BLOG TOUR: Review of 'Access All Awkward' by Beth Garrod

Hey there, my fellow book nerds. Today I'm thrilled to be taking part in the blog tour for Bella Fisher's latest adventure in Access All Awkward by Beth Garrod. My thoughts on this hilarious book are below!

Pages: 450
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Scholastic
Genre: Humor, Contemporary
Release Date: July 3rd 2018
Buy The Book: Book Depository - A Great Read

Bella Fisher is stuck in EXAM HELL - with only the promise of a weekend at the RebelRocks festival with her mates as a reward afterwards. OK, so she can't actually afford a ticket and will have to work as a litter picker and toilet scrubber, but it's still going to be epic: the best bands, her best friends and best-boy-in-the-world Adam, with not a parent or teacher in sight. But when she arrives to find annoying older sister Jo has been sent by Mum to keep an eye on her, things go from bad to worse. BFF Rachel is hanging out with some mean girls, awful ex-boyfriend Luke pitches up with his model girlfriend and her pristine Hunter wellies, and the drummer in her favourite band is exposed as a sexist pig. All the face glitter and flower crowns in the world can't save the day... can they?

In Bella's latest adventure, she's stressing over her exams before spending some of her summer working at the RebelRocks music festival in her town. During the festival, Bella and her friends find themselves with even more work to do. They want the world's hottest new boyband, The Session, to apologise for treating their fans, and women in general, like dirt.

The love I have in my heart for these characters is unreal. Bella is utterly hilarious and her narration of the story had me laughing so much. The situations she finds herself in! It's impossible not to love her and her group of friends. Their friendship is always such a central plot within this series and it's focused heavily upon in this book too. I adore Rach and Teegan as much as I adore Bella.

Bella's family are once again amazing in this third book. Their group chat is definitely a highlight in the story. What's especially great about them is that they always work through things together and stand by one and other. It makes for some lovely, heart-warming scenes.

• REALISTIC TEENAGE CHARACTERS. I never like it when YA characters come across as older than they should be, unless there's a specific plot which revolves around them having to be maturer from a young age. So I adore the fact that Beth writes her teen characters in such a perfect way. Yes, there's a lot of caps lock, and yes the characters shorten or, in Bella's case, join words, and yes they use plenty of references. WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT YA CHARACTERS SHOULD DO. It makes them so much more authentic that way.

• HEALTHY ROMANCE. I can't write this review without giving a shoutout to the way relationships are handled in this series. Yay for healthy relationships in YA that are positive and in which the characters deal with their problems in a good way! There were so many moments between Bella and Adam that made me want to hug this book.

• ONE LINERS THAT MAKE YOU HOWL. There are lots of lines I want to put in this review but won't because A) this is a spoiler-free zone and B) you absolutely have to read them for yourself. There were just so many little things that had me in tears. 

I don't want to say too much plot-wise, but I just need to say that I couldn't be more happy with the very ending of the story. Because it's not what I expected to happen, but is exactly what I was hoping for. Again, it goes to show how much it pays off to be realistic in YA stories, especially contemporary ones. Despite the humorous nature of this book, it deals with some very real issues that we have in our society in general, and it also deals with problems that young people who are taking exams and worrying about the future have to face It demonstrates that it doesn't matter if things don't happen as you planned, you can still make things work. And this book manages to do all of that as well as being perfectly hilarious. I couldn't ask for more in a YA story.

Royal Rating:

Be sure to check out the other fantastic bloggers taking part in the tour: