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Life by Committee Corey Ann Haydu Books

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Life by Committee Corey Ann Haydu Books

The Plot in a Sentence:
Suddenly being the “hot chick” in her small VT town isn’t making Tabitha any friends - but everything changes when she discovers an online community that tells her exactly how to live.

Why I Read It:
It takes place in a small town in Vermont. I was a teenager in a small town in Vermont. It sucked. Now I want to read about it.

Why It Rocked:
The Vermont-ness. Oh, man, did Haydu nail it. The cold, the isolation, the way everyone is sort of a hippie, the fact that the only things to do as a teenager are hang out in coffee shops, go snowboarding, or get high. I couldn’t have related more to Tabby’s sense of feeling trapped by the mountains and dreaming of a glamorous life in NYC and something bigger and better than her tiny town and little high school full of people she’s known forever. That was me. That was me SO HARD.

(At one point, a character name-drops the town next to mine. As the place to go to be a stoner. Hah. But also, true.)

The hot-girl-bullied-by-plain-girls theme was a refreshing, believable twist on the standard bullying trope. Being inside the hot girl’s head was fascinating (and excruciating): dealing with her insecurities, feeling the pain of missing not only her old friends but her old self. Tabitha really falls apart in this book. It’s hard to watch but impossible to put down.

Haydu also nails the experience of a life lived half-online and half-IRL. The way Tabitha tunes out the world to concentrate on LBC, the way she feels like these online strangers are her only real friends and events on the site spark her emotions throughout the day, reminded me so much of my old Livejournal days, when baring my soul online to strangers all over the world was the most important thing ever. It’s so easy to get sucked in. It’s so hard to describe in a way that matters. And Haydu does it so well.

The writing was real pretty, too.

What I Would Have Done Differently:
I liked that the “big reveal” in this book felt really surprising (I actually gasped on the subway), but I would have liked a couple more clues along the way. It also felt like there were some chapters missing between the first and final waves of resolution: some stuff happened with Tabitha’s parents off-page that I would have liked to see on-page, and then all of a sudden it was Big Climax O’Clock.

The climactic scene felt a tad overwrought to me. I mean, I guess it did its job because I cried. But, while the rest of the book rang absolutely, 100% true to my memories of being a teenager, the final scene felt a little…off. Maybe a little too feel-good. Which may be a personal projection, because I tend to like all things, even endings, to be dark.


Tags : Amazon.com: Life by Committee (9780062294050): Corey Ann Haydu: Books,Corey Ann Haydu,Life by Committee,Katherine Tegen Books,0062294059,Romance - General,Social Themes - Friendship,Social Themes - Values & Virtues,Friendship;Fiction.,Love;Fiction.,Secrets;Fiction.,Children: Young Adult (Gr. 10-12),Fiction,Fiction-Romance,Friendship,JUVENILE,Juvenile Fiction,Juvenile Grades 10-12 Ages 15+,Love,Love & Romance,Personal & social issues (Children's Teenage),Secrets,Social Themes - General,TEEN'S FICTION ROMANCE,United States,YOUNG ADULT FICTION,YOUNG ADULT FICTION Family General (see also headings under Social Themes),YOUNG ADULT FICTION Girls & Women,YOUNG ADULT FICTION Romance General,YOUNG ADULT FICTION Social Themes Friendship,YOUNG ADULT FICTION Social Themes Values & Virtues,Young Adult FictionFamily - General (see also headings under Social Themes),Young Adult FictionGirls & Women

Life by Committee Corey Ann Haydu Books Reviews

Very fun, intriguing look at what can happen when we let others get into our heads or when we feel lost because we've defined ourselves by others. A story of finding oneself through change and how finding oneself is a process that should never end.
Every time I read another Corey Ann Haydu novel it becomes my new favorite and this was no exception. Life by Committee captured me from the first page and I had to keep reading to see what was going to happen. All the characters were so fully realized--flaws and all. I especially liked that it was a departure from a straight up high school love story. Sometimes we do love the wrong person, especially when we're young. And Haydu's handling of the pull of online "relationships" and how intriguing and sometimes dangerous they can be was fantastic, without her pandering or being preachy about it. Just as important to the love aspect (maybe more so) was the story of friendship and the real problems girls go through as they grow and change in the tumultuous teen years. All the judgement! Yes, this is high school warts and all. This is one of those books that I want everyone I know to read whether adult or teen. I read it over a month ago and I still can't get it out of my head.
I would have finished LIFE BY COMMITTEE sooner, but I slowed down to highlight something on nearly every screen of my . Why? Because not only is Corey Ann Haydu a master at crafting sentences, she's also a wry, wise observer of human behavior and relationships. From little observations like "There is nothing better than hearing someone grin over the phone" (Chapter 13) and "He's going to do great at college -- he's a natural at academic-looking frowns" (Chapter 16) to grander pronouncements about the universe ("...I think this is how people feel about God. Like he's watching and is everywhere, giving purpose to the parts of your life that have started to feel stale or strange or too sad" -- Chapter 9), the book is rich with these thoughtful statements.

