3 1/2 stars

The first thing you should know about Clara Shin is that she’s absolutely nothing like Desi Lee, so if you’re a fan of I Believe in a Thing Called Love, and you’re coming to this book expecting another driven, studious MC with lists of life-goals and Korean drama references, then you may be disappointed. The second thing that you should know about Clara Shin is that she’s a three-dimensional, sympathetic character all on her own, and her story (while perhaps not as hilarious) is just captivating and colorful as Desi Lee’s.

Like our girl Desi, Clara is growing up in SoCal with a single father. However, unlike Desi, Clara resists all responsibility. Preferring not to be tied down by icky things like obligations, relationships, and lunch plans, Clara lives moment to moment with her casual BFF’s, sowing chaos and pulling pranks wherever she goes. When she is jokingly nominated as prom queen, Clara decides to go whole hog into the process just to spite her arch-nemesis: the driven, “perfect” Rose. However, when Clara ultimately turns her prom queen “moment” into yet another crazy prank (picture: fake blood, girl-fighting, tangled wires, and a fire), it’s the last straw. Rose and Clara are sentenced to a summer of working aboard Clara’s father’s food truck to pay for the damages. Clara begrudgingly agrees to commit to the summer and finds to her surprise there may be something worthwhile about stability and earnest emotion after all.

Although I think that I enjoyed I Believe in a Thing Called Love just a bit more, this book definitely held my attention. The world that Maurene Goo creates here is diverse, surprising, and just a bit zany. Clara’s pranks and crazy schemes made me smile, and her growth from shallow to deep felt hard-earned and real. Her adorable romance with the bravely emotional and up-front Hamlet was surprisingly drama-free and never fell into cringe-land. However, I think that the real appeal of this book lies in Clara’s “Odd Couple”-ish friendship with Rose. I loved their snarky comebacks and slowly developing realization that maybe they actually did enjoy each other's company, and it was a pleasant surprise to realize that “perfect” Rose had a lot to learn about friendship too.

This is a solid follow-up to I Believe in a Thing Called Love and will appeal to fans of lighter realistic fiction with diverse characters and settings.

This book was so fun! The concept of a Korean-Brazilian fusion food truck is kind of the best thing ever, and I was so excited to get to read about it! There is a enemies to friends relationship development, which is one of my favorite tropes. The main character, Clara, goes on a journey of self-discovery over the course of a summer working on her dad's food truck. Unfortunately, this is essentially the entire book. It didn't exactly LACK depth, but depth was also not in abundance. It was well-written and enjoyable, but I don't think it brought a lot of new stuff to the contemporary YA summer romance genre. I would definitely recommend this book for a quick, fun read!

Maurene Goo’s The Way You Make Me Feel is a fun and lighthearted book that is filled with my favorite three F words: friendship, family, and food. The story follows Clara Shin, a teenager who thrives on her reputation at school as the class clown. Clara lives to disrupt school and pull pranks on unsuspecting people like uptight class goody two shoes, Rose Carver. Rose and Clara loathe each other, and Clara loves every opportunity that presents itself to get under Rose’s skin, which leads her to devise a prank that is so outrageous, it’s sure to push Rose over the edge. Clara’s prank not only goes terribly wrong, but it also manages to land both she and Rose in hot water with the school administration, and with their parents of course. The principal initially plans to suspend both girls from school, but Clara’s dad comes up with an even better punishment: he proposes that Clara and Rose work together all summer aboard his food truck and that the wages they earn can be used to pay for the damage done to the school by Clara’s prank and the aftermath caused by Rose’s reaction to it.

What could possibly go wrong? But that said, maybe something could actually go right…


Clara and I got off to a rough start because I wasn’t a fan of her fondness for pranks and disruptions. I immediately worried that this might end up being an issue for me since I’m the type of reader who really needs to like or somehow relate to the main character. I’ll expand more on my issues with Clara in the ‘Dislikes’ section of my review, but for now I’ll just say that I was able to move past them fairly quickly so that I could enjoy the story and by the end, I really liked Clara.

Why the change? Mainly because she grows so much as a person throughout the story. I quickly realized that most of Clara’s clowning around was her way of protecting herself. She is afraid to open herself up to others for fear of getting hurt and so she wears her humor like a suit of armor, keeping all but a select few at a safe distance. She walks around acting like she doesn’t care about anything because it’s just easier that way. Realizing this about Clara made it much easier to connect with her, mainly because I wanted her to take a chance and open herself up to something real, whether it be friendship, romance, or a bit of both. It probably sounds cliché but I wanted her to not just laugh, but to live, laugh and love, which brings me to the fabulous relationships in this book.

