What I Loved:

KOOK by Christopher Vick is a sweet and sad coming of age story about Sam. He’s nerdy and nonathletic and new to Cornwall with his mom and sister when he meets beautiful and broken Jade. Jade brings him into her friend circle of surfers and the trouble starts from the beginning. Sam is drawn to the same waters that killed his father ten years previous and if Sam isn’t careful, they just might get him too.

One of the greatest things about this book is that the characters feel so real and so frustrating. They constantly make poor decisions but for all the right reasons. You know from the first page that disaster is inevitable – you just don’t realize how severe or how badly things will go before it’s all over.

I both loved and hated each character throughout the course of the book. Sometimes I really loved the characters and other times I wanted to scream at them to stop being such dummies but at the end of the day, they are all characters you root for. Characters you believe will one day be making better choices even if you don’t get to see that day.

I do want to mention that the book includes explicit drug use and has a sex scene and could be a cause for concern for some readers.

What Left Me Wanting More:

The story has a slow start up and if you’re the type of reader who has to be brought into the story in the first chapter, this probably isn’t the book for you. Things are slow moving as Sam slowly but surely makes his way into the surfing culture and gets better at surfing and it really kicks into gear at the halfway mark.

Final Verdict:

Kook is a book that will make you cringe and pump your fist in the air in victory. It’s a book you’ll want to slam down and stay up late reading. It’s perfect for fans of broken characters who keep screwing up and keep forgiving each other and anyone who is a fan of surfing.