4.5 Stars
Best friends Colby and Bev's plans after graduation: skip college and spend a year traveling around Europe. They have been meticulously planning the ultimate Eurotrip for years. They've skipped all the campus tours and tossed every college catalogue that's come in the mail... or so Colby thought. Just as they leave on a week long tour for Bev's band, The Disenchantments, she drops the bomb: She's going to college not Europe. Colby doesn't get it. He's been obsessively planning this trip with her everyday for the last 4 years and she just forgets to tell him that she applied to college?? He feels totally betrayed and heartbroken. Not only is he coming to the realization that he doesn't know Bev as well as he thought he did, he also has no freaking clue what he is going to do now. It's too late to apply to art school, or really any school... and does he really want to go to Europe all alone?? He has the next week to figure it out as he, Bev, Alexa, and Meg go on a memorable roadtrip.


My Thoughts:
OK when I read the description of this book I totally thought that Colby was a girl!! Which is kind of dumb, I know... so I was thinking that this was going to be a book about all girls and here it's about girl and guy besties that are basically coming apart. I was definitely thrown through a loop. BUT I didn't care because this book was so addicting and heartwrenching and heartwarming, that I got over my initial mis-view pretty easily.

So Colby is in love with his best friend Bev, and she is basically crushing his heart. I felt SO bad for him. And I pretty much hated her. They're on a week long trip with Bev's band (which includes Alexa and Meg), traveling from San Fran to Washington State in Colby's uncle's VW bus. It's a really awesome journey. Bev and Colby are in full on awkward-mode and Alexa and Meg are doing their best to make this trip memorable for them anyway.

I loved the overall theme that I got out of this book. And that was that GROWING UP IS HARD!!! For everyone. No one is just given a map of how to go from kid to adult. How to act in adult relationships and how to figure out what you want to do with your life (and why do you have to figure it out at 18??). This book is about that. It's about realizing that shit gets hard once you get out of the childhood bubble.

I loved all the characters in this book. Colby's parents & uncle, Jasper, Walt and all the kooky people they met on the road, and especially the sisters Meg and Alexa. The things that the 4 of them would do for each other and for the sake of the trip... it just made me love them more.

The relationship between Colby and Bev was completely complicated. I didn't love all the turns it took, and I especially didn't like Bev's reasoning for leaving Colby hanging like that... but I still loved the journey they took together. The only thing I could say I didn't like about this book was that some of the relationship between the 2 climaxed a little early and the book ended up dragging a bit at the end for me. But I loved that this book made me think about growing up and making me want to do it all over again..... yeah on second thought, maybe not!

OVERALL: If you liked [b:Hold Still|6373717|Hold Still|Nina LaCour|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1270305052s/6373717.jpg|6561348](which I insanely did), you will love this book. It holds that same emotion without the sadness. It's a roadtrip book about growing up and having your friends help you along the way. I recommend it to ANYONE who likes contemporary and ANYONE who likes coming-of-age.


My Blog:

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characters reminded me of a dull john green book. i loved the cover but thats about it. the story had interesting ideas but the characters fell flat ( )

So forgettable. ( )

I want to read the story hidden in the suggestions of the people in this book. Nina LaCour does am amazing job of opening up the characters and letting you troll around in their brains, but you don't get to see everything and are left with a lot of questions. ( )

This book is legit.

The Disenchantments by Nina LaCour

Colby, Bev, Meg, and Alexa have just graduated from high school, and they're going on tour of the Pacific Northwest in a turquoise Volkswagen bus named Melinda. The Disenchantments are a terrible riot-grrl inspired band with their own pet boy/chauffeur/truth-speaker. They have less than two weeks to tour the Pacific Northwest before they deposit Meg at college in Portland, Alexa returns to S.F. and high school, and Colby and Bev fly to Europe for the big adventure. So when Bev tells Colby that she's going to college instead of Europe, on their first day out of the city, it not only crushes his heart but throws his whole future (and the tour) into question. The show must go on an as Melinda wends her way along the California coast the four teenagers learn about each other and themselves, the world outside San Francisco and high school, and the difference between dreaming big and doing big.

A few weeks ago I read Lola and the Boy Next Door, and noted that the San Francisco of that novel was a sort of Disney-fied, Full House version of the real deal. The Disenchantments is legit. By the eighteenth page I knew that a Bay Area native had written this book, and checking out the author blurb confirmed. It's in the locations, the setting description, the way that the characters view themselves and others...it's in the dialogue:

"Why the fuck not steal a tool kit? That shit is useful."

I laughed out loud so many time reading this novel just because the venues, conversations, and observations are just so dead-on. The Disenchantments tour takes them up the California coast to Arcata, a truly singular place where I finished my college degree. Again, it was clear that the author had not only been to Arcata, but actually lived there. It would be so easy to slip into stereotypes for that little city where the sixties never ended. The description of driving into Fort Bragg, scene of The Disenchantments first disenchanting experience, where the world goes gray is hilariously accurate.

The novel is very rich due to the author's genuine familiarity with the people and places she is writing about: the hopelessness of Fort Bragg, the anything-can-happen weirdness of Arcata, the initial appeal and swift boredom of Weaverville, and the clean promise of Portland. The girls and Colby discover that nothing about their summer is turning into what they thought it would be, but in some ways it's better, because it's real. Each of the characters has a distinct perspective and journey, and LaCour blends these and their journey together into a rich, true-to-life narrative.

The character development in this novel is outstanding. Each character is so well written that by novel's end I felt like I could predict what each would do in any given situation. La Cour juggles the complexities of the different relationships beautifully: Alexa and Meg as sisters who are different but loving, Colby's love for Bev but his uncertainty about her feelings, Bev as the guarded frontwoman for the band and social group. It stirred up a lot of emotion: I felt angry, happy, sad, melancholy, hopeful...the full range while reading this novel.

It's a beautiful journey written with love by an insider. East-Coasters just don't write West-Coasters like this. Satisfying. ( )