Nice Try, Jane Sinner by Lianne Oelke BLOG TOUR // Read This Quirky Story!

Nice Try, Jane Sinner, by Lianne Oelke
Publication: January 9, 2018, by Clarion Books
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Contemporary
Pages: 416
Format: ARC 
Source: Publisher
Rating: 

The only thing 17-year-old Jane Sinner hates more than failure is pity. After a personal crisis and her subsequent expulsion from high school, she’s going nowhere fast. Jane’s well-meaning parents push her to attend a high school completion program at the nearby Elbow River Community College, and she agrees, on one condition: she gets to move out.
Jane tackles her housing problem by signing up for House of Orange, a student-run reality show that is basically Big Brother, but for Elbow River Students. Living away from home, the chance to win a car (used, but whatever), and a campus full of people who don't know what she did in high school… what more could she want? Okay, maybe a family that understands why she’d rather turn to Freud than Jesus to make sense of her life, but she'll settle for fifteen minutes in the proverbial spotlight.
As House of Orange grows from a low-budget web series to a local TV show with fans and shoddy T-shirts, Jane finally has the chance to let her cynical, competitive nature thrive. She'll use her growing fan base, and whatever Intro to Psychology can teach her, to prove to the world—or at least viewers of substandard TV—that she has what it takes to win.

 My Thoughts:

Nice Try, Jane Sinner can be best explained by labelling it as refreshing. It is different, more alluring than most books I've been reading these days. For one, we FINALLY have a college student YA protagonist. Normally, protagonists in New Adult novels are college students (or a little older), but the fact that this fits in the YA genre is lovely. Since the first time I learned about this story through an event Lianne Oelke, the author, attended, I was hooked to read this book. Reality shows, drama, and college life are what hooked me in, and let's just say that those were the aspects that sticked with me even after I finished reading this. 

I actually don't think I've ever read a book about a reality show. Make sure to prepare yourself for a realistic, contemporary experience that is the complete opposite of your typical Laguna Beach/90210 story. Oelke beautifully accompanied her writing with humour that actually made me laugh out loud. (I normally laugh in my head when viewing bookish humour, to be honest.)

Now - time for the flaws and cons. Before I get started, please note that I definitely recommend this book. Just because the writing style didn't work for me, does not mean that it will ruin your experience! I found it quite difficult to equally enjoy the different formats in which the book was written. There were text messages, conversations and short-term names that bored me. The story also felt really unnecessarily long, which I am ALWAYS picky about. It took me a long time to start to connect to the characters, which was a major flaw.

HOWEVER. I did enjoy this story nevertheless, and found that the best part was our protagonist, Jane Sinner. House of Orange, the reality show she is part of, allows readers to see how cameras and pressure can manipulate a person and help others see how they are. This was great.

Nice Try, Jane Sinner is a read you must devour if you are looking to meddle away from your typical YA contemporaries. I hope more books like this will be published... with, of course, faster pacing and a plot that intrigues me earlier.

*A review copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for a honest review. Thanks so much!*

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Q AND A WITH THE AUTHOR

Q: Would you want to be in a reality show? If you do, what kind of show would be your dream one?

A: There’s a reality show on the History channel called ALONE, where contestants are dropped off in the middle of the wilderness on Vancouver Island. Not only do they have to survive on their own for months (build shelter, fish, hunt, forage, hope a cougar doesn’t eat them), each contestant has to film themselves, as there’s no crew around. Some of the contestants spend months out there, trying to be the last person standing. I really enjoy camping, so I would love to be tough and skilled enough to take it to the next level– and maybe I’d last a day or two on ALONE– but more likely, I’d be radioing for help as soon as the sun went down. There is nothing more terrifying than glowing eyes in the dark. Also I’d have a hard time committing to months away from home because I’d miss my cat too much.