The relationships in this book were what really made the book for me. When Clara is initially forced to work with Rose all summer long, she thinks it’s going to be an absolute nightmare because they can’t stand each other. What they realize over the course of their summer together, however, is that maybe they aren’t as different as they thought they were. If you’re into the idea of enemies becoming friends, this is a relationship that will certainly appeal to you. Even though I truly thought Rose and Clara were going to kill each other early on in the book, I soon found myself really looking forward to their scenes together as they friendship started to take off. It was so cute, since it became clear that neither of them had had this kind of friendship before. In that sense, it was a journey of discovery for both Clara and Rose.

On a similar note is Clara’s relationship with Hamlet. Hamlet is absolutely precious. He’s a Chinese American teen who works at a coffee cart at one of the spots where Clara’s dad likes to park his food truck. Hamlet is clearly enamored with Clara as soon as he meets her, and he’s so sweet and cute and funny, that he starts to work his way into Clara’s heart, no matter how determined she is to keep that armor of hers in place. It was just so cute to watch their relationship grow. Even though I’m not a romantic at all, I wanted Hamlet to get the girl so badly I couldn’t stand it, lol.

In addition to her budding relationships with Rose and Hamlet, I was also an especially huge fan of Clara’s relationship with her dad, Adrian. Adrian isn’t perfect by any means. He makes mistakes like all parents do and he realizes he has probably been a little lax in the way he disciplined Clara over the years, but he’s still just such a great dad. I loved that he came up with the idea of making her work on his food truck all summer and even though she was livid at the beginning, it was fun to watch them work together and to see Clara learn to appreciate just how hard her Dad is working to try to make all of their dreams come true.

I also really appreciated all of the sacrifices that he made in his own life in order to always be there for Clara. And the more we learned about just how much he really did for Clara, the more I adored him. He really makes up for the fact that Clara’s mother is basically a dud of a parent. Seriously, what kind of a person just abandons their family because they’d rather be a social media influencer and live the posh life. (As I’m sure you can guess, I was not a fan of Clara’s mom, especially since I have a feeling that she’s the reason why Clara felt like she needed to protect herself from getting hurt).

The Food: This might sound silly, but one of my favorite parts about The Way You Make Me Feel was the newfound appreciation it gave me for food trucks. I guess it’s because we don’t have many here and the ones we do have are basic, but I had no idea what truly incredible meals you could get from a food truck. Goo’s vivid descriptions of the Korean-Brazilian dishes that Clara’s dad served from his truck had my mouth watering every time he or the girls cooked and made me wish that his KoBra truck was a real thing so that I could stop by and try his delicious, spicy concoctions.

I have to admit that even though I ended up really liking Clara overall, I found her class clown routine in the opening pages of the novel to be so obnoxious and juvenile that I almost didn’t continue reading. It’s probably a personality thing with me because when I was in high school, I never found the class clowns to be very funny either. It always seemed like they were trying too hard to be funny and that was the same vibe I got from Clara. The humor just felt forced. Thankfully, once she began serving her “sentence” working on her dad’s food truck, Clara toned down the class clown bit and became a much more enjoyable character for me. She was still funny but the humor felt a lot more natural than her juvenile pranks did.

Even though I had some issues with Clara in the beginning, she really grew on me and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend The Way You Make Me Feel to anyone who enjoys lighthearted stories about friendship, family, and first loves. If you’re looking for a great summer/beach read, give The Way You Make Me Feel a chance. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

I was a bit iffy about this one because the last one I read by her I was really on the fence with it. Nevertheless, I sat down and read this in two days. I don't know the last time I did that. Although it had its issues, it was still an enjoyable summer read.
Clara is the class clown and she feeds off the laughs she provides to her friends and even those that don't like her. But one day she went too far and her dad sentences her to working for him on his food truck. Even worse, with the person who got her into this mess, Rose Carver. But unexpectedly, working there over the summer gets easier and more fun as the summer goes by.
The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars was the MC. I understand she was a prankster, but LAWD someone should have told her for stunts like she did someone could get hurt or ARRESTED. A lot of the things she did didn't even seem funny to me. I was definitely more of a Rose fan. I liked that she was able to calm her down. And then there was Hamlet. I liked him for her too. He wasn't afraid to tell her like it was, no matter what the situation was. She was so annoying and they really helped to tone her down. I didn't really start liking her until close to the end I realized. And last but not least, her dad was THE BEST.He was present in her life and he was super funny and acted like a parent. Not always present in YA nowadays. (It's normally a present mother)
I really loved summery, food truck setting of the book as well. It was something that I had never read before and it was fun to see the way they worked together and how things were different from a real restaurant. (I worked at Olive Garden before) It was also really great to finallybe able to read some books set in the sunshine when the sun is actually shining outside.
I also really loved the plot. It was set at a great pace. I found that it flowed so easily, that I wasn't even aware that that much time had passed. (The whole summer.) I found that I was so invested in the story that I didn't care, I just wanted it to keep going.
I had a small issue with the main character, but for the most part I really liked this one. This one is very different from her last, I Believe in a Thing Called Love. I can'y wait to see what else Goo will write.

