e-Audio, 05:15:37
Narrated by: Kuda Dutiro Robinson
Release Date: February 11, 2025
Published by: Hachette Audio
Read from: February 13-16, 2025
Stand-alone
Source: Library’s Libby (I also received an ARC from the publisher, but I received it after I already had the audio. I received it in exchange for a just and honest review.)
Content Warning:
For Readers Interested In: Coming of Age, Family Diversity, Racial/Ethnic Diversity, Realistic Fiction, Romance, Socioeconomic Status Diversity, YAA hilarious and heartfelt young YA contemporary debut about the misadventures of an aspiring young rapper as he navigates school, family, and friendship.
Thirteen-year-old Growls (aka Shaun) is an aspiring (awful) rapper who hopes to enter this year’s Raptology competition with his best friend, Shanks (aka Zachariah). After all, what better way to land his crush (Tanisha) and get the respect he finally deserves than winning the contest and going viral?
But when a livestream practice goes epically wrong, the two friends do go viral– and not in the way they’d hoped.
Now the laughingstock of the school, Growls is sure he’ll never have another chance to date Tanisha. Even worse, Shanks has gone MIA, leaving him terribly alone.
But when Growls meets the new girl on the block (Siobhan), things don’t seem so terrible after all. And with some patience, a little luck, and a whole lot of practice, he just might win the Raptology competition and be a hero to both Siobhan and Shanks.
Either way, he’s ready for this. He’s steady for this. It’s comeback season and they call him comeback king for a reason.
*MY THOUGHTS*
When I read this I spent the whole book rolling my eyes. This kid was annoying lol And I know this is a YA book, but this was more than that. He was one of those kids who laughed at his own jokes and said stuff that he laughed at but never other people. And while that’s fine sometimes, to do it all then time was just dumb lol
So I guess we’ll start with the characters. Baby when I tell you this dude made me mad af throughout this whole book! He was not funny and was borderline weird. I kept leaning my head over like wtf are you talking about lol Almost every time he opened his mouth was like a cringe. It really took me out of the story. And yes I know teenage boys that want to be rappers will walk around and make up lyrics all the time. But the reason why his were annoying, were because his just weren’t good. The other characters were more chill and kind of had some sense, which was the reason I didn’t DNF it I think. The other character that he falls for tho, didn’t actually have sense. I didn’t actually understand the reason behind her doing that. Anything could have happened. (I’m not gonna lie, that irritated me.) But i was glad that he found someone that actually cared about him.
The representation in this one tho was very on point. The way he spoke about his mama and how she was a single mom who was like not eating at some points because they had to. I felt that was very real. And the mental health rep that stems from that live stream. It was very real. Can you imagine sniffing your arm pits with that many people watching? lmaooooo
Which brings me to the humor of this. It was definitely funny lol But Idk if it was because it was actually funny or if it was because he really was that bad a rap lol Some parts were funny, but most of the time I was laughing at him because his rap skills were not there. I fear its the latter because the only real part that I laughed at was the beginning where they went viral lol
The social media aspect was also one of my favorite things. Y’all know I’m a sucker for a book with social media. And this one got me. I hate to say it, but I did laugh at them going viral. I DID give him his props tho when he did what he did at Raptology. At least that one was cool lol
This book was ok, but I wanted more depth. This was really just a constant state of weirdness lol And I know it was supposed to be this fun time, but for me I just kept hoping that he didn’t get into this rap battle because the people telling him he had skills were doing him a disservice lmao
Overall, I give this
