Recent Reads: We Used to be Friends by Amy Spalding

Source: From Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This in no way alters my opinion or review.

We Used to be Friends by Amy Spalding 
Publisher: Harry N. Abrams
Publication Date:  January 7, 2020 

 

Format: Ebook


Rating: DNF at 58%


Goodreads Synopsis:

Two best friends grow up—and grow apart—in this innovative contemporary YA novel

 

Told in dual timelines—half of the chapters moving forward in time and half moving backward—We Used to Be Friends explores the most traumatic breakup of all: that of childhood besties. At the start of their senior year in high school, James (a girl with a boy’s name) and Kat are inseparable, but by graduation, they’re no longer friends. James prepares to head off to college as she reflects on the dissolution of her friendship with Kat while, in alternating chapters, Kat thinks about being newly in love with her first girlfriend and having a future that feels wide open. Over the course of senior year, Kat wants nothing more than James to continue to be her steady rock, as James worries that everything she believes about love and her future is a lie when her high-school sweetheart parents announce they’re getting a divorce. Funny, honest, and full of heart, We Used to Be Friends tells of the pains of growing up and growing apart.

Review: 

I have been sitting on this book for a while and finally took the time to pick it up. I had heard a lot of good things about it when it was released but it just wasn't for me. I ended up deciding to stop reading around the 58% mark. 

This book is told through alternating point of view - James and Kat, but it is also told in two directions, so one story moves forward in time and the other one moves backward recapping events. When we meet James, she and Kat are no longer friends and James is about to go to college and in Kat's story we start at the beginning of their last high school year.

The reason that I decided to give up on it is because I am not sure where this story could go that would make me want to finish it. It is all about their friendship but I was not really invested enough in either character to really give it my all. From what I read, both Kat and James are flawed and their friendship suffered because of both of them. 

Kat is the popular girl, seemingly self-centered, and her dialogue was written too well there were a lot of "likes" and "duhs" when she speaks which was very annoying to read and very stereotypical. Although I know a lot of people talk like this is was off-putting to read. James is part of the track and field tiean and quiet, almost nerdy. It was a little weird that these two were friends and it was hard to tell how they got there becuse of this story. Kat also would probably have more of a clique is she was popular, before she befriends all of Quinn's friends. (At least this is how it would have been when I was in High School). 

Although I liked that there was a focus on LGBTQ+, it felt fast and forced at times, at one point Kat had no idea she liked girls, and then she is all in. That is great, but seemed a little unrealistic. Overall this romance seems forced. 

While I found these things problematic, the biggest issue was the friendship between Kat and James. James did not give enough of herself to the friendship and Kat was too self-centered to even notice that James was detaching. Both were at fault in their own ways, but I was able to figure this much out at 58% and decided I didn't need to read any more. I didn't really like how either character was handling it or themselves.