Hello Everyone!
Playing Tyler by T.L. Costa
Publication Date: July 2nd, 2013
Publisher: Strange Chemistry
Source: E-ARC from Publisher (Thanks!)
Rating: Did Not Finish (Read around 100 pages)
My Review:
First, this review is only intended to give you, my reader, and account of my thoughts of Playing Tyler.
After reading about a hundred pages of this book I was tired of trying to become interested in this novel. It was just too difficult.
Job. Hunt. Tear. Jazz. Silver. Clap. Huh?
I began Playing Tyler
with similar disorientation and the anguish resurfaced throughout the book. I understand that the writing style portraying Tyler’s
point of view was meant to read as an authentic portrayal of a person with ADHD. Its just that every time Tyler was thinking, I felt an ache in my brain reading pages full of disorienting and constant run-ons. I am no Grammar Queen and I glad that Costa was trying to make Tyler genuine, but I just could not enjoy his point of view while noticing all the grammar errors.
I want to read a book today. Sigh. Me too.
I breathed a sigh of relief whenever the story wandered to
another point of view that thought in the standard English I am used to
reading. I was surprised of the change of character. I began this book thinking
it would stay in Tyler’s view entirely. This point of view was Ani a gammer and a sixteen-year-old girl hired by a company to create a stimulation. Ani never reaches the bounds of moving off the page into a memorable character as she is a typical nice girl who likes playing games. Tyler is close to the main who hired Ani. The man Rick and Tyler gladly agrees to be a beta-tester of the stimilation. Rick promises to help Tyler become a pilot and Tyler loves video-games.
Then comes the quick romance.
After their initial meet-up, Tyler emails Ani constantly for weeks and she never responds. Then, suddenly she does and they immediately rush into loving each other.
And then I relented in deciding to stop trying to read this book.
Simply because the book was hard to read and never had an entertaining factor. I hope this book would be a Ender's Game-espce novel since it was described to be about a gamer encountering a realistic gaming system. Instead it became an awkward, and somewhat uncomfortable romance.
Thanks for reading!
I always find it quite interesting when authors alter language to fit their characters, but it does sometimes take me a while to adapt to really unique styles. It's a shame that it wasn't as easy to read here as it could have been. And a rapid romance, too? I really don't think this book is for me now. Thanks for the honest and helpful review, Rachel!
ReplyDeleteAww, I'm sorry that this was such a disappointment, Rachel!! I can definitely see how the messed up format/grammar of Tyler's POV could make it really hard and irritating to read. Honestly, I think it's risky to try to do that, and it only works well if it's executed well (such as in Blood Red Road, which is awesome read!). It sucks that it didn't work out here. :/ And gah, insta-love! I seriously hate with that happens with romances! Because it's just so unrealistic, you know? Like, romance like that never happens in real life.
ReplyDeleteLovely review, Rachel, and thanks for such honest thoughts! <3
Too bad on this one Rachel! I can definitely see how Tyler's POV would be jarring and hard to settle into initially, and I would likely breathe a sigh of relief when it switched to Ani's POV as well. I'm all for a romance in a book, but definitely not of the uncomfortable and insta-love variety, so I think I'll pass on this one!
ReplyDelete