SUCH A RUSH--and why it's really not

Such a Rush
By: Jennifer Echols
Reported  by: Julianna Helms
Source: ARC from ATWT
Release date: July 10th, 2012 from MTV Books

A sexy and poignant romantic tale of a young daredevil pilot caught between two brothers.

High school senior Leah Jones loves nothing more than flying. While she’s in the air, it’s easy to forget life with her absentee mother at the low-rent end of a South Carolina beach town. When her flight instructor, Mr. Hall, hires her to fly for his banner advertising business, she sees it as her ticket out of the trailer park. And when he dies suddenly, she’s afraid her flying career is gone forever.

But Mr. Hall’s teenage sons, golden boy Alec and adrenaline junkie Grayson, are determined to keep the banner planes flying. Though Leah has crushed on Grayson for years, she’s leery of getting involved in what now seems like a doomed business — until Grayson betrays her by digging up her most damning secret. Holding it over her head, he forces her to fly for secret reasons of his own, reasons involving Alec. Now Leah finds herself drawn into a battle between brothers — and the consequences could be deadly.

-Summary from Goodreads
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A promising beginning crumbled by a hypocritical yet beautiful ending, Such a Rush is a convoluted novel that's both intense and grilling.

I had hoped to love this book--my friends loved it, and it looked simply amazing. But while the setting shimmered with richness and the characters flared with authenticity, this book ultimately did not claim me a fan. I am probably more disappointed by that fact than imaginable. There are several elements that contributed to my unfortunate distaste:

1) The Writing: Jennifer Echols's writing is smooth and fleshed, but the text was quite redundant. This may very well be only the ARC's issue and will not occur in the final book, but the repetitions emerged so numerously that I realized it was devaluing my experience of the book. I no longer have the ARC with me, but for example: Leah would say something was annoying, then in the next paragraph she would say the same thing, phrased only slightly differently. Then a chapter later she would mention it again, or another character would say the same thing she said. While repetition can be used as a powerful literary tool, I felt like the redundancy dragged the plot in this case and snapped me out of the story. The most prominent example I can think of is the phrase such a rush used at least twenty times, but since the title is Such a Rush, I suppose I should exclude that one. Even then, though, my thoughts still stand.

2) Leah: This is a slightly personal opinion that might not affect anyone else, but I am not a fan of girls like Leah. Let me explain something really quick: she has had a hard, hard life; neglected and used and abused. I understand that, and it makes me incredibly solemn and sympathetic. But she claims to be strong; to be different than the other girls who grow up to be "sluts," who are flaunters and exhibitionists and nothing more than that. Leah believed she was something else.

But while she appeared to be someone stronger, different, ultimately she was not.

She said she hated her mother for the oblivious decisions she made; but then Leah makes those choices herself. And sometimes she realizes that she's acting just like her mother and would be ashamed, but oftentimes she would not. She says she is not one to be a druggy like others; but you do not need drugs to sink into a "slut." I'm using her own word here, because I believe the word "slut" is extremely subjective, but Leah is bold--too bold, too hot-headed, at least in my opinion. EVERYONE tells her how beautiful and sexy she is, and she's just like, what? I'm beautiful? Since when? But then she goes and wears obscenely short shorts and disturbingly flaunting shirts; what do you actually realize, Leah? It was her act of hatred towards things and then doing them--confused and disbelieving truths and then suddenly acknowledging them as if she knew them all along--that made me eventually disappointed with her.

There are things I must applaud Jennifer for, of course. A female pilot? How cool! It's obvious she did her homework on planes and mechanics. The brothers' tension? Talk about realistic. Romance? Steamy as heck. But in the end, despite these uniquely well-portrayed aspects, Such a Rush's aggravating protagonist and a repetitive habit resulted in a sadly unfavorable response from me.

Yet, there is not much ground I hold with my sole opinion; others have loved this book, and I urge you to give its fresh and eccentric atmosphere a try.