I mostly enjoyed this novel, and it was original and made me think. I think that's the overall feeling I have about it upon finishing it. The ending was not altogether surprising, but it was kind of unsettling.

I read some other reviews criticizing the narrator for being unlikable, but I found that in his honesty with himself and in the fact that he's still young, he wasn't awful. I liked how the author wove his story with the town and his sister, and that showed a lot about who he was and why he was that way.

Some things I did not enjoy about the book were all of the strange names of the characters. It seemed excessive, unnecessary, and distracting. At first I thought it was to give the novel an unidentified, kind of timeless era, but then the trip to Las Vegas and the usage of cell phones destroyed that theory. Another thing that was weird and distracting was the constant "yeah?" at the end of some sentences. I teach high school and I have never heard anyone use that filler. I'm not sure what the purpose of that was, except to annoy me, yeah?

Overall, I'd give it a 3.5 stars.

I wish I could have loved As You Wish…

As You Wish by Chelsea Sedoti is a stand-alone teen/YA fictional novel. I received As you Wish from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Eldon is on the verge of his 18th birthday. Most teenagers are very excited to reach this milestone but in Madison, Nevada its extra special because in this small desert town on your 18th birthday you get to make a wish and it comes true. For the month leading up to his 18th birthday Eldon goes on a quest researching the past wishes of others in the town and if those wishes have had a positive impact on their lives. He wants to learn what wishes work and which don’t so that when his time comes he can form the perfect wish. He finds in his research that the wishes have not made people’s lives better and in fact have made them pretty miserable. Eldon learns that perhaps happiness doesn’t come from a wish but its something you need to create for yourself.

I loved the premise of this story. How many times do we say I wish for this or I wish for that? And in the town of Madison you actually get granted a single wish. What I loved about this book was in alternating chapters you get the story of some of the townspeople and the wishes they made and how it impacted their lives for better or worse. In most cases it was for the worse. There are a few things that didn’t work for me though in this story. The first, Eldon was not a likable character and I didn’t bond with him at all. I kept expecting he would become a likeable character as his journey progressed. In the end I did start liking him but it wasn’t until the last few chapters of the book, which was unfortunate. The second problem for me was there were quite a few rules to making your wish and you didn’t learn some of these rules until later in the book. It was a bit confusing because as you were reading it seemed there was some kind of instructions to wishing but they weren’t apparent to the reader yet. Overall, I did enjoy this story and I think teen/YA readers will also enjoy.

I had a bit of a difficult time getting through this story,
I loved the style of writing, and the topics that this book touched on - there were quite a few difficult ones
however, the main character was really a bit mean, I felt.

I loved the idea behind the story - with everyone receiving a wish. The main character really felt a lot of pressure from others to wish for things they wanted him too, rather than wish for what he wanted.
The story dragged a bit around the middle, but the outcome was enjoyable

Interesting story. I liked the idea but was expecting something different. Also, the main character is very unlikable.

Unfortunate As You Wish did little except thoroughly frustrate me. It featured an insufferably selfish jerk of a protagonist who I couldn't possibly feel sorry for. And it was disappointingly lacking in any sort of Princess Bride reference. How dare it.

However I did really really like the magical realism premise! It centres around this small town where everyone gets a wish on their 18th birthday. It's a HUGE secret from the outside world though. And like it brings up a lot of questions of what would you wish for. Because wishes can ruin your life just as easily as fix it. So A+ premise and it was so interesting exploring it!

The problem came, the more I read, that I realised not only was Eldon a huge jerk, he wasn't going to change. Even his friends called him out on being an asshole, his father said he needed a severe attitude change, and his ex said she left him because he was self absorbed and cruel because of it. Does any of this sink in? Apparently not. He continues to be horrible the entire book, even right to the end. He even throws tantrums that people don't like him, when he goes and treats them like rubbish. He's rude and cruel to his friends and thinks only of himself. He also "plays god" with his (very predictable) wish and that did nothing but make me super angry.

