Alma Presses Play
By Tina Cane
3 stars
Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All of the opinions are my own and this did not affect my review in any way.
When I received a copy of this book I had no idea what it was about but both the cover and the format looked beautiful so I decided to give it a go. Although this book was not necessarily for me I am still able to appreciate what it tried to do and I did end up enjoying my reading experience.
Alma Presses Play is a lyrical novel-in-verse that takes us through the journey of coming of age in New York during the 80s. We follow Alma, whose life is a series of halfways. In this world of confusing beginnings, middles, and endings, is Alma ready to press play on the soundtrack of her life?
Unfortunately this book did not live up to my expectations, I was hoping for a beautiful coming of age story written in verse and honestly this felt a little short. Don’t get me wrong, it is not a bad book in the least, but I wanted more. The plot seemed nonexistent, the characters had no depth to them, I never got to really connect with anyone and honestly it was just a little boring.
The main two issues I have with the book are minor, firstly, through the summary of the book we are lead to believe that music and the Walkman make up a huge part of Alma´s life and even though we do get to see Alma listening to music, music is not a main topic of the book as I was hoping it would. Secondly, the references to mythology and poetry felt a little too much for me, I love getting some references but it felt like each page had a new reference and I became a little overwhelmed by this.
I know it seems that I didn’t like the book at all, but there are some things I quite enjoyed: first, I love Alma´s trip to San Francisco it was very refreshing to see someone discover a new city a new culture and those chapters were my absolute favorites. Second, I love the diverse representation this book offers, we get to meet various different characters that bring the book a new and fresh perspective. And finally, I have come to love books written in verse, I don’t know why but for me, verse is a way of conveying a lot of emotions in just a few words and it was amazing.
Overall, even though this book did not meet my expectations I am still able to appreciate how it may work for some people and I would still recommend people to read it if the premise sounds intriguing to them.
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