Book Review: Five Flavors of Dumb

Five Flavors of Dumb

by Antony John
Release date: 11th November, 2010
Publisher: Dial
Pages: 338 (Hardcover bought by me)

Summary from Goodreads:

The Challenge: Piper has one month to get the rock band Dumb a paying gig.

The Deal: If she does it, Piper will become the band's manager and get her share of the profits.

The Catch: How can Piper possibly manage one egomaniacal pretty boy, one talentless piece of eye candy, one crush, one silent rocker, and one angry girl? And how can she do it when she's deaf?

Piper can't hear Dumb's music, but with growing self-confidence, a budding romance, and a new understanding of the decision her family made to buy a cochlear implant for her deaf baby sister, she discovers her own inner rock star and what it truly means to be a flavor of Dumb.

Review By Alaiel Kreuz:

Amazing book. Yes, it's amazing, you know why? It's one of those books that makes you think, makes you realize that things you thought were impossible to accomplish are not as difficult as they seemed.

Piper for instance, the main character in this book. She is deaf. Yep. And she wasn't born deaf, she just developed it with time because of her inheritance and now to comunicate she reads lips (and she is amazingly good!) and listens with a little thing which name I can't remember -sorry...-. Of course to read lips she needs to be facing the person she is speaking to.
The amazing part? This girl, who struggled a lot with her condition (we'll get into that soon) has to get "Dumb" a gig somewhere. A paid gig. Let me make this clear: She needs to get this band, with such an unfortunate name, a real gig that involves money. And what does she get if she manages to do so? She gets to stay as their manager.
But, here is the difficult part: she is DEAF. And her dad, with whom she has a difficult relationship, always remarks that little problem.
To make matters worst she thought her college money was already saved since her grandparents from whom she inherited her condition, left her that money but that money was used, without her permission, to help her little sister who was developing the same problem. And Piper loved her little sister but that was HER money and no one cared to ask her.
This only gave her the impression that her parents where, somehow, ashamed of her.

But she had an amazing brother, Finn, who very often translated things for her. Not because she couldn't communicate perfectly but because she was used to "use" him and he never complained... much. But he is the sweetest kid ever.

Anyway, going back to Dumb. The band is formed by:

- Josh: Lead singer, sexy and hot guy who thinks he is perfect and amazing. In fact he is an idiot and an egocentric.
- Tash: Scare young lady with a really bad attitude. In fact she is very nice once you get to know her. She is the lead guitar.
- Will: Josh non-identical twin brother who always seemed to be bored of everything and everyone. In fact he is not that bad. He plays the bass guitar.
- Kallie: Gorgeous and popular girl that becomes a member after something Josh does. She is supposed to be one of the guitarist but she can't play. At all. Piper doesn't really like her at the beginning but Kallie's life is not as perfect as it seems.
- Ed: The drummer boy. Sweet and before all this happened only used to play chess with Piper. Now he is showing more sides of him and is... well, amazing.

These are her very own flavors of Dumb and she has to take them to the top. And not only for them but for her too, to prove the world that deaf people can do everything, to prove her parents, specially her dad, that she could do amazing things and most important, to prove herself that she was capable of be special, different and that the only thing she needed to do was find the right path.

Alaiel's Rating:

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