There were also some dubious moments that had me raising my eyebrows a lot. And being either confused or shocked.
• Like Eldon mentions "most" of the kids are beautiful or super talented or whatever, due to wishing for it. Well. They wish on their 18th birthday, right? Ergo last year of school? And it's a small town?? So my question is: HOW MANY KIDS ARE IN THIS TOWN.
• There's one wisher in the past who wishes away his gayness. But he accidentally wishes himself away romantic feelings, ergo he's the most SAD and PITIFUL and LONELY character ever due to not being able to be romantic at all. Excuse you. This is real rubbish and discriminatory to asexuals.
• It does seem to only negatively talk about disabilities.

Also it's a long book and nothing happens, except Eldon angsting about his wish. It just grew tedious and tiring when nothing went down.

The excellent premise just couldn't save the book for me, when it featured too many horrible characters and it was far too slow.

Thank you Net Galley for the free ARC.

Be careful what you wish for should be the slogan in Madison, a tiny town in the middle of the Mojave desert. Every citizen is granted a wish their once in their lifetime and most people's wishes go terribly wrong.

Eldon's wish day is coming up in less than a month and many people are presurring him to wish for the obvious - money, health, to be the best football player. Eldon is not so sure that is what he wants to do.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher I was able to read and enjoy the new contemporary release by Chelsea Sedoti:

"As you wish"

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

What if you could ask for anything- and get it?

In the sandy Mojave Desert, Madison is a small town on the road between nothing and nowhere. But Eldon wouldn’t want to live anywhere else, because in Madison, everyone gets one wish—and that wish always comes true.

Some people wish for money, some people wish for love, but Eldon has seen how wishes have broken the people around him. And with the lives of his family and friends in chaos, he’s left with more questions than answers. Can he make their lives better? How can he be happy if the people around him aren’t? And what hope is there for any of them if happiness isn’t an achievable dream? Doubts build, leading Eldon to a more outlandish and scary thought: maybe you can’t wish for happiness…maybe, just maybe, you have to make it for yourself.

MY THOUGHTS:

🌟🌟🌟🌟

I decided to give it 4 stars.

Its a book where each citizen on the day of his/her 18th birthday is granted a wish that comes true. Some people wish for money, some for love. Some wishes are selfish and other are out of goodness of the hearts.

This book deals with human nature of wanting. What would you wish knowing that it will come true but its the only wish that you will have?

"It's kind of sad. After you make your wish, your birthday stops mattering. Nothing is ever going to top the year you turned eighteen. So everyone stops celebrating, and it becomes just another day."

The story is very original. Even though it's just a work of fiction it made me think about my own life. I've started questioning myself what means happiness to me? How to achieve it? What would I wish for?

The characters are complex. The book shows us how easy is to judge others without knowing their stories. The relationships these people have between each other are also deep.

Love, money, loss and grief. Desire to be loved, respected, feared are all so very human.

I definetely recommend this book. It's a contemporary that deals with important subjects in 'super-light' way.

I received an ARC copy of this book via Netgalley and SOURCEFIRE Books in exchange for a fair review.

Eldon, the main character who gets a wish on his 18th birthday, like the rest of the town's inhabitants, in this drove me a tad crazy. I get that he's the narrator and you're going to sympathize with him but his indecisiveness got to me after a while also he was fully fleshed out at least because he wasn't perfect.

This kind of dragged to be honest and I was more than confused about how the "mythology" about the wishes worked and why it just seemed to be this thing in the town without any extra world building going on. By no means is this a bad novel, it's unique and gives the reader something to chew on but overall it just wasn't for me.

This book was so different from The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett. It has the similar angst of an unhappy teenager protagonist and narrator but that's about it. As You Wish in the Mojave Desert, the small town of Madison is unique, every wish that a town's person makes on their 18th birthday comes true. Our narrator Eldon is weeks away from his birthday. The story is strange, fast paced and has read. I definitely recommend it.

If you could wish for anything, what would it be? If that one wish were guaranteed to be granted, would that change your choice? In As You Wish by Chelsea Sedoti the residents of an entire town can wish for one thing in their lives and it always comes true.