This was a cute story despite the main character being irritating for the first majority of the book. Her constant bickering with her frenemy, well beyond long enough to get the point across in the book, almost caused me to DNF. I persevered and eventually she began to grow as a person and was much more tolerable. That being said, I liked the story itself and the other characters were great. The food truck aspect was fun and helped make it feel like a summery read.

This was such an enjoyable and fun read!I loved the story line and the characters were lovable!I liked Clara. She’s quite an interesting character. She’s snarky and maybe a little rude, but there’s a lot of potential.It was nice how we see her grow up through the story and she changes to something even better!I picked this book for the cover and I'm glad it was an amazing read!I loved how this book focuses on relationships!

I haven’t read any of Goo’s books before, but I’ve heard only good things about her works so I decided to request this one and I was not the least bit disappointed. The novel follows Clara, a teen who loves to pull pranks, especially when it means ruining her enemy, Rose’s, day.

However, when Clara’s prank at prom takes things too far she suddenly finds herself having to work on her father’s food truck, the KoBra, with Rose, ruining her plans for the perfect summer and visiting her mom, Jules, who she doesn’t see often. Miserable and angry, Clara wants nothing to do with this task or with Rose, but the longer she’s forced to work with her the more Clara realizes Rose isn’t all that terrible after all.

I really loved this story because I think Goo did a really good job of showing where Clara’s needs for pranks came from and I really understood her as a character. On the flip side, I also totally got where Rose was coming from and I liked seeing these girls being forced to realize that even though they were different that didn’t mean they had to be enemies. I’m a big fan of girl friendship stories and this was a great one.

Additionally, Clara’s dad, Adrian, is definitely a DILF. I fell in love with him pretty early on and I have no regrets. I also really liked Clara’s romantic interest, Hamlet. He was so quirky and genuine and I thought that was a nice contrast to Clara, who definitely struggled with facing her real feelings about things.

Lastly, Goo did an incredible job of showing the relationships between Clara and her separated parents. I think it would’ve been really easy to make one parent look like the good one and the other look bad, but Goo did a great job of showing why Adrian was so awesome, but also how Jules was flawed but still tried. I thought it was amazing to see Clara learn more about her parents, because I think it’s something a lot of kids with divorced parents go through, where they realize their fun parent isn’t always the best parent.

Thus, overall, I highly recommend this book. I truly loved it and it made me incredibly hungry, but in the best way. Now I want to read all of Goo’s books so I think I’ll go do that. If you’ve read The Way You Make Me Feel, let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

I've been in the mood for some diverse characters and am trying to put together a list of romances featuring Polynesian characters but in the midst of putting that list together, I came across this book. A contemporary YA set in LA, featuring an Asian lead? Count me in.

So, this book features Clara Shin who is a junior at Elysian High School in the Echo Park part of Los Angeles County. She's known at school as a prankster and she's always at odds with straight-laced Rose Carver. When things go a little too far at junior prom, Rose and Clara are sentenced to working off their fight on Clara's father's food truck, called the KoBra where they serve Korean and Brazillian influenced food. Clara is not happy about this as she's not one for working over the summer but Rose will whatever it takes to not have this on her permanent record so she's in.

From the very beginning, Rose and Clara butt heads. And they butt heads over everything, big and small, they argue and then fight and Clara's Dad has had it. He's going to make sure that they learn their lesson so he trains them and then he leaves them on their own to run the food truck. Being stuck on a food truck with your least favorite person in town is pure hell and continues to be that way for Clara until they start to get to know each other.

Seeing Clara really come into her own and take a hard look at the way that her life has been up until this point was refreshingly honest. I really enjoyed Clara's character. Her personality was so L.A. and seeing her grow closer and closer to Rose was fun and meeting Hamlet then seeing him and Clara circle each other was great.

