Frankly in Love, David Yoon

This book will make you laugh out loud and it will make you cry when you really don’t expect to. So sit yourself down and get to know Frank in this rollercoaster of a book.

Frankly in Love, David Yoon

Themes: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance

Reading Format: Paperback

Pages: 406

4 STARS

Thank you to Penguin Platform for sending me an early release copy of this book. It’s out now so you can pick up your copy today! 

I went into this book with an open mind, as I find I have to with contemporaries. I either have a love/hate relationship with them, but there was something about Frank and his sense of humour that made me knew I’d enjoy his narration. A funny and expressive Korean-American teen, Frank is all about trying to break from his parent’s controlling grip on his dating life.

We see a lot about the Korean-American culture in this book and the struggle Frank has to please his parents and still live the American part of his culture. He turns all situations into humour though, especially when his best friend Q is with him, I love the relationship and dialogue between these two. I like the different dynamics we get to read about in this book and how everyone interacts differently with each other and their parents. David Yoon does a very good job of capturing how varied we all are with our parents and how we never truly notice anyone else is different from us until it’s right there in front of us.

Frank wants to date a girl in his class, so he and his fellow Korean-American friend make a pact to pretend to date each other so their parents don’t get suspicious. This concept sets up for destruction really, when does this kind of thing ever go well?! I was just waiting for this to go wrong and enjoying seeing where the story was going, but don’t worry, I won’t spoil it for you!

This tackles so many issues that are important to talk about, again no spoilers so I won’t say what they are. But I found there was a lot for readers to take from this book and empathise with, which makes it quite an emotional book. David Yoon is the husband of Nicola Yoon, author of The Sun is Also a Star, which had me crying my eyes out, so I’m not really surprised this book made me cry too.

When you pick this up, be ready to feel a lot and laugh a lot. Frank has such a unique voice and I loved him as the main character.