ARC Review: Cut Both Ways

Cut Both Ways by Carrie Mesrobian
Genres: Contemporary, Young Adult
Published by Harper Collins on September 1st 2015
Format: ARC (352 pages) • Source: Around the World ARC Tours
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Will Caynes never has been good with girls. At seventeen, he’s still waiting for his first kiss. He’s certainly not expecting it to happen in a drunken make-out session with his best friend, Angus. But it does and now Will’s conflicted—he knows he likes girls, but he didn’t exactly hate kissing a guy.

Then Will meets Brandy, a cute and easy-to-talk-to sophomore. He’s totally into her too—which proves, for sure, that he’s not gay. So why does he keep hooking up with Angus on the sly?

Will knows he can’t keep seeing both of them, but besides his new job in a diner, being with Brandy and Angus are the best parts of his whole messed-up life. His divorced parents just complicate everything. His father, after many half-baked business ventures and endless house renovations, has started drinking again. And his mom is no help—unless loading him up with a bunch of stuff he doesn’t need plus sticking him with his twin half-sisters counts as parenting. He’s been bouncing between both of them for years, and neither one feels like home.

Deciding who to love, who to choose, where to live. Whichever way Will goes, someone will get hurt. Himself, probably the most.

Sigh. I don’t know. This book had the potential to be really interesting and thought-provoking, but it felt too much like an “issue” book. I don’t mind reading books with clear messages, but it tried to be a lot of things at once. Will’s parents are divorced, his dad’s an alcoholic, he discovers that he has feelings for his male best friend, and he gets his first girlfriend. Lots of drama. It really felt like he was a trainwreck and didn’t help anything with his blasé attitude.

Faves

The opening of the book was interesting and I completely agreed about his thoughts on divorce. I could relate to him and his feelings about his parents. Beyond that, this book was fairly addicting and fast to read (for the first half). I can’t think of much else that I liked. Oh, he always made fun of Joe Buck and his football announcing. I liked that too.

Flaws

I didn’t like the choppy, fragmented writing style. I feel like it only added to the fact that Will didn’t have a lot of legitimate thoughts on anything. He was so detached! There was SO much going on in his life, and he didn’t feel connected to anything. His voice was just… not there. He had no interests except from sex. It was LITERALLY all he thought about. Even when shitty things were happening to the people in his life, he still thought about having sex with them. It reminded me of the miserable main character in September Girls. (I wouldn’t wish that book upon my worst enemy.) I get that the book involved, primarily, Will trying to figure out his sexuality, but c’mon… don’t people think about other things? It seemed like a superficial male stereotype. He was mad at his mom for potentially cheating on his dad, yet he was simultaneously hooking up with his best friend and his girlfriend. Hypocrite, much? It doesn’t make it okay because you’re “not gay.” He didn’t even consider the fact that he could be bisexual. Literally didn’t cross his mind once. There was an author’s note at the end about “bisexual erasure,” which explains that a little, but I couldn’t help but be irritated. Anyways, he spends the whole book hooking up with his friend while dating this girl. It was the epitome of “oh god, shit is going to hit the fan HARD” because he just KEPT DOING IT. I don’t mind books where cheating is involved. I don’t mind love triangles. But this was unbearable. ALSO THE ENDING. OH LORD. View Spoiler »There was absolutely no closure at all. So wide open. Will literally wakes up one morning and is like “yep, eventually I’ll have to decide between the two of them” and that’s it. The book ends. Ok?????? « Hide Spoiler I ended up skimming a bit of the book towards the end; the daily ins and outs of his life were suprisingly boring, considering how much drama there actually was with his family/friend/girlfriend.

Final

This book totally didn’t work for me. I haven’t read a lot of books about sexuality or people trying to figure out their sexuality, so I was hoping this would be a solid one. Everything from the choppy writing, to the characters, to the trainwreck-level drama, to the shitty ending, just did not appeal to me. I can’t think of anyone to recommend this to? The book alternates between Will complaining about his parents, hooking up with Angus, hooking up with Brandy, working at a restaurant, and thinking about sex (with either one of them). There ya go, now you don’t have to read it.

           

 

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