Sweet by Emmy Laybourne

TL;DR weight loss supplement promotion goes horribly wrong

(finished 7/18/15)

Sweet was addicting. Almost as much as Solu, believe it or not. I read it in 24 hours after I finished Monstrous Beauty. I totally had a book hangover immediately after finishing and that's probably gonna influence a lot of this review. I apologize for that in advance if I don't go back and edit some of it out. 

Let me also preface this by saying that Sweet is not contemporary or realistic. That's kind of the reason I liked it. It wouldn't have been nearly as interesting without the turn of evens that transpired in the book. 

Sweet seemed nice enough starting out, but I should've known better than that from Emmy Laybourne. From what I remember of Monument 14, it was hella depressing. Good, but one of those books that I have to read a fluffy book afterwards to recover. For some reason I wasn't expecting Sweet to take a Monument 14 turn and I was completely wrong. I didn't have a craving for a fluffy book, though, so it's not as dark as Monument 14. 

I can't say that the science behind Solu is realistic at all, but the whole thing is intriguing. I'm definitely interested more in how the logistics of it work. The latter half of the book is downright creepy and the blurb does the bare minimum in hinting what actually happens. (I don't know if I was able to guess from reading it or if I'd read what actually happened somewhere before sitting down with the book in my hands, but I'm not gonna mention it. You're gonna have to read it.) 

I really love Laurel and Tom as characters. Laurel is very body-positive and I was really glad to see that she was comfortable with herself and didn't feel the need to take Solu. There's been a really unfortunate trend in YA where the main characters talk themselves / their appearances down, so it was really nice to find a character who doesn't sell herself short. She's also not a pushover. Tom's cool in the fact that he's not some spoiled famous kid -- he's actually pretty level-headed. He's not a pushover, either. 

I think the romance was kind of fast, but I actually really enjoyed it. I don't think it quite counts as insta-love (but I can see that point being argued). They get together really quickly but it's not like they fawn over each other all the time. Not like they really had any chances to. They care for each other but it's not reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet like a lot of other YA couples unfortunately are. 

The execution of Sweet's plot was amazing. The pacing was great and for a while I wondered if I'd been wrong about what actually was the deal with Solu -- I was kind of afraid there'd be a sudden "oh no, everyone suddenly turns insane" kind of scene, but the lead-up into that worked perfectly. 

A lot of the negative reviews I'm seeing have to deal with the fact that they were expecting something contemporary or somewhat realistic. Sweet is neither of those. At all. Well, I guess it's contemporary time period-wise, but it's definitely nowhere realistic. I'm pretty sure Laybourne mentioned B-roll films in her acknowledgements. It's essentially like one of those, from what I understand of them. A really amusing B-roll movie. (I'm pretty sure B-roll isn't exactly a compliment, so I'm sorry if it comes off as mean.) 

Another thing I really love is that Tom and Laurel's chapters are clearly distinct. Their typefaces are a little too identical, both serif fonts with only slight width differences, but it helped. (Along this line, if you've ever read Legend, let it be known that I love how the split narration was done. Especially design-wise.) Tom and Laurel have different voices, too, which I really appreciated after reading Echo and Mystic back-to-back. Even without the typeface differences, their grammar usage and thought patterns are unique. 

I've actually been in the same room as Emmy Laybourne! I actually happened across the LA stop of a Fierce Reads tour she was on. I walked into The Last Bookstore about ten minutes late, though, so all the seats were taken. I just stood at the back for a couple minutes and listened before carrying on to explore. I'm also surprised that our library got a copy of the book so soon after its release. 

I'm really hoping there's a sequel, because the cliffhanger Laybourne left off on is killing me. I cannot deal with the stress of imagining what the backlash of said cliffhanger will wreak in book-world. I'm gonna be upset if I hear nothing more from the Sweet universe. I need to know what happens!! 

TL;DR I really enjoyed Sweet but it takes a good amount of trusting that Laybourne knows what she's doing, and also an enjoyment of the not-quite-realistic. If you like your stories to be grounded in real-world logistics, then Sweet's probably not your thing.