Book Review: LEAH ON THE OFFBEAT by Becky Albertalli
FACTS ABOUT THE BOOK
Title: Leah on the OffbeatAuthor: Becky Albertalli
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Price: $12.00
Pages: 243
Genre: Novel (LGBTQ*)
Year: 2018
BACK OF THE BOOK
In this sequel to the acclaimed Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda—now a major motion picture, Love, Simon—we follow Simon’s BFF Leah as she grapples with changing friendships, first love, and senior year angst.
When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic.
She’s an anomaly in her friend group: the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon.
So Leah really doesn’t know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high.
It’s hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting—especially when she realizes she might love one of them more than she ever intended.
Becky Albertalli returns to the world of her acclaimed first novel, Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, in this warm and humorous story of first love and senior-year angst.
Can you read it if you haven't read Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda beforehand?
Yes, you can. But..
I sort of did do that myself since it's been quite a while that I've read Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda myself - I think I read it for the first time in 2016. So I didn't really know much about those characters anymore and found it quite hard to keep track of all the different characters at first.
The book definitely expects you to know those characters and views itself as a sequel but after a while you'll get into it whether you've known the characters beforehand or not.
But since Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda is a wonderful book and since its movie has just come out, I would definitely recommend to you to read Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda first!
And this book obviously has major spoilers for Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda so if you want to read Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda one day, you should probably read that one first.
MY THOUGHTS ON IT
I love love love the cover. I wish there were more books in this beautiful colour and I think it's one of the prettiest books that I own. Turquoise is my favourite colour and this book sets such a beautiful contrast with the purple and I just adore the font and the drawing of Leah. So if I hadn't already loved Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, I certainly would have bought this book just because of the amazing cover!
So like I said, I found it quite hard to keep track of all the different characters at first. It felt as if the author expected the reader to have read Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda right before this book which caused some chaos for me. There were so many names and I just didn't know who they were and had a hard time figuring out who was who and who was related to whom in which way. I should have reread Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda before I read this because I decided to reread it after I've read Leah on the Offbeat and then I knew all the characters and could follow the story right from the beginning. But as I said- although I felt thrown into this group of friends at first - I figured it out eventually. I just think that it would have been nice if the author had included a little bit of a "previously on" or just some more details and reminders of the characters. That would have made the reading easier right from the beginning.
Ever since it got announced that Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda (how often have I written this long title already?) will get a movie adaption, I wanted to reread the book. But I didn't think to do so BEFORE I read Leah on the Offbeat so I spoilered myself a lot because I just didn't remember a lot about Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda anymore.
What I loved most about this book - besides its beautiful cover - were all the Harry Potter references! *-* If you know anything about me you know that I'm a huge Potterhead and that I love nothing more in a book than Harry Potter references. And that was also what made me love Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda (I'm going to copy and paste this from now on..) so much because I remembered that it had a lot of them. But since I've reread Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda right after Leah on the Offbeat, I can now confirm that Leah on the Offbeat has a LOT more!
And the references were just amazing - I think I posted lots of them in my Instagram Story and I've also seen others post them. Becky Albertalli is definitely the Queen of Harry Potter references.
And the references were especially great this time because Leah, the main character, is a Slytherin - like me. ;) And I could therefore identify a lot with her and loved that. I think every book character should get sorted into a house. That should be the basic description of any character really: brown hair, blue eyes and Ravenclaw. I'd love that.
I liked Leah but I LOVED Simon. Simon was just perfect as a side-character. Every time he appeared he just made me want to reread Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda so badly.
Leah does not only identify as as Slytherin but also as bisexual. And since bisexual characters are still underrepresented in the media I just love that Becky Albertalli explored this sexuality. I also really liked the girl-girl romance in this book and thought that it was done in a lovely way and I definitely shipped the two. (I don't know if it is a spoiler to say who Leah is in love with, that's why I don't mention her name.) There was also a male love interest for Leah and I kinda wished that he would have been more of an option for Leah because that would have created more struggles and would have made the book way more thrilling.
The book slowed down a lot in the middle but I nevertheless read through it extremely quickly. That's mainly due to the rather easy writing style of Becky Albertalli. Her books are incredibly easy and quickly to read through and are definitely a good choice to start reading English books.
Leah was definitely not your average character. She's quite sarcastic and has a really refreshing personality.
CONCLUSION
What bothered me the most in this book was the lightness of it. It was just not an extraordinary or even a deep book. And now that I've reread Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda and didn't love it as much as I initially did and since I also didn't really love Becky Albertalli's last book The Upside of Unrequited (click here for my review) I just think that Albertalli's books are just meant to be a light and uplifting read that doesn't go very deep and just entertains you a bit for a while and wants nothing more than that.
And I know that I shouldn't compare every book I read with CALL ME BY YOUR NAME but since this is my favourite book of 2018 I just have to. And when I think about the depths that CMBYN has explored I just cannot but be a bit disappointed in Leah on the Offbeat.
Maybe if I've read Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda right beforehand I would have lowered my expectations because I used to adore this book and now I am not as hyped anymore.
So, to sum it up, Leah on the Offbeat is definitely a nice, entertaining, lovely book which I praise for having bisexual representation in it and love for its many Harry Potter references (there could have been even way more in it - especially in the second half!) and for the extremely adorable Simon scenes, but which disappoints in its lack of going deeper and really touching the reader.
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