Monday 23 January 2012

Kiss Date Love Hate review

Kiss Date Love Hate
Luisa Plaja
February 2nd 2012 
Random House Children's (Corgi)


What if you could change your friends' lives and loves through the settings of a computer game...? 

Lex Murphy's group of friends have all dated, hated, ignored and lusted after each other for the last few years. If only there was a way of matching people perfectly to avoid all the unrequited love, dumping and drama! Then Lex's friend George is given a mysterious Sims-like game by his software-testing dad which involves building character profiles in the categories of Life, Looks and Love. Lex and George populate the game with avatars for all their mates, making a few 'wishful thinking' adjustments to the settings - and find that the next day these tinkerings have come true! But how long can this new calm, loved-up atmosphere continue?



Kiss Date Love Hate was an adorable, slightly nerdy, lovely book full of laughs and love and a properly realistic British teen narrative. While that realism may sometimes make the characters seem a bit off-putting, they are very relatable, and there's a sweet story at the centre of it all.


I must say that when I first heard about KDLH, I knew I had to read it. Come on! I love the premise for it, and I could tell that it was going to be a fun cute book that I'd like. It's about a computer game that can actually change people's lives! How cool is that? And as well as the awesome premise, it definitely shows the negative side of such a thing if it ever could exist, and I really liked the character development that revolved around this game and the idea of having the power.


I liked Lex, I guess, and she was definitely a believable teen, but there were times when she kind of annoyed me. Not to criticize her or anything, I could totally see where she was coming from, but she did kind of have the irrational mind of a teenager. There were times when she could be selfish and seemed like she was playing around a bit, but at the end of it, I did like her. And there was kind of a reason at the end of the book that explained quite a lot of it, but I think I'd of liked it more if that had been mentioned earlier on? But then I guess it wouldn't have really got the whole point across...


My favourite character was George, I won't lie. I want to give him a cuddle. Luisa, can you tell George and Lex that I find someone who consciously knows the difference between who and whom attractive? ;) I'm sorry, I love it when nerds are main characters in books and they aren't presented as the stereotypical douchey-nerd (you know the type I mean...).  Though he did have his moments of douchiness, he was a really nice guy, and I would go up to his room to see him LOTR posters anytime ;)


Drew was also really great, and I liked how he wasn't really all that he seemed. I like it when nice guys are the heroes, even if people don't think that they're nice guys at first ;) Also, the inclusion of the whole film making course was something that I really liked. Though reading books with awesome indie cinema's run by lovely old men who show LOTR marathons makes me want one. And that is sadly something that just ain't gonna happen... ;)


Kiss Date Love Hate is a really sweet book that I thoroughly enjoyed, and I definitely need to check out Luisa's other books! 

2 comments:

  1. Awesome review! I can't waaaait to read KDLH, Luisa Plaja is so lovely! Yay nerds! Who aren't totally douche-y! LOL.

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  2. great review! I just finished this and loved it too! George was awesome but I have a thing for longhaired bad boys so you know, Drew was my guy! ;)

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