[독서리뷰] Wait For You by Jennifer Armentrout

Being my first time ever reading a contemporary romance novel, this review will be more about the genre than this specific book. That books with such colloquial (and rather puerile) writing style are regular NYT bestsellers came as quite a shock to me. Not that I didn't enjoy the book - I enjoyed it immensely, but not in the way its usual readers would; I guess it is somewhat similar to the joy you get from watching a toddler play.

The writing style immediately reminds you of your typical blonde American high school. "It was so not my idea" "So not the case" "I could so kiss him right now" etc. The key point is to italicize the word "so". In addition, cussing was sprinkled here and there in inappropriate places as one would during teenage years when daring to utter those words were thought of as genuinely cool. I think "way to the mother fucking no" kind of sums it up. Fortunately, the use of cussing was limited enough for it to look marginally cute. 

Not that I want to make fun of the book entirely. The conversations between Avery (the protagonist) and her friends and the remarks made in them made me smile like an oldie reminiscing the good old days, especially with a gay guy called Jacob pumping energy into the group. "We are your friends," said Jacob. "It is the law of friendship that you tell us things you don't want to tell us."

The ridiculous confidence of Cam, Avery's wooer and eventual boyfriend was also cute and entertaining, although it got a little repetitive and annoying by the end. 

"I'm not going out with you, Cam."

"But you will eventually."

"You're delusional."

"I'm determined."

"More like annoying."

"Most would say amazing."

"Only in your head."

"In many heads is what you meant."

Of course, such confidence would have been nothing short of unbearable if Cam were not the most absolutely perfect guy. He is unrealistically well-built, smart, sensible, caring, active, and, well, hot. But thinking again, this guy is bad influence; girls expect guys to be like this, and guys think they can pull this off. Especially since the main body of readers is at their impressionable ages, the authors of this genre should be careful about pushing it too much. 

This genre is often called "contemporary romance," but it is nothing of the sort. Rather, if I could be bold enough to create a new genre, I would place the book under "fantasy comedy". It just made me burst out when the book showed Avery's unspoken smugness when Cam chose her even though Stephanie the Hot Girl made brash advances on him; Stephanie never loses in the real world.