This book was well written. Goo's depiction of Los Angeles was real, authentic and true. There is a huge Asian population in San Gabriel Valley and it didn't surprise me at all that Hamlet played basketball (Ha, I've been to many an Asian League basketball game in SGV and could totally picture Hamlet there). I even pictured Hamlet as one of my daughter's friends. The way that Hamlet was described fit my daughter's friend description really well. I was nodding along to pretty much all of the L.A. bits because L.A. is my hometown and I thought all of that stuff was spot on.

It was really easy for me to connect with this book because I'm a huge fan of Los Angeles and coming of age stories. Clara was a great lead character and I really loved seeing the friendship blossom between her and Rose. I also really enjoyed the little romance that she had going with Hamlet and the positive parenting thing going on??? YESSSSS!!! Far too often, I see a lot of absent parents in YA books so it was nice to see parents who were involved in their children's lives and showed genuine love for them. All in all, I really enjoyed Clara's journey of self-discovery in this book and I will definitely be reading more from Maurene Goo. I recommend this book if you're in the mood for something cute, sweet and funny. This fits the bill quite nicely.

<strong>Grade: 4 out of 5</strong>

THIS WAS AMAZING. The award of Hottest Dad in a YA Book goes to Adrian, hands down. But now seriously, the main character was sarcastic and moody and so so realistic, it reminded me of my teenage phase. I loved how the friendship developed between two very different people, and how that pushed them outside their comfort zone and made the girls think and reconsider what good friends are. The romance wasn't that interesting to me but it's always nice to see a cute, polite and sweet boy in a YA book. Please enough with the broody love interests, I want more Hamlets. And now my favorite things: the father/daughter relationship (and the issues with her mom) and the descriptions of food. Honestly, I usually don't expect much in terms of setting from contemporary books but the descriptions of Los Angeles, specially the food-truck scene, made me feel like I was IN the story. ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS

I first picked this up because I really enjoyed Maurene Goo's recent title, I Believe in a Thing Called Love, but it turns out the main characters couldn't have been more different. Where Desi was driven, popular, and a little bit awkward, Clara is a goofball slacker who can't be bothered to care what you think. It took a bit of time to get used to Clara's attitude, but it was worth the effort.

After a school prank gone wrong, Clara is forced to spend the summer working in her dad's Korean-Brazilian food truck alongside her school nemesis, Rose. Working literally side-by-side in the tiny space, the two slowly get to know each other and start to appreciate their differences. Add in a superhot, adorably earnest love interest and you've got a summer to remember. But when the summer comes to a close, will Clara's old life be waiting for her?

I loved all the descriptions of food and cooking throughout this book, both on and off the food truck. I also really enjoyed how deeply the story felt rooted in LA, although I can't say if it was realistic. This is a fun, heartwarming read that's perfect for the summer. I look forward to recommending it at my library.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley to read in exchange for an honest review.

This young adult novel is about a coming-of-age summer for Clara Shin, a Korean-American teen whose parents originally hailed from the Korean immigrant community in Brazil. Clara, 16, is just finishing up her junior year in high school in Los Angeles. She is often in trouble; she “lived for pranks and disruption.”

Clara lives alone with her dad Adrian, only 34. Her similarly young mom is a “social media ‘influencer,’ paid to traipse around cool destinations.” Her mom has four million followers and travels around the world wearing free designer clothes and getting pampered. “How do you get a job doing…that?,” a friend asks Clara. She reports: “The words flew out of my mouth before I could stop them. ‘Extreme narcissism.’”

Nevertheless, Clara loves when she gets to see her mom, and looks forward to spending some of the summer with her in the resort city of Tulum on the Caribbean coastline of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula.

Plans change when Clara causes a scene at the junior prom with one of her pranks, and ends up in a fight with her nemesis, the “goody-goody” Rose Carver. Clara’s dad and Rose’s parents agreed to “sentence them” to working together on the Adrian’s food truck, The KoBra, all summer. The truck, named for both Korea and Brazil, serves a fusion menu.

To some extent the plot is reminiscent of the beginnings of “Parent Trap” albeit with school mates instead of twin sisters. Stuck together in the small food truck all day, Clara discovers that everything she thought she knew about Rose was wrong. And she found herself gaining a best friend. Moreover, she finds a boyfriend too. All this is new for Clara - previously, she never had a boyfriend that lasted more than six months, or a confidante. She just hung out with other people with whom she could engage in pranks.

