Dear Evan Hansen by Val Emmich (with Steven Levenson, Benj Pasek, and Justin Paul)
Genre: YA Realistic Fiction
Blurb (on back of book):
From the show's creators comes the groundbreaking novel inspired by the Broadway smash hit Dear Evan Hansen.
Dear Evan Hansen,
Today's going to be an amazing day and here's why...
When a letter that was never meant to be seen by anyone draws high school senior Evan Hansen into a family's grief over the loss of their son, he is given the chance of a lifetime: to belong. He just has to stick to a lie he never meant to tell, that the notoriously troubled Connor Murphy was his secret best friend.
Suddenly, Evan isn't invisible anymore--even to the girl of his dreams. And Connor Murphy's parents, with their beautiful home on the other side of town, have taken him in like he was their own, desperate to know more about their enigmatic son from his closest friend. As Evan gets pulled deeper into their swirl of anger, regret, and confusion, he knows that what he's doing can't be right, but if he's helping people, how wrong can it be?
No longer tangled in his once-incapacitating anxiety, this new Evan has a purpose. And a website. He's confident. He's a viral phenomenon. Every day is amazing. Until everything is in danger of unraveling and he comes face to face with his greatest obstacle: himself.
A simple lie leads to complicated truths in this big-hearted coming-of-age story of grief, authenticity and the struggle to belong in an age of instant connectivity and profound isolation.
MY OPINION: ***
Short review!
This book wasn't the best book for me. However, I think the whole idea behind it was really good and for that, I'll bump my rating up from its original two-stars.
I know that DEH is a worldwide Broadway phenomenon that everybody is talking about. I really want to go see the show because it's coming around where I live, which is the main reason why I picked up the novel version in the first place. I knew absolutely NOTHING about this story before I read it, other than the fact that a lot of people at school love it for some reason.
The plotline is intricate and very complicated and you can see how Evan just keeps digging his grave deeper and deeper (probably not the best choice of words right there). I felt bad for Evan half the time but I mean, he was trying to help the other people as well as help himself. If he was doing something wrong for sympathy/empathy reasons, can we really punish him?
The other half of the time, as much as I hate to say this, Evan annoyed me. His whole character was based around being a loner and being weird and that's what started all of this mess. My problem with Evan is that he never really tried. I get that he has extreme social anxiety and is a social outcast overall but he could have toughened up and made an attempt to make a friend who ISN'T DEAD.
I mean, sure, we have Jared, but to me, he really didn't seem like a friend. Neither did Alana.
Also, there was no chemistry between Zoe and Evan and I'm ashamed to admit that I accidentally skipped over their first kiss. Oops. I just wasn't interested in the two of them together or by themselves.
However, I do understand why this is such an interesting idea and I think that if I had read the script or just started with seeing the show, I would have loved it a lot more. It didn't really seem like a novel-type story because it was mostly just the same ideas being repeated over and over again.
I would recommend this book to readers who are fans of Broadway novel adaptations or to people looking to find a beautiful story of a lonesome boy.
Main Character: Evan
Sidekick(s): Connor (I guess), Zoe, Jared, Alana, etc
Villain(s): Death, lies, misunderstanding, guilt, loneliness, etc
Realistic Fiction Elements: All of this was very real to life.
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