i read millie bobby brown's new book so you don't have to

because at this point I'm about a third of the way into the book and I'm like wow there is no plot hi welcome or welcome back to my channel I'm gonna be honest I ran out of ideas for YouTube or I had ideas but none of them sparked joy and in the wise words of Marie kondo describe whatever doesn't spark Joy but anyway I didn't know what I wanted to make a video on and then I remembered that Millie Bobby Brown was dropping her debut novel this week called 19 steps so I decided that I'm gonna read it so that you don't have to I'll be pretty much explaining what happens and sharing my opinions and if you are just going this channel for the first time I usually post videos on TV and film and pop culture in the format of video essays and rankings Etc but occasionally I make something random like this but yeah if you like these kinds of videos then make sure that you like this video And subscribe to this channel so Millie Bobby Brown announced back in March that she would be releasing her debut novel not Memoir novel on September 12th and when this was announced the book was described as a historical fiction novel with a romance weaved into a World War II story and I was like Millie Bobby Brown 11 from stranger things wrote a Roman and slash World War II story okay I looked it up and apparently this book is dedicated to Millie's grandmother who told some real stories that the book is based off of including the bethanol Green Tube accident although it is important to know that this book is still being marketed as fiction and merely based off of real stuff and has references to real people so I didn't go into reading this book thinking that everything happened exactly but I'd hope that the book being based off of real stories would make it feel more authentic and interesting Millie also got a Ghostwriter for the book and that is open public knowledge and it's honestly not that surprising not like in an insulting there's no way Millie Bobby Brown could ever write a book sort of a way but more so in a how the hell would she have had the time sort of away the ghost writer's name is Kathleen mcgirl and she detailed her process of writing the book in a blog post on her website where she basically says that she would have meetings with Millie and Millie would present research to her and workshop ideas with her and then when she started writing the book she would still meet with Millie to talk ideas and then the book went through several drafts before getting to the final product so yeah that's the context that's what you need to know and so I finished the book this morning and I have a headache from trying to consolidate my thoughts it's it's not terrible but it's not good and I should disclaim that Millie Bobby Brown is a very talented actor this is absolutely nothing against her but okay if I had a skill from Kendall and Kylie's dystopian novel to Jeanette McCurdy's Memoir which I understand is a broad scale but hear me out this book would be right in the middle so to me it's mid and I have a theory and I'm sure that someone else has thought of this Theory because let's be honest none of us have ever had an original thought but my theory is that Millie is setting this up so that she can produce and start in an adaptation of this book I honestly pictured someone like Millie as the main character because a it's her book and B the main character is an 18 year old girl named Nelly that's two letters off so Nelly lives in the East End of London in bethnal green during World War II it began September 1942 and she lives with her family including her mother M her dad Charlie her brother George and her sister Flo she also lives close by to her Aunt Ruth and Uncle John whom she's really close with so the book opens with Nelly trying to take Flo out on a picnic and then there's a daytime air raid so they go to the Beth no tube to take shelter and they're fine because it's only chapter one but it establishes the conditions that they live in and also where the title of the book comes from because it's 19 steps down the entrance steps of the tube so they get home safely and it's implied that Nelly doesn't come from money and that everyone in her family aside from flow has to work in order to provide for the family including Nelly who works as an assistant to the mayor I was wondering if and when the book would name drop Winston Churchill which didn't take long because Nellie's like I just gotta think of Winston Churchill's wise words Never Surrender also Barbara and Billy are two siblings who are Nellie's childhood best friends they're important characters and I was a little taken aback by the fact that Billy was described as both like an older brother to Nelly and as a possible Prospect for marriage because those two don't go together it goes into more detail about how Billy and Nelly have always loved each other but for Billy it's always been not platonic they'd flirted a bit in the past and spent a lot of time together but ultimately neither of them have ever confessed to one another but they ultimately want different things out of life like Nelly wants to leave Beth no green eventually and travel the world but Billy wants to stay there and raise a family there so I was like all right how is this gonna play out Nelly then goes to work and then someone raises an issue about the tube's entrance steps the 19 steps and how it's easy for someone to slip and fall and get hurt and so in the event that there's a lot of people coming in at once there's a higher risk for people getting hurt so they decide to make and submit a proposal to redo those steps and at this point I'm like a handful of chapters in I'm about a fifth through the book and I feel like I don't really know Nelly like she cares about people but that's all I really know about her and none of the characters seem to have a lot of depth so come another air raid Aunt Ruth and Uncle John decide to use a Morrison shelter at home because they're old and it's hard for them to go all the way to the tube a Morrison Shelter by the way is an indoor steel shelter that people would have in their homes and well their house took a direct hit and they died but tell me why one of the people closest to Nelly dies and the only way to describe Nellie's reaction to this is her falling to the ground and sobbing like the direct quote is Nellie's knees buckled and she fell to the floor sobbing I mean as a reader I'm not moved it that's the best way that you can describe sadness there's legitimately no descriptive writing in this book like it's all this