Helpful Score: 1
I'm a junior high teacher and I'm constantly buying books for my classroom library. I bought this one recently and decided to read it myself before putting it on the shelf (Hey, that rhymes!).
Guitar Notes is a story told through the eyes of Lyla Marks (a seemingly perfect honor student/cellist) and Tripp Broody (a seemingly slacker/guitarist). The story opens on the first day of school. Tripp finds out his mom hijacks his beloved guitar because she feels all he does is lock himself in his room and play it. She wants him to become more social and bring up his grades. Needless to say, he is MAD...and desperate. Switch to Lyla...she is starting to suffer anxiety from being under so much pressure all the time to be a perfect daughter/friend and serious musician.
Tripp and Lyla's paths cross when they both sign up to use a music practice room during lunch. For Tripp, this is a way around his mother's punishment since he will get to use one of the school's guitar when he uses the practice room. For Lyla, it's a way to escape the stress that surrounds her and be alone for a while. Soon, they start leaving behind notes for one another in the practice room, which start over Tripp leaving behind some trash one day, but quickly evolve into notes about music and their lives.
It was a cute story and I LOVED the idea of a boy and girl communicating through notes. It sounds very romantic. HOWEVER, if you're looking for more romance, then look elsewhere. Guitar Notes is the story of a great friendship between a girl and a boy, but I wouldn't call it a romance. I can see Lyla and Tripp getting together sometime in the future, but this book didn't go that far. And that's ok. I think Lyla and Tripp both needed a friend first, someone to "get" them, and they found that in one another.
My main complaint with the book is the climax/falling action/resolution. It happens WAY too fast. I kept waiting to see how Lyla was going to deal with her father who expected her to follow in her mother's footsteps to be a professional cellist and attend a prestigious music school. Lyla figures out she might not want this, but doesn't know how to tell her father. I was also looking forward to how Lyla would deal with her suffocating friendship with Annie. Annie wasn't a bad person, but she was very intense and kept expecting Lyla to care as much as she did about auditions, talent shows, and getting accepted to a prestigious music school. However, we don't get to "see" Lyla deal with them at all. The climax is traumatic, yes. But it's over fairly quickly, and this lessens the emotional impact of the event. Then it's fast forward to the end. I felt like I was missing a few chapters at this point. We're left guessing that the climax must be the catalyst that "helps" Lyla solve her problems, but I think the story would've been much stronger if there had been more showing than telling at this point.
Guitar Notes is a clean story. No profanity that I can recall, and no drug use, violence, or sexual situations.
Guitar Notes is a story told through the eyes of Lyla Marks (a seemingly perfect honor student/cellist) and Tripp Broody (a seemingly slacker/guitarist). The story opens on the first day of school. Tripp finds out his mom hijacks his beloved guitar because she feels all he does is lock himself in his room and play it. She wants him to become more social and bring up his grades. Needless to say, he is MAD...and desperate. Switch to Lyla...she is starting to suffer anxiety from being under so much pressure all the time to be a perfect daughter/friend and serious musician.
Tripp and Lyla's paths cross when they both sign up to use a music practice room during lunch. For Tripp, this is a way around his mother's punishment since he will get to use one of the school's guitar when he uses the practice room. For Lyla, it's a way to escape the stress that surrounds her and be alone for a while. Soon, they start leaving behind notes for one another in the practice room, which start over Tripp leaving behind some trash one day, but quickly evolve into notes about music and their lives.
It was a cute story and I LOVED the idea of a boy and girl communicating through notes. It sounds very romantic. HOWEVER, if you're looking for more romance, then look elsewhere. Guitar Notes is the story of a great friendship between a girl and a boy, but I wouldn't call it a romance. I can see Lyla and Tripp getting together sometime in the future, but this book didn't go that far. And that's ok. I think Lyla and Tripp both needed a friend first, someone to "get" them, and they found that in one another.
My main complaint with the book is the climax/falling action/resolution. It happens WAY too fast. I kept waiting to see how Lyla was going to deal with her father who expected her to follow in her mother's footsteps to be a professional cellist and attend a prestigious music school. Lyla figures out she might not want this, but doesn't know how to tell her father. I was also looking forward to how Lyla would deal with her suffocating friendship with Annie. Annie wasn't a bad person, but she was very intense and kept expecting Lyla to care as much as she did about auditions, talent shows, and getting accepted to a prestigious music school. However, we don't get to "see" Lyla deal with them at all. The climax is traumatic, yes. But it's over fairly quickly, and this lessens the emotional impact of the event. Then it's fast forward to the end. I felt like I was missing a few chapters at this point. We're left guessing that the climax must be the catalyst that "helps" Lyla solve her problems, but I think the story would've been much stronger if there had been more showing than telling at this point.
Guitar Notes is a clean story. No profanity that I can recall, and no drug use, violence, or sexual situations.
