Check & Mate

This one met my expectations. Mostly.

Which is a kind way of saying, not bad but it could have been so much better.

Usually I like Ali Hazelwood's books, but as this was her first foray into ya, I was prepared to give it a little grace. It needed that grace and then some. There were times when I struggled to pay attention. It was never difficult to set the book down, except maybe the last 20 pages. Pretty sure that was more about me counting pages and continually reminding myself that the light at the end of the tunnel was glaringly bright.

Mallory is a fairly well written mc. She's got her good points and her flaws. I didn't necassrily like her - her childish bs and self appointed matyrdom grated on my nerves -but character wise she was fleshed out. I liked most of the chess related secondary characters, especially Oz. Who didn't I like? Nolan. The character equivalent of a wet paper towel. There was no depth to him. Chess. His grandfather. (who also played chess). And....he's a 20someyear old guy with no relationship experience who has no idea how to take care of himself when he's sick. That's it. We didn't learn anything about him that was comforting or revolutionary or even suggest that his favorite color was something other than beige. He chemistry with Mallory was miniscule at best. To the point where I didn't feel like there was really a romance at all.

My other issues would have been minor if the main story had held my attention better. But since it didn't...Mallory's mom? She was sick? I think? But no idea how she was sick. At first I thought it was depression. Then maybe recovering from cancer. But maybe it was some other kind of chronic illness? Lupus? Chronic fatigue? Arthritis? Fibromyalgia? No idea. Something was needed to explain why Mallory was playing parent even though her mom was in the other room. Mallory's sisters. Good grief. How does Mallory's 12 year old sister know that much about her sex life? Plus both girls were walking, talking Gen Z encyclopedias, practially just spewing lists of jokes and references to try to make the author appear like she knows what she writes about (Riverdale was not that good, but at least she didn't include the horrible, inexplicable Nancy Drew farce). It was all superficial.

One other point of contention: I think this book is mis-genre'd (is that a word?). Based on the ages of the main characters, where they are in life and the amount of sex talk, this should be New Adult, not YA. I wish publishers would stop trying to say something is YA, even when it's obviously not in an attempt to get those who read YA to look their direction.

Overall, 2.5 stars. I'm not feeling generous enough to round it up to 3