This week, I set out to determine if the popular BookTok book “Binding 13” by Chloe Walsh actually lives up to the hype. BookTok is a subgenre of TikTok videos dedicated to discussing literature. As someone who loves to read many different genres, BookTok books hold a special place in my heart because I never know what to expect. Some are objectively bad for a host of reasons, but a select few are like finding gold mixed in with the garbage. So, is that the case this time?
“Binding 13” is the first novel in the “Boys of Tommen” series, which is a young adult (YA)/new adult contemporary romance and sports fiction set in a private school in Ireland in 2005. Before even opening the book, it scared me a little bit. It would be 606 pages of either the best or worst reading decision I had made so far. Not only that, but the first page was a list of name pronunciations that I still did not manage to remember, followed by three pages of an Irish slang glossary that I was sure to screw up.
At the time of writing, I have only managed to make a dent in this 600-page novel, but here is what I can tell you right now: it’s worth the read. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s not a life-changing novel, but it’s great at killing boredom throughout the day. The main character, Shannon Lynch, is a girl pulled from her last school by her mother due to years of bullying from her peers. Needless to say, there is a heavy theme of mental health woven into the pages. Shannon suffers quite a bit until she meets Johnny Kavanagh, the star rugby player at Tommen College, who only has eyes for her.
From there, their relationship develops with some rather unrealistic turn of events. He also manages to flirt with the school secretary without giving her the ick, considering he’s seventeen years old and she’s, what, middle-aged? Some scenes like that require the reader to suspend their disbelief and internalize the cringe, but if we continue on, it’s not horrible plot-wise, just writing-wise. After flirting with the secretary and failing, he somehow gains access to her files through his best friend and reads everything that happened to her during the last few years of her schooling. The writing itself very much reads like something straight off Wattpad, so I wouldn’t be surprised, to say the least, if it had been adapted from it.
About one hundred pages in, Shannon and Johnny have very few scenes together, but there are a lot of random scenes with their friends trying to push them together. As much as I want to root for the two of them, Walsh doesn’t make it easy. There is no real reason for the reader to want them to end up together at this point, but, hey, there are still five hundred more pages for her to establish this relationship.
Now, I don’t mean to be too harsh on this story because it is entertaining. There might not be a lot of educational value to it, but it’s fun. Sometimes that’s all that matters. Especially when it comes to one of the side characters, Bella, who is the stereotypical desperate girl who wants the main love interest but doesn’t receive his affections. Instead of quietly moving on, naturally she creates problems, as any quintessential YA novel has been known to have a character do. Allowing Johnny and Shannon to get together at the start would be too easy, and there would be no story left.
Ultimately, “Binding 13” is worth the read. The quality of the writing is questionable at times; it does, however, bring to light some important topics like mental health, which gives it a more realistic feel for the times when the reader needs to suspend their disbelief. It also reinforces the belief in true love, which is also perfectly timed with Valentine’s Day coming up. Johnny and Shannon are the pinnacle of what a couple should strive to be, and they’re often thought of as a soulmate couple within BookTok. I can’t say what happens at the end of the book or in the next books of the series, but I know that the two of them getting together will be electric, and for that, I would say that Walsh’s novel deserves a solid four stars.
4/5
