Woodhouse Hall by Sara Marks Published by Illuminated Myth Publishing on October 28, 2019
Genres: Young Adult, contemporary, Chick Lit
Source: eARC from Author
Amelia is stuck in the worst dorm on campus for a whole year!
She’ll have to make the best of it in Woodhouse Hall and her roommate Jenna will be her new best friend, Amelia’s sure of that. Jenna’s sweet personality and openness to new things incite the matchmaking-genius in Amelia to find the perfect boyfriend for her new bestie. She shoots high by attempting to entice Eric, the President of the Student Government, to fall for her roommate. Amelia’s past success makes her confident they will be a couple in no time. When that turns out to be a disaster, she is forced to face the lies she's told herself about her strengths and her assumptions about the people she loves. Over the year, Amelia learns who she is, what she wants, and how to fight for what's really important.
This novel, inspired by Jane Austen’s Emma, will have you laughing, crying, and finding a little of yourself in one or all of the characters.
Woodhouse Hall is a young adult/new adult contemporary romance by Sara Marks. Woodhouse Hall is a re-imagining of Jane Austen’s Emma, and I was super excited to read it. Upon first glance, it ticked off so many of my boxes- college dorm room setting, match making, romance. Seemed like it would be a cute read. Unfortunately, I did not love this book. In fact, it irritated me to no end, which is a real shame because this is normally the type of story that I would really enjoy. My biggest disappointment with the story were the characters themselves.
In Woodhouse Hall we meet our main character Amelia who is assigned to the worst dorm on campus, Woodhouse Hall. Amelia is our Emma, who is trying to set up her roommate Jenna with the student council president. There is also another storyline going on at the same time, of the demolition of Woodhouse Hall. I actually enjoyed the plotline of the story, but Amelia drove me up a wall. I found her to be completely immature. This book is college aged, which places it in the new adult age range but our main character was even too immature for young adult books, in my opinion. In true Emma fashion, she butts into other people’s business with no regard for what they actually want. But she was way less endearing than Emma, and there was no character growth for Amelia, which ultimately frustrated me.
Amelia didn’t listen to Jenna, didn’t listen to Adam, didn’t listen to Eric. She just didn’t listen. And I kept hoping that she would but I was disappointed. All of her interactions felt very juvenile and one sided. When she finally “got it” the whole thing felt very forced. Bottom line: This book was just not for me. But if you are a big fan of Emma, and if you want a college book that fells like young adult, this might be a good option for you.
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