happened that this character said this and this character felt this after the funeral Nellie's Dad decided it was time to send flow to the countryside because the Air Raids were becoming more frequent and it was normal at the time to send kids to the countryside when things were getting worse so Nelly and her mom take Flo to the bus that's going to take her to the countryside and then they put her on the bus and as the bus is leaving Nellie's mom changes her mind and tell me why there's a more emotional description of seeing her child on the bus than there is of Nellie's reaction to her family dying like there is an attempt here with something emotional her mother's anguish was real it was as though her heart was being torn out of her body by that bus the ties binding her to her youngest daughter stretching to Breaking Point and if they snapped it would be em who broke that versus Nellie's knees buckled and she fell to the floor sobbing yes so Nelly runs after the bus to get flow off of it and then we're introduced to what I thought would be an enemies to Lover's Romance the Samara Airman named Ray Fleming helps Nelly out and then is like why would you run after a bus and Nellie's like why don't you drink a tall glass of mind your business juice then the book switches to Rey's point of view where he's like God she's so hot but she's so rude and mean how could she not thank me she's got that British Bulldog Spirit which genuinely made me laugh I understand the symbol of a British Bulldog okay it was just funny to read his train of thought going from she's so hot to She's So Mean To she's like a British Bulldog and then the chapter ends with him being like ah I gotta go to the pub to get her out of my head so the next night Nelly Barbara and Billy go out in the town with their friend Amelia and while they're out they all make Nellie sing and remember how I said that I pictured Millie as Nelly while reading this my mind just kept playing that Viral clip of Millie Bobby Brown singing that one line from Imagine and now I refuse to believe that Nelly did not sing imagine you may say I'm a dreamer anyway of course they run into Ray Fleming and the book kills my dream of any enemies to lovers romance because they straight up apologize to each other and then they start flirting in the cheesiest most Wattpad way I'm gonna find something Ray Fleming he held out a hand and she took it it was a good sign a thawing of the ice Nelly Morris pleased to meet you Nelly Morris she blushed as she took his hand thank you too for saving my life don't mention it he grinned actually do mention it not every day I save a lady's life how often there's a cheeky flirty look in her eye as she asked how often what do you save ladies lives ah now let's see he pretended to think about it counting on his fingers um you're the first she laughed seeming pleased with this answer it also absolutely kills me the way that Nelly is physically described here she was naturally beautiful yet she seemed totally unaware of the fact her hair was dark her eyes wide her mouth generous a smear of lipstick accentuating her lips she was Slim him yet curvy is thank you for establishing that Nelly is the most conventionally attractive looking white woman by today's beauty standards but the fact that this is also from Rey's point of view I'm not particularly fond of there's also this one bit after they introduce themselves to each other where it's like God but she was pretty and there was an odd combination of vulnerability underneath that feistiness that he liked liked a lot so you literally just met her what do you mean like is there anything intriguing about Nelly besides the fact that she's hot and feisty so after about five more pages of that it's pretty clear that this is not an enemies to Lover's romance nor is it really a love triangle even though they tried to make it seem like it is because Nelly clearly has zero interest in Billy even though Billy is pining after her so that chapter ends with Rey asking Nelly to go out with him another night and then she accepts so Barbara Nelly go out again this time with Rey and his friend Clayton and Nelly and Rey are talking and Rey talks about how he wants to travel the world and see every everything and Nellie's like wow we're so connected you both just want to travel but all right they have a nice time they kissed they're a thing now I'd honestly wish they had played more into the love triangle thing because that would have made the book more interesting because at this point I'm about a third of the way into the book and I'm like wow there is no plot like so far it's a very underwhelming romantic story with War as a backdrop this book is really no thoughts just War so the next morning Nelly and the Mayor found out that their proposal for the Improvement of the tube steps had been rejected and then Nelly feels worried and compelled to tell her family about it and this part's a little confusing because her logic is that if she doesn't suggest an alternative as a shelter or she doesn't warn her family about the tube steps then if something bad happened to them it would be her fault so Nelly lets her family know and her family's like cool thanks we'll just have to be careful going down those steps and I know that we're leading up to the Beth no green tube disaster which really did happen during World War II but this felt like an attempt at a noble heroic moment for Nelly that was just very underwhelming Ray and Nelly continue to date and my main issue with the writing here is that they say that they have gone on many dates and that they're really connecting and they have so much uncommon and that they told each other everything about each other but they're not actually like really doing anything with their relationship or showing us anything meaningful about it it's all just cheesy fluff full of stuff like this gem there are thousands of stars to be seen for my folks place in Michigan Ray said don't you just love that the Stars I grew up looking at over Lake Michigan are the same ones that shine over London she looked sideways at him now you're going to say that if forever apart we can look up at the night sky and know that we're seeing the same constellations she giggled it's what they say in the movies anyway were they were they saying that in movies in 1942 oh yeah and Billy is just straight up not having a good time because he's still pining after her and he tells Barbara if he hurts her I'll kill him nothing like some classic good old-fashioned toxic masculinity you know at the very least Billy being jealous adds some sort of