Weekly Reading With Why We Broke Up {Audiobook Edition}

{Sep 17, 2012}

Weekly Reading With Why We Broke Up

Weekly Reading With Why We Broke Up {Audiobook Edition}

Why We Broke Up, Daniel Handler and Maira Kalman (Illustrator). Narrator: Khristine Hvam

Min Green and Ed Slaterton are breaking up, so Min is writing Ed a letter and giving him a box. Inside the box is why they broke up. Two bottle caps, a movie ticket, a folded note, a box of matches, a protractor, books, a toy truck, a pair of ugly earrings, a comb from a motel room, and every other item collected over the course of a giddy, intimate, heartbreaking relationship. Item after item is illustrated and accounted for, and then the box, like a girlfriend, will be dumped.

The audiobook narrator was fantastic. This is my 3rd audiobook narrated by Hvam (after Daughter of Smoke & Bone, and Pure), and she was able to capture the snarky, witty banter that seemed to be the trademark of Min, the main character of the book. She did an excellent job with the male voices too. The audio production also had a few sound effects which added to the story and made up for not being able to see the cute illustrations at the beginning of each chapter of the physical book.

BUT, I am SO glad this book is short, otherwise I don't think I would have made it through to the end. I accept the blame for even picking this up in the first place (damn you Amazon Best Books of 2012 So Far list) ... I knew that I shouldn't be reading a book about why a relationship that lasted less than 3 months, between 2 16-year olds ended! The book is just boring after a while - Min is overly verbose in an obnoxious sort of way that made me dislike her character, plus there was an obscene amount of references to old movies & movie stars that no one has ever heard of - turns out, that's because none of the movies or actors/ actresses exist - they were made up by the author.

Maybe this is intended solely for teenagers EXCEPT I would NEVER advise a teenage girl to give a letter to an ex-boyfriend detailing all the things she thought and all the obsessive things she did during their relationship, ESPECIALLY if he's on a sport's team - basketball, football etc. That's just asking for it to be shared with everybody he knows & joked about. I gotta say that Why We Broke Up might be the least enjoyable book I've read all year (and I've read Fifty Shades of Grey). (Audiobook| Goodreads)

Currently Listening To and Next

World War Z (Book) The Inquisitor (Book)

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, Max Brooks. The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. (Amazon| Goodreads)

The Inquisitor, Mark Allen Smith. Narrator: Ari Fliakos.
Geiger has a gift: he knows a lie the instant he hears it. And in his business--called "information retrieval" by its practitioners--that gift is invaluable, because truth is the hottest thing on the market. Geiger's clients count on him to extract the truth from even the most reluctant subjects. Unlike most of his competitors, Geiger rarely sheds blood, but he does use a variety of techniques--some physical, many psychological--to push his subjects to a point where pain takes a backseat to fear. Because only then will they finally stop lying. (Amazon| Goodreads)