Why The Haters is absolute shit
The Haters is a sorta “adventure” book centered around three kids, Wes, Corey and Ash, who are musicians, and is written by Jesse Andrews. Ash immediately catches Wes and Corey’s attention as the usual straight relationships in subpar books go, the “boys fall for this hot girl, while the chick ignores them but then realizes one of them isn’t an absolute weirdo and has a great personality, and falls for him.” Except that this time, they become friends after a jam session and leave the camp. They go through various different gigs, from playing in a people Chinese restaurants to sitting in a hot tub with complete strangers.
Personally, I didn’t particularly like the book. It was bland, and the characters just seemed like bored teens with nothing to do, rather than these cool epic kids who were going to explore a musical journey. Especially since Core and Wes kind of only went because Ash was going. So, the inciting incident, when it was supposed to be like an explosion but really was more like a melting slab of ice cream in summer, started the book off, I was more than a little skeptical of the quality of this gremlin.
Now, here is where it gets really, really annoying. Conveniently, Ash has this billionaire dad that, conveniently, doesn’t care if she uses his money. So, now they don’t have to worry about shelter, food, hygiene, any of that. Maybe the author wanted us to focus more on how they developed as a group, but to be honest, there are better ways of doing that! Where's the struggle? The people at the Chinese restaurant being annoyed by them there? Them not getting their dream bikini when they go hot-tubbing with strangers? They’re not in any perilous test to survive!
Besides, the characters are blander than Hendrick House’s sandwiches. They didn’t learn, didn’t grow in any such way. At the end, Ash is still an immature kid, Corey is still a total dumbass, and Wes is still a skimpy kid with no real life skills. Hendrick House is also still inedible.
Now, with such a shit plotline and no character development, the author adds even more bs: really, really dumb situations that the kids just happen to get into. They go to a bar, (and are underage, mind you), and oh wow, there’s a guy who's into gigs! And now, he invites them to his house where Wes finds another hot girl and Corey almost commits suicide! What even is that? Like, if you’re going to add crazy things, at least make the series of events logical! It’s just Hendrick House coleslaw, if you think about it; weird, mismatched and something someone definitely would not enjoy processing.
Personally, as, you can see, I thought the book was really dumb. I don’t know who to recommend it to. Perhaps it should be used in an experiment measuring human sadism, as this Andrews guy dedicates a whole section where Corey and Wes describe so called “dick harm”, that made 5 perfectly trash plotline pages unreadable for me. By this point, the author just seems like that kid in highschool that has no real sense of humor, but thinks they have the funniest slaps in the world when their entire database of jokes consist of knock-knock or nsfw ones. You can’t even compare to Hendrick House anymore; Hendrick House, as disgusting as it is, isn’t this vile.
To sum it up, the TL-DR:
Bad characters
Shit plotline
F-ed up events
Moldy Humor
This book was a waste of my time, energy, and overdue library loans and I would not recommend it to anyone.
Great review Renee! Love the Hendrick House references! I could nearly taste the slimy coleslaw in my mouth as I read this book review. I could almost feel the soggy cabbage and carrot pieces squelch with each bite. You could almost say that this book is like one of their spinach cheese wraps: bad and moldy.
ReplyDeleteThanks Jay! I'm so glad that my review made you think of Hendrick House; you sound very upbeat when you talk about the moldy lunches!
Deletebland af burritos
Deleteso true though😭
DeleteGood review. This sounds like a fun book that I may want to read it myself sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI loved how brutally honest you were. It seems like a stereotypical boring adventure story with no creativity. I will definitely never read this book.
ReplyDeleteWow, that title makes good clickbait! (Except the content is good). You wrote with so much excitement and energy that I'm excited. Kind of tempted to ignore the non-recommendation and read this "You can't even compare it to Hendrick House" of a book. Great review though, definitely up there on the engagement level.
ReplyDeleteyes clickbait is quite effective
DeleteOmg renee I'm totally reading it now. It seems like the author was really bored and made the book, and I bet any song lyrics in it are very funny. Andrews dood clearly said "f-it" and just published the book, while Hendricks house actually tries to make their food better. You had so much fun bashing it and I want to read it so I can bash it too, or find something the author did well (even Hendricks house slaps sometimes yk) to spite you.
ReplyDeleteHey Renee! I loved the comparison to the utterly disgusting hendrick's house lunches. Thank you for your brutal honesty about this novel. I will steer clear of this dumpster fire book.
ReplyDeleteAfter seeing that title I just had to click on it, and I'm glad I did because you made a boring and overall bad book into a really entertaining review. It was really passionate and I enjoyed your references to Hendrick House's questionable food. Great review!
ReplyDeleteThis was a great review Renee! I loved how you gave accurate comparisons to the hendrick house lunches. Your title was definitely very intriguing and the content was even better. The book seems really interesting even though it seemed like it was really bad. Good job!
ReplyDelete