn't participate in the revenge even though she was the one who started it. The revenge. Like, I get it. The boys are doing harm so you want to get back at them. But is this truly the message we want to send to our teens? It's ok to seek revenge because and eye for an eye and all that? No, I would not want my child thinking it was ok. And also, without spoiling too much, the mystery that gets revealed. The complacency of the teacher that is involved, and the fact that the girls involved just move on like it was not a big deal. They will carry that secret for the rest of their lives and, despite how terrible the MMC is, how can you say anyone deserves that? The mystery/thriller angle was never really there for me. Because I figured it out right from the start. It was too predictable. And there were no twist and turns, no cliffhangers to really drive the story forward. The sex ideas. For the most part I find this to be an important conversation for teens as we all know they are introduced to such themes very early on these days. But how they were presented in the book were very raw. It was like zero to 60 in three seconds with no build up, no nothing. And for YA, it was more graphic than I thought it would be. The ending. WHAT EVEN WAS THAT? Like, men suck, I'm done, let's date? It just felt forced. There was nothing organic about it at all. I feel like the author wasn't sure how to end the book, so she just threw it in. Had there been some build up to it during the book, I would have felt much better about it. This was a quick read but mostly because I just wanted to get to the end. I found much of the book boring and felt I had to push myself to truly move on and get to the end. Unfortunately, not really to my liking but I can see where teens may enjoy the story.
Author:
Jordyn Taylor is a New York City–based writer and journalist, currently the deputy editor at Men’s Health magazine; her work has appeared in the New York Observer, Mic, and Glamour.com.
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