Bummed Out City

First of all, let me point out that I was given this book for review and in exchange to give my honest opinion.

With that said, this book bothered me quite a bit and it took me a long time to get through it. The main character, David, is this unlikeable character that doesn't have much going for himself. He is mad at the world, depressed, and barely doing anything to change. Throughout the entire book, he didn't seem to change. In the beginning, he was very much against any type of change. He would argue against it with his girlfriend, Carol. Then about two thirds into the book, he decided to play adult. Act like one kind of and do what Carol wanted even though that isn't what he wants. He seemed lost for pretty much the entire book. That was one sad character.

I didn't see any character development till about the last chapter of the book. The way he spoke also annoyed me because he never seemed sure of himself. There were a lot of “whatever”, “I mean”, “um”, “I don't know”'s after literally everything he said. It was very hard to read. The author wrote the dialogue like most people talk but that is not always the best for a book. For a main character, I would of liked to see a lot more of character development by at least half way in. He did somewhat but you could tell it was all fake. That he was just doing it for the sake of his relationship.

By the end of the book, things seem to be getting slowly better for him despite what happened to him. He had to deal with a lot of bad luck and it seemed like he would give up. He doesn't though and he gets some breaks here and there. He doesn't seem to do anything for himself though. Everyone is handing him all these opportunities and he is just like “ok maybe”. Like come on, do something about it! He had no confidence at all and I think that is what hurt him the most as a main character, an author, and a person overall. It was just a really frustrating character to read.

For the other characters, I would say that there wasn't a lot of description and background story for them. You just got about a paragraph of description and were back reading the present dialogue. I would of liked to see how Carol and David got together. They seemed to put up with each others problems too much to make me personally want to stick around in that relationship. The character development for the story is just what bothered me the most. I felt no connection for any of the characters.

Overall, this book was alright. I wouldn't of picked it up myself if I wasn't given it for review. I was excited to read about it and hoped that it would be a good book outside of my usual comfort zone, but I was wrong. Maybe it just wasn't the right book for me and what I enjoy to read.