Flat-Out Love

This week Danielle brings the 2011 Jessica Park novel Flat-Out Love. Julie is a typical teen moving to Boston to start school. Somehow, her plan to rent an apartment sight unseen turns out to be a scam, and she goes to stay with some family friends. Julie quickly starts inserting herself into everyone else's business. Not that there isn't business to get into, what with the youngest daughter carrying around a cardboard cutout of the eldest brother, Finn, since he's traveling in Africa. Meanwhile, the parents are totally checked-out and most of the responsibility of taking care of Celeste falls to their middle, college-aged son, Matt. Everyone refuses to tell Julie anything about why Celeste needs Flatt Finn, and Matt tells her to leave it alone, but leaving things alone is beyond Julie. She starts talking to human Finn on Facebook, but he is equally unhelpful. Meanwhile, Julie decides to mess with Celeste by using Flat Finn to manipulate her into doing things outside of her comfort zone. After some confusing shenanigans involving a fear of heights, or possibly just escalators and elevators, Julie dumps her perfectly nice barista boyfriend because she's falling in love with Finn on Facebook, something which is clearly a good idea. However, the family's big secret around Flatt Finn will shake Julie to her core, only not really since it's pretty obvious and also not really terrible or shameful, but since everyone in this book kinda sucks (except Celeste and Flatt Finn, who only gets a pass because he's cardboard) there is, of course, drama. So join us for a book that begs the question: Why are there two more sequels, and when can we read them? Be sure to check out I Drink Your Podcast, especially the Into the Wild episode featuring Danielle. You can find them on Twitter @IDYP_Podcast, Instagram @idyp_podcast, and listen wherever you get your podcasts.