Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell | Rating: ★★★☆☆As you all well know by now, Rainbow Rowell is on the fast track to be the next It-Girl author. The buzz for her novels is undeniable — she’s everywhere in the literature world; when people aren’t buzzing about her two young adult novels Fangirl and Eleanor & Park, they are discussing their anticipation of Landlines. Her novels go perfectly to the tune of many contemporary young adult novels and can be paired off with John Green’s work.
That being said, I had high hopes for the buzz worthy Eleanor & Park and looked forward to reading it due to its content. Perhaps, my hopes were too high for the novel and upon further inspection I’ll come around to the novel and see it as something different. But with my mindset, as it is now, I found one too many problematic things in the novel to fully love it. Flaws are common in literature and you come to expect that, yet for some things within the pages of Eleanor & Park I couldn’t really ignore.
I’m very, very torn on what rating I want to give this story. That isn’t to say it’s necessarily a bad story — it had moments that were more enjoyable than others and the writing is pretty solid. It’s got all the makings of a proper young adult love story and still keeps it true to life. I liked that Eleanor was relatable and that I could look back and see certain bits of myself in here. I liked that Park wasn’t like most leading males and grew so, so, so bloody much by the final pages. Rainbow, though her writing/views flawed during many moments, really put thought towards these characters and managed to keep the story crisp and clean.
