Forest Hills Bootleg Society

(Full disclosure: I received a free e-ARC for review through Edelweiss.)

How it started: four besties embarking on a(n almost) carefree road trip to a gas station creepily located in the middle of nowhere.

The goal: Buy some bootleg copies of Princess Mononoke and Totoro.

The snag: An errant copy of Super Love XL, complete with a giant mecha shooting lasers out of her giant boobs.

How it ended: a side hustle selling home-burned copies of risque anime to their hormone-addled peers at Forest Hills Christian Academy (and public school).

Best friends Kelly, Brooke, Melissa, and Maggie just wanted to earn enough money to buy matching new jackets, and maybe eat out at Shiver Me Burgers on occasion. Instead their newfound cash flow made them the show more target of every bully at school; ate at the consciences of the more devout members of the Forest Hills Bootleg Society; tore apart longtime friendships; and, yes, landed them in an ocean of hot water with the 'rents and school administration.

It was a wild trip, though, wasn't it?

There's so much to love about FOREST HILLS BOOTLEG SOCIETY: the diverse cast of characters; all the nerdy goodness; all the queer goodness (it almost feels as if everyone at Forest Hills Christian Academy is gay, but in truth I think I'm just not used to seeing more than one or two queer characters in a book); the focus on female friendships and insecurities; and OF COURSE the GORGEOUS artwork.

The various asides and character summaries felt kind of cool and edgy at first, but these devices are used so often that it got a bit tedious after a while (just a bit - I mean, do we really need to know who's right- vs. left-handed?).

That said, I was fully ready to give this bad girl four stars ... until I reached the end. Like, wtf was that? No spoilers, but suffice it to say that I can't remember the last time I felt so cheated by a lackluster ending. (TROUBLE GIRLS? THE ANIMALS IN THAT COUNTRY? idk.) Grim, uninspired, pointless. It almost made me wish I'd never picked this book up. (Almost. Again, did I mention the artwork?) Do yourself a favor and just stop reading when the adults barge into Brooke's room, mkay. show less

Gorgeous art style, very well realized characters. I really liked the tiny portrait notes that were included around people and places in some of the wide shot scenes. You got little snippets of things about a person, right handed, has secretly been in love with best friend since he was 6, really likes robots. It really added a great flavor and realism to the story. I also super enjoyed the maps that were added and the notes on those. It made the setting feel more tangible.

I liked the story right up to the very unsatisfying ending. I guess it was at least realistic, and I probably should have seen it coming, but I'm really tired of stories about queer folks ending unsatisfying. It wasn't a misery ever after, but it was unhappy. And I get show more unhappy in reality often enough I don't want it in my stories. show less

I enjoyed the story and I appreciate that their actions had consequences.

I found the character descriptions and multiple word bubbles per panel distracting at times. There were so many half thoughts, I wasn't sure if that was on purpose or if that was is something that will be different in the finished copy.

A beautiful symphony, that falls on its face at the end. The characters are so fantastic, but the ending is just plain anticlimactic. Why did I read all those pages? For that? Boo! A fantastic book gives one an indescribable feeling at the end. A feeling of accomplishment. A feeling that you experienced something. You won't find that here.

A tedious, dull and depressing story about a high school friendship group starting to collapse under romantic entanglements and the quick-money scheme they've hatched to sell pirated, racy anime videos around their Christian boarding school.

Characters are introduced in little info dumps that seem cute at first but quickly become annoying once every single side character gets the same treatment. Why should I care that a kid we see once in the cafeteria is right-handed? Why would I even want to know his name?

The main characters and art are engaging, I only wish the creators had come up with something equally engaging for them to do and hadn't cluttered and slowed the story with so much unnecessary garbage.

Actually uncertain how I feel about this one. In a way, the sense of abrupt loss that seemed part of how the circle of protagonist friends must have felt at the conclusion was part if what I felt as a reader—which I suppose was fitting, but that doesn’t make me feel better about the book. A total lack of resolution just isn’t satisfying to a reader, even if it’s realistic in some respects. The characters…I was sympathetic to them all, and yet I was aggravated by them all just as much.

I’ll need time to process, and maybe I’ll change my mind and feel more strongly one way or the other later.

Great characters and I was sucked in at the start but it lost me at the back end. Bummer of an ending and was a bit rushed I felt. I wanted more.