Things I kind of used to like: The Jessica Darling books

I try to keep the tone positive over here at A few of Mrs. Dude's favorite things. My aim is always to highlight things that are good in the world and to keep the negativity to a minimum. Yes, I bring the snark. But I don't want this to be a blog where I snark about everything.

But I am seething with rage, so I have to get this out.

Kat(ie) at Kat with a K alerted me to the fact that Megan McCafferty was planning to write a 5th Jessica Darling book.

I was suspicious, but cautiously optimistic that maybe that wasn't the case.

I now have confirmation that Kat(ie) was right.

I've read all four of the Jessica Darling books. It could be argued that Jessica and Marcus are the greatest romance of our generation, literarily speaking.

For teens and twenty-somethings everywhere, Marcus Flutie is every guy they crushed on in high school. He is brooding and sweet and hot as can be. Jessica is all of us--insecure, snarky, and unable to decide what to commit to.

They are Veronica and Logan for the bookish set.

Fourth Comings was terrible. Maybe it was a necessary evolution for Jessica, but it stunk to high heaven. It was tepid and uninspired at best.

It was as if McCafferty couldn't leave well enough alone.

Now we get word that McCafferty is writing a fifth book.

I liken it to going to the hairdresser and getting a really bad haircut. The hairdresser cuts too much off of one side of your hair. To make it "right," she cuts hair off of the other side to even it up, but she manages to make the other side even shorter. She goes back and forth, desperately trying to even things up and you walk out with a dorky haircut that you paid way too much money for.

Maybe the ending of Fouth Comings didn't feel "right" to McCafferty. Maybe it was her plan all along to make a fifth book to resolve things. Maybe she just gots to get paid. I don't know know.

But I wish that she'd stop picking at the scab that is Marcus and Jessica. After all, there is such a thing as saying too much.

You know what the sad thing is? I'll read the fifth book. And I'll probably bitch and moan on my blog.