It's the tradition that on the eighteenth birthday of every Madison, Nevada resident they get to walk by the light of a candle into a specific cave and speak their wish aloud, after which it will come true. Most people spend their lives leading up to the momentous day thinking of and finessing the details of the wish they're going to make. For Eldon, he can't decide what to wish for - money like his mother wants so they might be able to save the life of his comatose sister or something altogether different that he might want for himself, if he could only figure out what that might be. In trying to narrow down what to wish for, Eldon asks many people in Madison what they wished for and if they are happy with their wish in the hopes of making a more informed wish decision.

The choices you make when you're young often have a lasting impact on your future, which was demonstrated in a unique way through the characters' magical wishes made at the young, naive age of eighteen. This narrative helps to illustrate differences in being provided with your wish and working toward what you desire in life, which offered readers an opportunity to contemplate further upon the wish stories that were presented through various characters. As a whole, the story was interesting, but I found Eldon rather annoying and self-absorbed - I could understand it trying to be representative of a "typical" teenager, but it was taken a bit too far as it was pointed out by other characters that he was behaving badly toward them, which kept me from enjoying the story more.

Overall, I'd give it a 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC.

In As You Wish we meet Eldon, who is a month away from his eighteenth birthday. Turning eighteen is a big deal, but it's an even bigger deal in Madison, Nevada because it's the day you get your one wish. Each citizen gets their chance to go into a magical cave and make a wish. The golden rule about the wish is that it can't make an impact on the world at large. So wishing for world peace it out. That's because Madison wants to keep their wishes a secret from the rest of the world. Eldon's job is working at the gas station in town, which is full service, and making Madison seem like the most boring place on Earth so no one wants to stay there.

The story is only narrated by Eldon, so his view of Madison is all we know. He sees it as a miserable place where wishes have destroyed the lives of everyone he knows. He spends the month before his wish interviewing people who have already wished and not been happy with the outcome. Because so many people are unhappy with their wishes Eldon isn't sure he should even make his wish. Most of the book is him trying to make up his mind what to do.

Eldon is also unhappy because of a family tragedy that has occurred months before the start of the book. On top of this he has also suffered a break-up with his girlfriend and he's dealing with not being top dog at school anymore because of other's wishes. Most of his classmates have already had their birthdays and, being young and naive, wish for things like better looks, more intelligence, or better sports prowess. Eldon comes across as selfish to the reader and other characters in the book. He's not the most likable guy by any means. I did have to wonder how he was so good looking and great at sports for all of high school until his class starts turning 18. I mean, other people would be older than him and receiving these type of wishes also, so how was he so great prior to his senior year?

I did enjoy the story though. It makes you think about big decisions we make at eighteen and how they have consequences as you get older. In Madison the consequences are immediate because of the wishes, but even IRL people make choices they have to live with on a daily basis. I was happy that most of the young wishers made request befitting that age - more money, better looks. Few were not self-serving. I think that would ring true if people really did get one wish at 18.

Because of that this quote stuck out to me: "It's human nature to fixate on the path not taken rather than the one you're walking." I do think most people start to look back at the choices they made when they were younger and wonder what would have happened if they chose the other path.

Funnily enough I could suspend my disbelief to allow that there was a magic cave where wishes were granted, but I stayed hung up on the fact that they wouldn't let outsiders know about this phenomenon. How do new people ever move to town? According to Eldon they don't. Then how big is this population? And do people leave town and get married to someone outside of town? That's never addressed, but these logistics stayed in the back of my mind throughout the book. Overall, this story was entertaining, even if you do want to reach in and shake some sense into the narrator from time to time.

Ack! I really wanted to read this book but there is too much swearing and F bombs for me. I didn't start it.

The problem with an obnoxious narrator is that his is the only voice you can hear through the whole book, and in this case, he was even called out for being an asshole by his friends, so it wasn't just me that didn't like him.

Other than that, this was an interesting take on the getting the one wish and getting it right. It seemed to stretch on quite an bit, which is why the three stars. The concept was cool. Imagine if you could have one wish when you turned 18. What would you wish for, and how could you screw up your life by wishing the wrong wish.

That part, exploring what others had wished for, was fascinating, but Eldon's constant bitching about how the one wish he wanted to make, he couldn't, got me down after a while.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.