Amy & Roger's epic detour (Morgan Matson)

After Amy's father's death, her mother moved across the country and now wants Amy to join her and bring the car from their old home in California to the new house in Connecticut. The only problem: Amy hasn't been able to drive since the car accident that killed her father, so an old family friend named Roger joins Amy on her road trip across the country for his own reasons.

"The best discoveries always happened to the people who weren't looking for them." 

I know that summer is over again but I still need to catch up on reviewing the books I've read over the summer break and this book is perfect for the holidays. This year I've done a road trip (through Iceland) with my family, so this novel was especially fitting since that's the setting of the story. I absolutely loved the road trip aspect (come on, who doesn't love road trips?) and how the story tells you to take risks once in a while, because their epic road trip only happens due to Amy not listening to her mom and instead starting to plan their own route with Roger. I just think it's quite important to be dared to take a risk once in a while, especially for me, since I usually just take the safe route, and this story does a good in encouraging the reader to do something outside their comfort zone. It is so amazing that each stop is illustrated by the main character's travel diary, which is filled with photos, receipts and little doodles and playlists. These illustrated pages just help make the book a lot more exciting and special because, let's be honest, apart from that, the novel isn't that unique and is basically just like a lot of other YA contemporary books. I enjoy Morgan Matson's writing, but once again, it's nothing special. Nevertheless it's a fun and quick read that gives you such positive vibes and awakens your inner wanderlust.

I like how the romance is handled at the beginning and the middle part of the book, because it's not super dominant and plays out rather in the background than being the biggest plot of the story and it also doesn't distract the reader from the main part, which is the amazing character development of the main character. However, towards the very end the romance suddenly develops instantly and is just way too cheesy and stereotypical for my liking. Since that issue only concerns the last couple of pages, I overall suprisingly enjoyed the romance of this book a lot more than I anticipated to.
I liked the two main characters as well as most of the other characters a lot, but I couldn't really relate to any of them too much. Roger is just a way too perfect person to exist in real life and even though I feel super mean I just have to admit I often found Amy a pathetic character, who makes her problems seem so much bigger than they actually are. Both of them however, especially Amy, go through a big character development during their road trip and it's just so nice to see both of them grow into better people. Also, I genuinly really like the idea of wrapping this development into the concept of a road trip.
Over the summer I've read all of Morgan Matson's books and I can say that I enjoyed all of them a lot, so if you're in need of a summer read or in general just a cute contemporary novel, definitely pick up one of her books!

Rating: 4/5 ✹

I'm genuinly so sorry for not uploading these past few months. I've been lacking both motivation and inspiration as well as time, since the amount of work I suddenly have to do for school is ridiculously high. I hope that I can somehow still find the time to post at least two times a month, but I can't promise you anything, especially because all of my exams are coming up soon. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this review, I know it's not really fitting the current season, but I started it about a month and a half ago and just wanted to finish it. Have a lovely day!

Leah