Review // Sam & Ilsa's Last Hurrah by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

Published: 5th April
Publisher: Electric Monkey
Format: Kindle
Synopsis: Sam and Ilsa Kehlmann have spent most of their high school years throwing dinner parties, and now they’ve prepared their final blowout, just before graduation. The rules for the twins are simple: they each get to invite three guests, and the other twin doesn’t know who’s coming until the guests show up at the door. With Sam and Ilsa, the sibling revelry is always tempered with a large dose of sibling rivalry, and tonight is no exception. One night. One apartment. Eight people. What could possibly go wrong? Oh, we all know the answer is plenty. But plenty also goes right – in rather surprising ways.

Writing this review is going to be one of the hardest things i've ever done - because I really just did not like it. It hurts even to type that! Rachel Cohn & David Levithan have been my writing duo heroes for a LONG time now. Their books are my absolute favourites (particularly Dash & Lily) and there are literally no words to describe how happy I was when I found out they were releasing a new book - and that I got it early. So what went wrong? *sigh*

Right from the off I disliked both Sam & Ilsa which is uh, kind of a big problem when the entire book is about them, their relationship with each other and their relationship with everyone else. I honestly just didn't care what they were going through. They were pretentious, terrible friends and really annoying to have to be with for an extended period of time.

It was really difficult to keep track of who was talking, which POV I was in etc as there wasn't a lot of substance to Sam or Ilsa for me to be able to easily identify them. It almost felt like Cohn & Levithan were trying really hard to be wacky with the dinner guests but they were actually completely overlooked. It was nearing the end of the book before I could even remember who their friend were. I think at one point a character appeared after being missing for a while and it genuinely took me a hot second to realise they weren't a new character and/or that that character had even been gone. It was kind of all over the place.

I'd say the most interesting character was their Grandmother and she didn't even feature in the book other than someone they occasionally talked about. I considered that maybe I was just too old to enjoy these books now but I was 100% here for Twelve Days of Dash & Lily book which only came out early last year so it can't be that. It's going to be very interesting to go and read reviews after this and see what everyone else thinks about it!

I wanted to love it wholeheartedly. I want Sam & Ilsa to be added to my list of fictional best friends. I wanted to throw a dinner party inspired by this book. None of those things happened. Honestly, I over-rated it on Goodreads purely because there's a sneaky little Nick & Norah reference and I was so overwhelmingly happy about it that I momentarily forgot that this didn't meet my standards.

I still love Cohn & Levithan. I'm going to definitely re-read this in a few months and reevaluate my opinion (we all have months of meh reading!). I haven't given up! But for now, if you're wanting something to blow you away - this isn't it.