“We’re all ugly, Ryen. The only difference is, some hide it and some wear it.”
Punk 57 is a dark romance that I’ve seen frequently recommended and praised but unfortunately, for me, didn’t live up to the hype and I ended up DNF-ing it at around 85%.
When Misha and Ryen were in fifth grade their teachers set them up as pen pals and triggered a seven-year long friendship. They’ve never met in person and have agreed never to share their social media, phone numbers or any pictures with each other.
That is until Misha comes across a photo of a girl online whose name is Ryen. After realising that the Ryen who writes him letters, who accepts him for everything he is, and offers unconditional support is nothing like the Ryen in real life, Misha stops writing back.
Ryen is left confused, hurt and worried when Misha suddenly stops replying to her letters, but suddenly there’s a new guy in school who is a welcome distraction from Misha’s radio silence, even if Masen doesn’t hesitate to point out just how much he hates her.
'Please don’t let it be. Please just be sweet, socially awkward, shy, and everything I’ve loved for seven years. Don’t complicate it by being hot.'
So, I had seen this book recommended multiple times across multiple platforms and the blurb did intrigue me. While I had seen it discussed as a dark romance, it isn’t actually shelved that way on Goodreads or – from what I’ve been able to find – advertised that way by the author and there’s no indication in the blurb about it either. I read a fair amount of dark romance, and it’s generally not something that bothers me (unless its super dark), but Punk 57 seemed more like a Bully Romance (it’s not shelved as Bully Romance or advertised as one either) and I do not like Bully Romances which certainly didn’t help my overall dislike for this book.
Right off the bat, Misha’s reaction to seeing a photo of Ryen seemed a bit ridiculous. Getting annoyed with her because she looked attractive and not a geek in glasses seemed like quite the overreaction. He then has an extremely short conversation with her and doesn’t like that she seems confident and not the shy, socially awkward girl she describes in her letters. As if such a short interaction was enough to get a true sense of what she was like. As someone who struggles immensely with social anxiety who’s frequently told I don’t come across as awkward or anxious I thought this was a ridiculous and superficial reaction for Misha to have.
'She lied to me. Well, she didn’t lie exactly, but I damn well got the impression from her letters she didn’t look like that. I’d pictured a geek in glasses with purple streaks in her hair dressed in a Star Wars T-shirt.'
Now as someone who loves a good enemies-to-lovers story and isn’t bothered by dark romance, I found the way Misha treated Ryen when he was ‘Masen’ (not a spoiler- we know Misha is Masen almost immediately from his POV chapters) was too far.
I found Ryen to be an incredibly unlikeable character. The way she treated other people and was so willing to throw others under the bus to stop herself from being on the receiving end of the same behaviour she was actively participating in was terrible.
At times when Misha and Ryen were together they did have some sweet moments, but these seemed to be few and far between and the extreme hatred Misha seemed to direct at Ryen was just too much, even if Ryen was acting like an awful person.
“You called me a cunt and cut my hair. You think I’d actually trust you to protect me? Don’t blink too hard, Shit-for-Brains. You might lose your last few brain cells.”
There was not a lot in this book that was likeable. Beyond how unlikeable all the characters were, and how disgusted I was with the way Misha treated Ryen, and how Ryen treated everyone else, the overall plot wasn’t all that interesting either.
So much of the book focused on Misha and Ryen being horrible, and I felt like the reason for Misha being at the school in the first place was just left to the wayside for most of the book. It’s not even really addressed in the chapters from his POV. Yes, we know he’s suffered a horrible loss with the death of his sister (also not a spoiler since it happens in the first chapter) and doesn’t have a good relationship with his father but none of that really explains why he starts going to Ryens school using a fake ID, until all of a sudden he’s trying to get a family heirloom back despite it never being mentioned (except for a slight reference made to it a chapter or two prior).
Honestly, one of the only reasons I read as much as I did was because I wanted to see the reveal- how Ryen would react when she realised Mason was Misha, and honestly after that I just got bored and getting answers to the other questions I had just wasn’t enough to keep me reading. I didn’t make a conscious decision to DNF it, I just put it down one day and then ended up losing any interest in finishing it.
Was it spicy? There were very explicit scenes, but I wouldn't call them 'spicy'. The characters are eighteen, but the fact that the book was set in high school and they were all so immature & childish that having such explicit sex scenes just made it incredibly uncomfortable. Obviously high school students aren't going to act like adults which is why the choice to have such explicit sex scenes in a book set in high school, with characters who acted like jealous & petty children, was so odd when it really wouldn't have much – if any – difference to the plot if it had been set in college.
Did I want Misha and Ryen to have a HEA? No, I honestly don’t know how anyone could want to be with someone who treated them the way Misha treated Ryen.
Were any of the characters likeable or have any redeeming qualities? No.
I honestly felt like so much of this book could have been resolved if Misha had just been truthful with Ryen when he met her at the party. If he’d sat down and had a proper conversation then the issue of Ryen not being like her letters made her out to be could have been easily resolved.
The one thing I did like was this quote from Manny, it was such a relatable moment and also had the added benefit of making Ryen realise how terrible she’d been and the impact her actions and inactions had.
“When everything is painful…” He drops the backpack and sprays the inhalant on the rag. “You start to ask yourself ‘what’s the point?’ No one cares, and you start to care even less. You just want the pain to stop.”
I think Punk 57 is a perfect example of why it’s important for authors and publishers to correctly advertise or highlight topics/tropes that are going to be in their books. As someone who doesn’t like bully romance, I am clearly not the target audience for this book and had I know it was a bully romance beforehand, I never would have picked it up.
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