This is a complex book in terms of the characters and their relationships, too. In Tabitha / Bitty, we get a perfect example of a girl that the world might dismiss for the choices she's made... the ways she's changed herself and been unapologetic about it. The book challenges the reader to look at Tabitha's choices and the way the world judges her. The other characters are similarly well-drawn, and Tabitha's parents are possibly some of my favorite parents in YA.

A highly recommended read.
Grade D
First 80%- B
Last 20%- F

Tabitha has issues. Her former friends hate her. Her father's a pothead. Her 32 year old mother is pregnant. And she's kissing a boy who has a girlfriend. Then she stumbles upon a website Life By Committee. Tell a secret. Get an assignment. Report back. Tabitha first tells about kissing Joe. Her assignment kiss him again. Then the assignments escalate.

I enjoyed the first 4/5th of LIFE BY COMMITTEE. Tabitha wasn't the most insightful or likable character, but I found her sympathetic in that when she acted selfishly. She had major self esteem issues, or she wouldn't be okay being Joe's secret and she wouldn't seek out an anonymous group of Internet strangers to tell her how to act. I found the whole LBC too far fetched to be believable. What 18 year old flies across the country to show up on her crush's doorstep unannounced? Then they tell her to propose and she considers it?

The ending ruined the story for me with incongruous coincidences that were just plain corny and the dumbest school assembly that would never happen. If I didn't enjoy reading the first 80% the ending alone would have made this a one star review.

THEMES friendship, family, parents, dating, drugs, peer pressure

The ending of LIFE BY COMMITTEE is so bad the book isn't worth reading. Message me if you want to know more.
The Plot in a Sentence
Suddenly being the “hot chick” in her small VT town isn’t making Tabitha any friends - but everything changes when she discovers an online community that tells her exactly how to live.

Why I Read It
It takes place in a small town in Vermont. I was a teenager in a small town in Vermont. It sucked. Now I want to read about it.

Why It Rocked
The Vermont-ness. Oh, man, did Haydu nail it. The cold, the isolation, the way everyone is sort of a hippie, the fact that the only things to do as a teenager are hang out in coffee shops, go snowboarding, or get high. I couldn’t have related more to Tabby’s sense of feeling trapped by the mountains and dreaming of a glamorous life in NYC and something bigger and better than her tiny town and little high school full of people she’s known forever. That was me. That was me SO HARD.

(At one point, a character name-drops the town next to mine. As the place to go to be a stoner. Hah. But also, true.)

The hot-girl-bullied-by-plain-girls theme was a refreshing, believable twist on the standard bullying trope. Being inside the hot girl’s head was fascinating (and excruciating) dealing with her insecurities, feeling the pain of missing not only her old friends but her old self. Tabitha really falls apart in this book. It’s hard to watch but impossible to put down.

Haydu also nails the experience of a life lived half-online and half-IRL. The way Tabitha tunes out the world to concentrate on LBC, the way she feels like these online strangers are her only real friends and events on the site spark her emotions throughout the day, reminded me so much of my old Livejournal days, when baring my soul online to strangers all over the world was the most important thing ever. It’s so easy to get sucked in. It’s so hard to describe in a way that matters. And Haydu does it so well.

The writing was real pretty, too.

What I Would Have Done Differently
I liked that the “big reveal” in this book felt really surprising (I actually gasped on the subway), but I would have liked a couple more clues along the way. It also felt like there were some chapters missing between the first and final waves of resolution some stuff happened with Tabitha’s parents off-page that I would have liked to see on-page, and then all of a sudden it was Big Climax O’Clock.

The climactic scene felt a tad overwrought to me. I mean, I guess it did its job because I cried. But, while the rest of the book rang absolutely, 100% true to my memories of being a teenager, the final scene felt a little…off. Maybe a little too feel-good. Which may be a personal projection, because I tend to like all things, even endings, to be dark.