Monday, July 9, 2012

Book Review: Real Live Boyfriends: Yes. Boyfriends, Plural. If My Life Weren't Complicated, I Wouldn't Be Ruby Oliver by E. Lockhart

Title: Real Live Boyfriends: Yes. Boyfriends, Plural. If My Life Weren't Complicated, I Wouldn't Be Ruby Oliver
Author: E. Lockhart
Publication Date: 2010
Read May 17, 2011

From goodreads.com
Ruby Oliver, the neurotic, hyperverbal heroine of the The Boyfriend List,The Boy Book, and The Treasure Map of Boys, is back!
 
Ruby Oliver is in love. Or it would be love, if Noel, her real live boyfriend, would call her back. But Noel seems to have turned into a pod-robot lobotomy patient, and Ruby can’t figure out why.

Not only is her romantic life a shambles:
Her dad is eating nothing but Cheetos,
Her mother’s got a piglet head in the refrigerator,
Hutch has gone to Paris to play baguette air guitar,
Gideon shows up shirtless,
And the pygmy goat Robespierre is no help whatsoever.
 
Will Ruby ever control her panic attacks?
Will she ever understand boys?
Will she ever stop making lists?
(No to that last one.)
 
Roo has lost most of her friends. She’s lost her true love, more than once. She’s lost her grandmother, her job, her reputation, and possibly her mind. But she’s never lost her sense of humor. The Ruby Oliver books are the record of her survival

My Review:
This is the fourth installment of the Ruby Oliver books. I have a special place in my heart for this series because it was really what kickstarted me back into reading after college. These books were all so well-written and very humorous. This particular book in the series, while not the strongest in the set, was still very good. It is to be expected for the fourth in a series. 

One thing that I always hate is when publishers change the cover styles on the fourth of four books... This happened here. THe first three books that I own have a particular cover style and then when the fourth was released, they changed the cover and did so to the older books too. It makes series collector's (like myself) have the desire to go purchase the first three even though I already own them. I know it is good marketing so they can sell the same book twice, but how irritating.

Anyway, back to this book. If you are going to read this, I would suggest reading all the books in the series. If you don't you won't have a true understanding of the main character. She really grows on you. She is quirky and all up in her head (what teenage girl isn't really?) Ruby is a lovable character and I feel the author really gave us a nice snapshot of her life and wrapped up the story set over four books very well. I wonder what Roo is up to these days?

My rating: 8 out of 10

Next Review: Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen