Review: Thanks for the Trouble - Tommy Wallach

Today's review is Tommy Wallach's Thanks for the Trouble,
a YA contemporary that released at the end of February!

Synopsis

"Parker Santé hasn’t spoken a word in five years. While his classmates plan for bright futures, he skips school to hang out in hotels, killing time by watching the guests. But when he meets a silver-haired girl named Zelda Toth, a girl who claims to be quite a bit older than she looks, he’ll discover there just might be a few things left worth living for." (From the book's dust jacket.)

Cover Purchase and Concerns

I'm gonna be 100% honest and say that a large part of why I bought this book is because of the cover. Photographed covers, especially with humans in them, don't always go well, but this one has a Wes Anderson vibe that I was definitely attracted to. It also had a great review by one of my favorite Goodreads reviewers (and she's tough on everything, for real). But mostly, I was diggin' on the cover. 

I was a little skeptical and concerned about the actual story, though. Last year, Wallach released his first book, We All Looked Up, and though it also had an awesome cover, it let me down and bummed me out. So I took a leap of faith in not only reading his second book but buying it (which I luckily didn't do with WALU)*. 

The Story 

As you saw in the synopsis above, the meat of the story is left pretty vague to the reader before they crack open the book. I am 100% okay with that. I think it was the best possible way to go into this book, and would recommend you do the same. The book is common YA contemporary fare: teens struggling with loss, happiness, school, the future. That being said, there is a certain element to it that is unlike other contemporaries and it really pumped some new life into an otherwise "been there, done that" plot. 

The Voice

The book is meant to be read as if it is Parker's college essay. He speaks directly to the reader, assuming it's an adult who might not want to hear all the gritty details but is going to get them anyway. He's a natural storyteller, and the book is sprinkled with tiny fairy-tales that show how much he loves to write and how imaginative his mind is. 

It's awesome when a book can make you laugh and cry and TftT did both for me. I highlighted and dog-eared so many passages and pages, something that I don't often do.

Zelda

Parker might be telling the story, but Zelda is at the heart of it all. Zelda is seemingly some quirky teen girl with a lot of money and free time to kill. For some readers, this might be an annoying trope. However, there is much more to her than what you see on the outside and once we figure it out, she becomes a whole different kind of character. It shifted my perspective and I loved that.

Some of my Favorite Quotes

"I've never understood people who take their coffee black. Isn't life already bitter enough?"

"Why is it that the bad shit in our lives always seems to take up so much more mental space than the good stuff? I wrote. Is that part of being a person,
or just part of being me?"

"There's a word in Portuguese that my dad wrote about in one of his books: saudade. It's the sadness you feel for something that isn't gone yet, but will be. The sadness of lost causes.
The sadness of being alive."

Overall

This read gets 4/5 stars. I closed the book with tears in my eyes and hugged it. It gave me lots of good life feelings and I'm so glad that I gave it (and Tommy Wallach) a chance.

 

If you'd like a review with some spoilers, I have one over on Goodreads (I spoil stuff on there because I can hide it and you have to make the decision to see them or not!). 

Do you think you'll read this story? I'd love to hear your thoughts!

*I am completely aware of how crazy I might sound because I bought a book despite having mediocre expectations simply because the cover is gorgeous. This is my life. Deal with it.