I think I finish books quicker when I'm on a time limit at night to go to bed. Because my dad literally threatens to break my laptop should I not go to sleep by the time it's 2 am. So then my mind's automatically working on a speed-drive to read quicker than normal, all while retaining the information in the book. Hence reading all standalones at night.
Waverly Camdenmar spends her nights running until she can’t even think. Then the sun comes up, life goes on, and Waverly goes back to her perfectly hateful best friend, her perfectly dull classes, and the tiny, nagging suspicion that there’s more to life than student council and GPAs.
Marshall Holt is a loser. He drinks on school nights and gets stoned in the park. He is at risk of not graduating, he does not care, he is no one. He is not even close to being in Waverly’s world.
But then one night Waverly falls asleep and dreams herself into Marshall’s bedroom—and when the sun comes up, nothing in her life can ever be the same. In Waverly’s dreams, the rules have changed. But in her days, she’ll have to decide if it’s worth losing everything for a boy who barely exists.
QUICK THOUGHTS AND REVIEW: 3.8/5, I REALLY DID NOT GET WHICH PART OF THIS BOOK WAS A DREAM OR REALITY.
Possible Trigger Tags:
1. Mentions of ASPD
2. Mentions of alcohol abuse
3. Mentions of substance abuse
4. Hinting at chronic depression
5. Academic neglect
6. Mentions of insomnia
WHAT DID I FEEL ABOUT THE BOOK'S:
1. Writing Quality: First person narration, dual POV, while it's certainly interesting to see Waverly and Marshall deal with their inner demons, there is something about the writing style that makes it difficult for me to distinguish between the characters. Often I thought it was Marshall narrating he story when it was in fact, Waverly and vice versa. Which was a bit sad, because both of the characters have very distinct personalities that stay with you for a while.
2. Character Development: I have some opinions about both Marshall and Waverly.
Marshall: Pretty sure it's clear that Marshall has been portrayed as the bad boy turned good, which is like 97% of Wattpad romance tropes. [No hate for it, just tired of the trope]. He smokes, he drinks, he parties and gets high, he's failing his classes and is almost on the verge of not graduating from high school. He quits smoking and drinking and partying and everything else he does once he meets Waverly. Which, again, another common trope. And turns out that Marshall wasn't actually a bad boy at all, he was just trying to cope with his fucked up life. Even though it's not really mentioned clearly, I think that Marshall might have been suffering from chronic depression which does often make him act out like that. There might be slight anxiety mixed with it, but I'm not really sure.
Waverly: Waverly might be one of the best well written characters I've really seen. It's mentioned once that she has ASPD, which explains the lack of emotions and the voices in her narrative [she uses she/her pronouns right?] makes sense. Though it did take me a good 70 pages to actually know about it and how suddenly it all fell into space. While Waverly pretends and tries to hide her best about her ability to not feel emotions, she also suffers from insomnia, which might be a bit less anonymous among the people around her. It is really interesting to learn about her coping method and studying the people around her, while also she's trying to understand Marshall and unknowingly warms up to him.
3. Couldn't put it down-Ness: 7/10, I guess that explains it. Hopefully. HOPEFULLY.
4. Intellectual Depth: The whole story is about masks. Not the COVID-19 masks that made life hell especially for people who have spectacles and especially for people who have to wear spectacles and masks in the stupid heat. But yeah, masks and what we do with them in our lives. We use the mask to pretend to be a different person in front of the world and this book talks about that. Through Waverly and Marshall, who are pretending to be fine, the book demonstrates how an actual person handles their masks, tape them down, adjust them as per circumstances or remove them altogether. It can be seen as a form of coping or defence mechanism, where people are aware of their own flaws, not in a healthy way and they try to pretend to be like other people to fit into that societal circle. Man society is just fucked up in my opinion.
5. Plot: Apart from the romance, there isn't much of a plot I guess? They say Waverly was dreaming, but it was really hard to distinguish which part of it was a dream and which part a reality. And other than the two falling in love, there wasn't much of a subplot as well. Maybe the plot is saving each other from their demons? I don't know.
OVERALL, A NICE READ, would have been better with an actual plot in my opinion.
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