Review: Top Ten Clues you're Clueless by Liz Czukas

Top Ten Clues you're Clueless by Liz Czukas
Publisher: Harper Teen
Publication date: 9th December 2014
My rating: 3 stars

Top Five Things That Are Ruining Chloe’s Day 5) Working the 6:30 a.m. shift at GoodFoods Market 4) Crashing a cart into a customer’s car right in front of her snarky coworker Sammi 3) Trying to rock the “drowned rat” look after being caught in a snowstorm 2) Making zero progress with her crush, Tyson (see #3) 1) Being accused—along with her fellow teenage employees—of stealing upwards of $10,000 Chloe would rather be anywhere than locked in work jail (aka the break room) with five of her coworkers . . . even if one of them is Tyson. But if they can band together to clear their names, what looks like a total disaster might just make Chloe’s list of Top Ten Best Moments.

I loved Czukas debut novel Ask Again Later earlier this year. It was funny, fresh and it was exactly what I was in the mood for at the time. When I devoured her book in a few days I made the decision there and then that I would read all of her future books. So when I heard about Top Ten Clues you’re Clueless, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on a copy. Unfortunately this story ended up falling flat for me in a few places.

Chloe was a great character, I liked how she had this obsession with compiling lists (it reminded me of myself a lot of times, but I’m one of those that never used to get hardly anything completed from my lists) and how she would notice a lot of things around her that a lot of people missed out on. Czukas was also once again able to bring in a wonderful set of characters just like in Ask Again Later; they were all unique in their own way, bringing a lot of variety and fun to the story.

I think my biggest downfall from this book was that I was expecting more from the mystery and the romance. The mystery in the story ended up being that someone had stolen most of the Christmas fund from the store. However instead of interviewing all the store staff individually, the manager decides from a tip off that only select few of the staff members can be responsible. So he ends up keeping them in the store after closing hours on Christmas Eve until the police get there and start questioning them. At first I didn’t get how he could come up with the conclusion that these youngsters could be the ones responsible, through their individual questioning, they had all denied it and none of the evidence suggested that they could have done it. Although being locked in store together sort of did bring these characters much closer together. In the past they had been quick to make assumptions of each other’s characters without having said a few words to one another. So it was great that they were able to break these judgements they had made of one another and actually form some sort of friendships. But the whole waiting around for the police to arrive sort of ended up kind of boring for me, yes it was great that they could all start over, but I sort of wanted more from this part. What was the point of keeping everyone behind without any real evidence? Also I was kind of able to guess who the real culprit was kind of early on, it kind of bugged me that not everyone else was able to realise this.

Then there was the romance, we were told very early on who Chloe had been crushing on for some time, I think because of this I was expecting to see more from it over the course of the book, however we kind of got it all in the end instead. I know so far it may seem as if I’ve just been complaining about this book, but this isn’t the case at all. I think I just went into this book with really high expectations after thoroughly enjoying Ask Again Later. However despite the irks I did have, Czukas once again was able to give us a super cute read, despite knowing who the culprit was I still found myself invested in reading until the very last page. Although this book wasn’t for me, I’m sure it will be for many other readers who are the lookout for a cute read full with many quirky characters.