Review: The Twelve Days of Dash & Lily by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan ~ Once Upon a Bookcase

The Twelve Days of Dash & Lily by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan (gift) - Dash and Lily have been dating for nearly a year, but when Lily’s beloved grandfather falls ill, the repercussions take their toll on everyone. Even though they are still together, somehow the magic has gone out of their relationship and it’s clear that Lily has fallen out of love with life.

Action must be taken! Dash teams up with Lily’s brother and a host of their friends, who have just twelve days to get Lily’s groove back in time for Christmas. From Goodreads.

I received The Twelve Days of Dash & Lily by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan as a Christmas present. Having loved the first book, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares, I was super excited to read this book and revisit the characters who I loved so much. But to be honest, I was pretty disappointed.

I should start off by saying I don't remember a huge amount about the first book, except for how much I loved it. But in 2016, I wanted my Christmas books to be about Christmas. At first - because it starts off with Dash attempt to bring back the Christmas spirit for Lily by buying her a Christmas tree, with the talk of the Twelve Days of Christmas, and each day being something Christmassy - I expected twelve days of gift giving in an attempt to make Lily smile and bring her back to her old self. But that idea just stopped. It was pretty much just the Christmas tree. Sure, the book is set over the twelve days leading up to Christmas, but, again, it's just a romance.

And sure it was sweet. It makes a change to read about a romance that deals with a relationship later on down the line, when the honey moon period is over and things aren't as easy as they once were. It could have been really interesting. But being narrated by the two of them, it became pretty clear early on that everything would be just fine if they would only communicate. So the longer they didn't, the more frustrated I got. She thinks he's not that interested any more, he thinks she wants some time and space - because he's giving her time and space, it seems like further evidence that Dash is losing interest, and because Lily is still in a low mood, the more he feels he should back up and let her deal with things rather than try and force her into happiness. It's a vicious circle.

And really? It was obvious to me how things would end up. And when the book ended and it turned out I was right, I thought, what was the point? By which I mean, what was the point of this book? It just didn't seem like a necessary story, and I think it may have been best to leave the first book as a stand alone. Yes, this was sweet, but I don't think it really adds anything to the story, especially when it becomes apparent that the two do still love each other, and just need to make each other aware of that, and all is fine. Really. There wasn't enough going on in this book to make me think that it was worth there being a second book at all.

So yeah, pretty disappointed. I liked it, but in the way you'd like something that you would also easily forget about. For me, not Christmassy enough, and no real point for this book's existence. This book, for me, showed me exactly what authors mean when they say it's time for a series to end, even when the readers want more. Dash & Lily's story was complete in the first book. We didn't need this one. But, you know, just my opinion. I know a lot of other people enjoyed it.