Over the course of the summer, she comes to understand that since her mom left, she has spent her life in an attempt to keep herself from caring too deeply about anyone or anything, lest she get her heart broken again.

But first there is a crisis that tests Clara’s developing self-awareness. Clara behaves badly, and everyone is angry at her for not being able to “handle being real,” and for thinking “it’s special not to care.” She has to figure out what really matters to her the most.

Discussion: The characters are well-drawn, and reflect the diversity of Los Angeles in an appealing way. Clara is of course Korean. Her old boyfriend was Hispanic, and her new one is Chinese. These different heritages are expressed mainly by the character names and by the varied food everyone eats; most of the emphasis is on them as teenagers, and what they have in common because of it.

I loved that when Clara was down on Rose, the fact that she was African-American never entered the equation. Rather, she hated “her inability to chill; her uptight, follow-the-rules compulsion; her stupid narc tendencies to get ahead in life.” But when Clara finds out why Rose was like that, she did gain some cultural awareness. As Rose later explained to her: “there’s a lot of pressure on black girls to be better than everyone else….”

Clara was not very appealing at the beginning of the story, but she grew up in the book. She had an excellent dad, and some great friends offering her support.

Evaluation: Teens will find much to like in this not-too-deep, light “summer-ish” read.

Working on her father's food truck may have been Clara's punishment, but it ended up being the push Clara needed to grow, change, and deal with some of her personal demons.

•Pro: I am going to start with my favorite thing about this book - HAMLET! That boy was just all sorts of wonderfulness. He was sweet and charming, and the way he interacted with his nainai and yeye just warmed my heart.

•Pro: It took a while, but Clara grew on me. At first, she was kind of selfish, but she grew a lot over the course of this book, and eventually endeared herself to me.

•Pro: Clara's dad was quite terrific. He was a very young dad, and took Clara's latest debacle as a call to parenting arms. We later find out, that dad was doing quite a remarkable job even as a teen.

•Con: There were a few too many loose ends for me. The ending was thoughtful and very sweet, but there were a bunch of other things that happened with other characters in the book that were just left hanging out there.

•Pro: This story has romance, but it isn't a romance. It's about finding those people, who are important to you, being real with them, and showing them how much they mean to you.

•Pro: The bond between Clara and her dad was really special, and was one of my favorite relationships in the book. Clara learns a lot of new things about her dad, and develops a deeper appreciation for him. She also shares some special moments from her past with us, and I won't pretend that a tear or two didn't formed in my eyes.

•Pro: I was a fan of the friendship that developed between Rose and Clara. It was good to see Clara had someone, who could ground her, but also support her.

Overall: A lovely story of friends and family, which was filled with a delightful cast of characters, humor, and plenty of heartfelt moments.

Laughing the whole time, getting annoyed by the protagonist and appreciate the learning are the feels that The Way You Make Me Feels made me feel.

The book follows the life of Clara Shin, who is known not only for being both a Brazilian and Korean but also in causing havoc and pissing people around her. 

Before, we seldom see diverse books that are being published. But now, if you notice, majority of the books that are being published nowadays are about people of different races. That we also see black people who is being portrayed as the main character. With this, people are happy to see and learn not only one culture and races but different, unique and beautiful that other races has to offer.

As a Filipino, I'm more than entertain reading the book as I read that mostly of the characters that are being described in the story are Filipino. It made me proud that the author showcase not only one race in the story but got to share other races in the story. 

"Kody was a Filipino American babe with a Patti Smith haircut and a raspy smoker's voice.

"The photo accompanying the link was of a little Filipino girl.

At the first part of the book, Clara is so annoying that I just wish she isn't the main character. But nonetheless, I like how strong independent woman she is and how she really stand on what she believes in. As time goes by, Clara's characteristics bloom into a beautiful one where she change to be an annoying person to a lovable one. I also like how father and daughter relationship is being portrayed well in the story. It lets us see the beauty of love a father can do to her daughter or son.  

With the romance between Clara and Hamlet. I found it as an instant romance which is not my type but I found it cute and romantic. The development in their relationship is also strong and lovable that makes me want to find my own Hamlet.

I really want to express my feelings more but that will really really spoil you. And I know that people hate being spoiled. So I suggest that you should just read the book. AS IN PRE-ORDER AND READ THE BOOK IMMEDIATELY AFTER ITS RELEASE.

My rating would be a solid 4  out of 5 stars as the book let me feel to be loved, and show that being a carefree person sometimes is not as bad as other thinks.

