Quick Review | Crumble by Fleur Philips

Procurement

eARC from publisher via NetGalley.

Summary (Goodreads)

Eighteen-year-old Sarah McKnight has a secret. She’s in love with David Brooks. Sarah is white. David is black. But Sarah’s not the only one keeping secrets in the close-knit community of Kalispell, Montana. Her father George, who owns a local gun shop and proudly drives a truck with a Confederate flag bumper sticker, hides his own complicated past. When he discovers Sarah’s relationship, George decides to share his feelings with Alex Mackey-a lonely classmate of Sarah’s whom George has taken under his wing. As Alex embraces the power of Sarah’s father’s dark hatred, the hopes and dreams of young lives hang in the balance. In just a few short months, Sarah and David will graduate from high school and leave Kalispell for a new life together in Los Angeles. Maybe in California, they can stop hiding their love-and the other secret they share…something George McKnight-and Alex Mackey-will never accept.

Quick Review

I disliked (hated) this book for several reasons.

First, there are way too many “issue” topics thrown into one book. I went into this thinking I’d get a story filled with hope for an interracial relationship. Negative. What I ended up with was a book full of racism, bullies, gun control, child abuse, abuse in general, alcoholism, killing, suicide, teen pregnancy, abortion, psychotic people and general idioticracy.

Second, the writing was full of excessive, mundane details. Numerous flash backs that did not support the topic at hand and further made the entire story read with more negative than positive. I confess to skimming the majority of these and they were numerous.

The entire character of Alex was just craziness. I never, ever want to be inside the head of someone like that again. Ever.

This book is the most negative thing I have ever read. Hated it. Immensely. I don’t understand why it was the winner or even nominated for the San Francisco Book Festival Winner for YA Fiction. I would never let my child read this book.

The summary is incredibly misleading. This is not a happy book. I do not recommend reading this on Mother’s Day weekend like I did.