seasoning to the story and by seasoning I mean salt and pepper so far or about 30 pages nothing worthy of no happens besides Rey and Nelly getting engaged but then the bethanol Green Tube disaster happens so basically in real life the bethanol Green Tube was used as a bomb shelter and had one narrow entrance on March 3rd 1943 a large number of people were trying to get through to that entrance and down those steps because of an air raid Alert in the rush to enter the station after an anti-aircraft rocket had fired nearby the entrance became overcrowded leading to a tragic Crush 173 people including 62 children had died making it one of the deadliest civilian disasters during the war and this had prompted safety improvements in bomb shelters but also more awareness of crowd control measures so what happened in the book was that Rey came in the midst of the air raid alert coincidentally and he was there to tell Nelly that he had been moved farther away so that he wouldn't be able to see her as much but also that they needed to put off their wedding probably but when he arrived his car backfired and that caused some people to panic and then the crush happened and Nellie's father and sister had died in it as you might guess the only way to describe Nellie's reaction when she found out her dad and sister died was that she fell to her knees but this time she howled in anguish Rey tells Nelly what happened and as one would expect she did not take it well she gets angry at him she tells him that he's responsible for the deaths of 173 people and then tells him to get out of her house and she's not processing her grief well because she lashes out at everyone and I mean everyone she tells the people in her family that are still alive that they're to blame she snaps at her boss the mayor who literally says back you need to get your temper in check because you're not helping anyone here and listen I have empathy okay I know she's grieving she's just not a well enough written character for me to extend that empathy especially because she yells at Billy for having asthma and therefore not being able to help as many people as he had already helped out of the crush the story is also just super predictable because I had already known at this point that Nelly was going to find out that it wasn't actually race car that caused the panic and it was actually a rocket and lo and behold that really happened the best green Council gave an official statement about how the Panic happened and they confirmed that it wasn't the car but it was the rockets that were fired from Victoria Park that caused the Panic so Nelly sends an apology letter to Ray and then she finds out that he died except he's obviously still alive because they said that they were shot down in France and they couldn't find his parachute and everyone knows in books and movies and stuff that if there's no body they're still alive that at work an official report of the tragedy comes back and it seems to blame the public and also the mayor's Council even though the mayor's Council isn't to blame because they had tried to get the steps improved long before the incident happened and then Nelly is advised by this guy named Stan to convince her mom to sue the council because they're responsible for the deaths even though they're actually not he's like I know your Council isn't actually to blame but your mom still deserves to get some compensation especially because it's harder to provide for your family without your dad so then her mom agrees to sue the council and Nellie's logic is that in the case they'll be able to say and prove that they had tried to improve the steps and that the outcome of the case would hopefully be that the government would end up paying for the compensation and that the council would be in the clear but the mayor doesn't defend herself and it's revealed soon after that she made a deal with the government that she would be the scapegoat for the incident if the government paid for all the compensation claims and then they don't talk about it again meanwhile Nelly switches up and she decides that she wants to stay in bethnal green and she wants a quiet stable life with Billy which comes out of nowhere like if the tube accident caused that mindset change that would be one thing but it didn't really make it clear how she got to that point and her feelings for Billy just didn't make sense because it was very clear she didn't love him and kept saying that he was like a brother to her and she clearly still doesn't because every time there's a nice moment between them it's followed by a sentence that's like I mean it isn't as good as it was with Rey but this is still nice and the last they get engaged and then the war ends and who shows up Ray Fleming and Nelly tells him that she's still gonna marry Billy and then on their wedding day like literally on their wedding day when they're about to get married Billy sees Rey and Billy's just like how could you not tell me that he was alive and then he's like I think he didn't tell me that he's alive because you still love him and you're clearly forcing yourself to marry me so I'm gonna say no to you so then Nelly gets with Rey and that's the end of the book there was a lot of potential for the book I just had a handful of issues with it obviously like I mentioned the characters didn't have a lot of depth and the romance and love triangle could have been written way better but I think that if everything else was good I might have still enjoyed the book but I'm wondering if the ghost writer's Detachment from the material hindered the quality of the book because Millie and her family presumably have a personal connection to the bethnal Green Tube accident but it doesn't seem that way from the way this book was written like the fact that Nelly had a much more emotional reaction to her fiance who she hadn't known for that long dying versus like her literal family the predictability the fact that all the characters are static and at the end I just kind of wondered what the point was like what is the take away from the story surely it's not the why wise words of Winston Churchill to Never Surrender is it so the book was mid like it was no better than okay but you know what go get your bag Millie Bobby Brown thank you for watching this video I really hope that you enjoyed it make sure that you like comment and subscribe to this channel foreign [Music]

Channel: opiniyon

Views: 304,846

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Id: j7tFHlXkjmY

Length: 17min 5sec (1025 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 17 2023