3.5 stars

Plot: Admittedly, I'm not a big contemporary reader, but something about The Way You Make Me Feel drew me to the synopsis. Clara was a jokester, and after a prank that caused far more property damage than expected, she had to join her single father working his food truck which allowed her to connect with her father on a different level and meet new friends that typically wouldn't have been in her orbit. The Way You Make Me Feel was a short read that can be devoured in one sitting and I enjoyed Clara's transformation and journey.

Characters: It took me a while to like Clara which was Maurene's point; however, I felt like all of the characters at the beginning were archetypes. Clara was selfish and didn't care for anyone else's feelings; she was a teenaged punk running around with her skateboard and dreaming of running off with her Instagram-famous mother. After she got over herself, I started to like reading about Clara and her friends, but I was especially attracted to Clara's relationship with her family.

Worldbuilding: The coolest aspect of The Way You Make Me Feel was the food truck culture. It was fun to see the research that Goo put into this important plotline and the delicious fusion foods that were included. I was drawn to Clara because she was juggling American, Brazilian, and Korean cultures and I loved how Clara embraced all three. One aspect that bugged me a bit about the food culture scene, was that Clara's Pai (and owner of the truck) completely trusted the two teenaged girls to operate the food truck themselves. Their duties included driving the food truck to the hot spots, taking orders, cooking the food, and counting the money after each shift all by themselves. That was just too much responsibility for two girls who were working the food truck as a punishment.

Besides that, I liked that The Way You Make Me Feel served as a love letter to L.A. Goo made use of the many hot spots in California and really made the setting a part of the story.

Short N Sweet: The Way You Make Me Feel was the perfect contemporary read for readers looking for a fluffy summer book.

The Way You Make Me Feel packed adorableness, food, fun friendships and amazing father-daughter relationships all at once. This was my first Maurene Goo book and I can safely say that it won’t be my last. I read it with a smile on my face the whole time and that is exactly what I was expecting when I picked up this book. Expectations, met.

A BEAUTIFUL STORY WITH FOCUS ON PARENTS-CHILDREN RELATIONSHIPS
💭

In this story, we meet Clara, a Korean-American teenager living alone with her dad. Clown of her high-school, queen of the most awful pranks, Clara was a main character that was, at first, a bit complicated to root for. She was certainly not perfect and, at times, her way of thinking or acting were lost on me, but that didn’t last too long. Once we got to scratch under the surface and got to know her a bit better, as the story went on, I discovered a passionate, but lost, a genuinely sweet, funny and witty character I ended up loving.
You will probably get it right from the synopsis, this book really is character-driven and everything I expected in a contemporary like this, yet what made me feel the most, about this book, were the relationships in it.

Let’s start with the one that won my heart, right from the start: Clara’s relationship with her parents, most especially her dad. She lives with him and her parents are separated, and damn, that relationship just made me really, really happy. The way they trusted each other, the way they interacted, everything else just somehow reminded me of Lorelai and Rory’s relationship in Gilmore Girls and that made me way too happy, I live for these kind of relationships in books, especially in YA! BOOKS! WITH! AMAZING! PARENT! RELATIONSHIP!

We also got to meet Clara’s mother a little bit and how conflicted their relationship was, but how, somehow, through it all, Clara’s mother is trying her best to be a mom even when she was not meant to be, or doesn’t quite know how to. I found that relationship interesting to follow as well, but let’s be honest, father/daughter relationship in this was my favorite thing about the entire book.

FRIENDSHIPS & ROMANCE : GOALS
💭

The Way You Make Me Feel also focuses on some other wonderful relationships, both friendships and actual romantic relationships. I really enjoyed the emphasis we got on friendship, how the friendship grew, changed, how endearing and adorable it was. Then there’s the love interest, Hamlet, such an adorable little bean. I loved how positive he was and the breath of fresh air and laughter he brought into Clara’s life. He and Clara were so different, yet they made sense somehow and I was rooting for them from the start…. not hard to do though, I mean, you should MEET HAMLET. He’s way too adorable.

A GREAT AND DIVERSE CAST OF CHARACTERS
💭

Maurene Goo gave a particular attention to her characters and we got to meet an amazing and diverse cast in this book: Clara is Korean-American, both her parents are Korean-Brazilians and you can get a glimpse of THE! FOOD! YUM! With Clara’s dad and his food truck and that was really amazing. Hamlet is Chinese, Rose is black (and anxiety rep. Yes). We got to see amazing diversity in this book and I loved the attention brought to it.

I also love the feeling of wanderlust I got, traveling with them in the streets of L.A, the hometown in that story, as well as in the small villages of Mexico.

OVERALL
💭

Overall, The Way You Make Me Feel was certainly a feel-good contemporary, a much-needed and overall quick read if you’re looking for something sweet, fun and with great friendships and parents-relationships for the summer. It’s about finding your people, it’s a love-letter to Los Angeles and it’s a really beautiful book. I’d totally recommend it.

Some suspended belief is necessary when coming to how Clara ends up working on the food truck. However, this story is wonderful and you become as invested in it as Clara does in her dad's food truck. Oh, and it made me hungry.

I liked the development of the relationship between Clara and Rose. I think this was the highlight of the novel. Their relationship was similar to rivals in a Korean drama (in general). I thought Clara's mannerisms reminded me of Choon Hyang from My Sassy Girl Choon Hyang (a Korean drama I watched as a child). Both Clara and Choon Hyang acted immature compared to those around them. Additionally, I enjoyed reading about Clara's relationship with her father. But what surprised me was when Clara looked up to her mother (who never took care of her) instead of her father. Fortunately, Clara developed as a character. I will not be going over this one as it's kind of spoilery.

My least favorite relationship had been Clara's relationship with Hamlet. In my opinion, everything happened way too fast between them. Their relationship (however the reader wanted to interpret it) did not seem okay. At times, I can't help but think what Hamlet saw in Clara because they had conflicting interests and drastically different personalities. Clara also seemed to be a bad influence (she was definitely annoying) to Hamlet (just my opinion). This is probably where the saying "tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who you are" comes in. Clara's interest in causing mayhem may have developed when she hung out with the wrong crowd (again, just my opinion). Even if this was the case, I thought it was hilarious reading about Hamlet and Clara's budding relationship.

Also, I appreciated the diversity in the novel. I'm Filipino so whenever I read about Filipino characters (even if it was just briefly mentioned or if they're just minor characters), I can't help but feel good because of the representation. I rarely read books with Filipino characters so this was a nice surprise. Needless to say, this book was not short in diverse characters. Like the idea of Clara (who was half Korean and Brazilian) working in a food truck that served an infusion of Korean and Brazilian food hybrid intrigued me. One thing I didn't appreciate was when Clara thought of Hamlet as a dog. It just seemed offensive to me. However, I think it depends on the reader and the way they take Clara's POV into context.

As for the writing, since the book was written in the first person point of view of a teenager, I was expecting the use of slang. For instance, Clara did say ‘pooped out’ in the novel. What caught my attention was the use of ‘ephemeral’ when she described love. To me, it seemed far fetched because of 3 reasons: 

- A character like Clara would never use ephemeral in a sentence unless forced to do so. Now, Rose using this word wouldn’t surprise me, but Clara using this word is laughable. I just don't think that ephemeral is a word used in general conversations (or in this case, her POV). It just seems 'out of character.'
- Clara described love as ephemeral doesn’t make sense either because she doesn’t seem to know much about love and relationships. Heck, she even told Hamlet that she didn’t even know if she loved her exes! Then again, maybe she used ‘ephemeral’ to describe the way her parents felt about one another. But this doesn't explain how she knew the meaning of 'ephemeral.' Look, I know that Clara isn't stupid but I just can't imagine her using that word.
- Finally, someone like Clara who doesn’t necessarily takes things seriously (like relationships), doesn’t seem like someone who would contemplate about the love life of her parents. It seems like Clara is someone who wouldn’t know much about it, or she doesn't seem like someone who would give her time of the day to think about it. However, I can see her as someone who would contemplate about the reasoning behind her parents’ separation but not in regards to the subject of love.

Once again, these are just my opinions. I don't claim to know know more about Clara's character compared to the author. I liked the author's writing but I don't think the word choice (ephemeral) seemed to fit for Clara's character.

Overall, I did enjoy reading this story. I would recommend it to young adults and those who wanted to read a story that is almost like a Korean drama.

*Huge thanks to the publisher  for the opportunity to read this book for free in exchange for an honest review!

Maurene captured my half-Korean heart with her sophomore novel, "I Believe in a Thing Called Love", so there was no question I was eager for The Way You Make Me Feel. I even posted about the cover reveal a few months ago, and have been eager and hopeful for an ARC of some kind.

Ugh, can I even contain my excitement about this book? The answer is a resounding NO! So can you imagine my excitement that I’m part of this blog book tour? Maybe!

I dove right into this book and stayed there for a long time. Clara Shin is an amazingly funny, down-to-earth character, always ready to be the joker–so much that it lands her right into trouble toward the end of the school. Due to her antics, her dad punishes her by making her, alongside a schoolmate named Rose, work in his food truck, the KoBra, an ode to their Brazilian-Korean heritage.

The best part about this book is that Clara learns–that Rose isn’t all she portrays herself to be, her friends might not be exactly who they say they are, and her father has done more for her than she originally thought. I loved every part of Clara’s discovery. I enjoyed romping through Los Angeles with Clara, Rose, and eventually Hamlet. I’ve only visited LA once but I was quite happy to see I recognized a few of the places in the book! 🙂

I also enjoyed how we dove deeper into Clara’s blossoming friendship with Rose and growing romance with Hamlet. I definitely think Clara needed both of these characters because they made her think a lot about her life decisions and situations. What Clara sees is surface level, but as we follow Clara and these characters, we see there’s something so much deeper, especially with Rose. I definitely like to imagine she and Clara continue to have a great friendship beyond the confines of this book.

My love for Goo’s father/daughter relationship started with "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" and keeps pace in this book, too. I’m always rooting for positive parent/children relationships since sometimes I feel like they are so rare, or if they exist, it’s the whole “my parents don’t understand me” routine. Not the case here at all! Clara’s relationship with her mom wavers, but that’s something she learns on her own, too.

Can I just mention once again how amazing it was to follow Clara and her father, Adrian, in their food truck? The descriptions of the food! Hello, my mouth was watering! Everything sounded so delicious. I loved how at home Clara felt wherever she went, seeing how she connected to each place, and she brought Rose and Hamlet along with her. The three of them make a great pair!

Clara is the person I wanted to be in high school. (Which is really saying a lot because I didn’t like high school very much.) I’m glad she’s here for others, especially Korean-Americans who (hopefully) see themselves reflected in Goo’s work and on her covers! I love the innate mentions of the kimchi squat and not patting down the rice because who wants matted-down rice? That’s right, Clara! You can just tell my husband that because he insists on doing it! Ugh!

DNF - 10%

Sorry, Clara is too much of a brat to me and I just couldn't like her character. I'm one of those people that has to like the character in order to like the book. The prom scene just did me in, it was too much, too... I don't even have words, I just thought it was stupid. I wish we could've followed Rose as I actually liked her a lot and would've kept reading if we had been following her.

As always, I don't star DNFs because I feel that's wrong because I didn't finish the book. Though if I had to rate it... you can guess what I'd chose.

Will go Live on my Blog: 5/01/2018

*I received an e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. A huge thank you to the publishers!

Going into this book, I really didn’t know what to expect. The synopsis sounded interesting, though, so I decided to give The Way You Make Me Feel a chance. I’m so glad I did!


Like I said, I didn’t have too many expectations going into this book, but even the few that I had, were so completely surpassed. It was just such a sweet read! I really just loved everything about this book.

One of the things I really loved were the characters, and how much diversity was included. When I first started reading, I expected Rose and Clara to have the typical rivals personality, and I’m so glad the author didn’t go that route. Rose wasn’t that popular, “mean girl,” and I really loved watching their friendship grow. I also really appreciated the anxiety representation. There was one particular scene in the book, where Rose was describing what it is like to have anxiety, and as I read it, it was just such a “yes” moment for me. I so related to her experience and vulnerability, and it was just so accurate and such an authentic portrayal.

Another aspect that I just loved about this book was the family dynamic. Clara and her dad’s relationship was just so sweet and real. I also liked how, despite the fact that Clara’s mom left them, and they weren’t super close, that the author still didn’t go the villain route with her. Family relationships are complicated, and can be so easy to make cliche, and I am just very glad that Maurene Goo wrote Clara’s family in such an honest way.

Then there’s Hamlet…*happy sigh* He was just the sweetest guy! I loved him so much! His and Clara’s relationship was so sweet, and I adored his grandparents so much, too.

Last, I want to talk about the KoBra. I just loved reading about the food truck, and Clara, her dad, and Rose working there. It was so fun to read about, and it made me oh so hungry! The whole LA setting was just wonderful, too.

Overall, I really adored this book far more than I expected to. It never gets too frustrating. It does feature a few cliches, but in the absolute best way. It has incredible characters. The Way You Make Me Feel is such a sweet and summer-y read. It is just one of those books that makes you feel like summer. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who loves summer, food trucks, cute romances, and contemporary novels.