A BOOK : Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan

It’s Friday and you know what you should read this weekend?

Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel
by Sara Farizan

Here’s why:

• You have first love + confusing crushes
• You have a funny and interesting main character, Leila, who narrates the trials of high school. She is absolutely adorable and super smart.
• Even though it’s 304 pages the pages are shorter, so this reads quickly. Perfect to finish in a weekend!
• Along with romance it has some pretty awesome friendship and familial story lines.
• It has a perspective that I haven’t ever read from– an Iranian-American girl who is still in the closet– which was super refreshing- especially when it came to Leila sharing her experiences at school and her fears with her sexuality.
• It’s funny! And wonderfully awkward in all of the real life ways.

This came into my life after listening to episode 8 [“Why Are Samosas in Every Book”] on the podcast See Something, Say Something. Check out the episode! It’s good :).

 

A BOOK : Some Girls Bite by Chloe Neill

B L O G M A S  D A Y 20

This is the book series that took my coworkers and I by storm for some odd reason this year!

I started it because I was craving a fast paranormal series and was asking my coworker for suggestions. She suggested this and paired with knowing my other coworker really likes this author I was like heck yea! Now that you have the back story that you probably don’t care about as to why I started to read this…

So Some Girls Bite is set in modern day Chicagoland area in a world where people know vampires exist and they kind of live together peacefully. Of course there is going to be TENSION because vampires need blood to survive and all, but for the most part everyone has their shit together and while the peace dynamics are on shaky ground, they are somewhat stabilized.

Now enter Merit, our main character. She’s living with her roommate happily going about life, whennnnn she is turned into a vampire. Without her permission. This is a big deal, because in this society you NEED a human’s permission to turn them, plus, Merit comes from a pretty fancy-pants family (however, she is not on good terms with them).

From there she is quickly introduced to the world of vampirism and all of the facets she never paid much attention to. As she is sinking into this world, there is still the mystery as to who turned her, as well as why she is… a little bit different than the other vampires.

It’s that difference that made me really like the series and also drove me a little bit nuts in the book. Because she is a little bit *too* special, you know? But it makes for an interesting story PLUS there is one facet about her that I’m REALLY curious about, that I don’t want to go into.

The series is a little bit sexy and a lot of fun and very much a good escapism read. At least this book! I’m not going to lie, I haven’t progressed much further into the rest of the series yet.

So if you’re looking for a good vampire series book to TAKE YOU AWAYYYYYYY try Some Girls Bite!

A BOOK : Everything Everything by Nicola Yoon

This little beauty snuck its way into my life, and ended up being a top favorite for the year. It’s about a girl who is basically allergic to the world and needing to stay in an uncontaminated environment. As a result, her life is pretty limiting. At the start of the book she has turned 18, and she has lived her entire life in her house with just her mother and her nurse for company. She has managed to make a life out of her life, but when new neighbors move in next door she realizes she might want more out of her life– whatever the cost.

So time to parse everything out!

1- I love the formatting. Included throughout the story are just little scraps from inside Madeline’s head- diagrams and definitions and an “insert” of a few journal pages from when she is 8. It fit with the flow of the story so well and as a result it didn’t feel gimmicky. It helped crystallize Madeline’s character and what she was going through.

2- The tone of this was beautiful. At its core it’s about living– what constitutes it, and what doesn’t? What happens when you want more than what you’re given? What do you do?

“Everything’s a risk. Not doing anything is a risk. It’s up to you.”

3- In many ways, it was so so so sad. I think I mentioned this in my top ten tuesday which featured this book on that list, but I was most definitely crying in public. But it’s not the most depressing book in the world, because….

4- MY GOODNESS CUTENESS OVERLOAD. There were lots of cute moments with a certain boy… and some surprisingly some extremely attractive moments over little things.

5- Speaking of which, I LOVE the dialogue between Olly and Maddy. It was adorable. Especially because since the girl is trapped in her house, they can’t do much else than talk and their conversations are so much fun.

Everything, Everything is definitely a must read if you like interesting characters put in interesting places.

Take a look at it on Goodreads!

A BOOK : All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven

 

B L O G M A S  D A Y  13

 

Today we are talking about All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven. You know how after John Green got SUPER popular suddenly every book that was young adult and contemporary had a little statement claiming it was EXACTLY LIKE BOOKS BY JOHN GREEN?

Well good news! I’ve heard little blurbs talking about THIS book saying if you like books by John Green you would like this, and I think that is SUPER accurate.

And I’m trying to figure out what it is about this one that seems like that is a very true statement. Because yes, in All the Bright Places you have two very smart seemingly very different from each other teens start becoming friends (and possibly more-ooh-la-la). You also have tragic stories mixed with humor.

On the surface all of those ring true, but that rings true for a lot of books that I wouldn’t say capture the same feeling and voice. Niven’s book speaks to that same feeling and voice though. It is of course completely its own story….

[SUMMARY TIME.

Finch is notorious for his weirdness and how different he is. Violet is notorious for her popularity. They are on polar opposites of the social structure, yet somehow they both end up on the roof of the school at the same time with possibly a similar idea… the book is told in alternating view points as they navigate their histories, trying to live in the present, and the possibility of a future.]

So even though the core of the story is definitely different, what Niven seems to do similarly is to put to words the yearning and emotion in life when you’re feeling stuck physically and emotionally that Green also seems to do. It’s idealistic in certain ways, yet grounded in harsh realities.

I will say, similarly with The Fault in our Stars there is an interesting tension between the lightness of the book with the seriousness of some of the situations being discussed.

Is it fair to spend so much time comparing one author to another? Probably not. But I think that was my strongest review reaction– especially because is has attained a similarity that a lot of marketing people seem to be striving for.

So if you’re looking for something that simultaneously somehow draws from your happy and giddy emotional pool and your my heart is breaking emotional pool, add All the Bright Places to your to-read list!

Heads up though- the book does discuss suicide a lot.

A BOOK : A Man Called Ove by Frederick Backman

I think if you were to ask me what my favorite book I read this year was, I might have to say it was A Man Called Ove. I listened to the audio, and I have to say. If you decide you’re going to read this go for the audio if you can, if only because at the beginning of different chapters it starts with, “A man called Ove….” and for some reason that line repeated again and again throughout the book just drives home all of the charm this story had.

Because my goodness, is it charming.

It’s charming yet heartbreaking and at times goofy and heart warming, but still. So, so, so heartbreaking.

Basically A Man Called Ove is about a curmudgeon-y old man who lost his wife and now doesn’t want to live himself. He likes his systems and he likes his schedules and he likes his orderliness and he likes his rules, and so every day his days follow the same patterns. He does his morning neighborhood patrol and then essentially tries to end his life. Except. Life keeps getting in the way, as things in his neighborhood get a little nutty and of course, as Mr. Uber Controlling Neighbor he butts in or is forced into dilemmas whether he likes it or not.

While most of the story line exists in the present, it flashes into Ove’s past– his relationship with his father and growing up and how he met his wife. Ove is just such an endearing character. He sees a problem, he fixes it. He’s stubborn and certainly is very oblivious. He angers way too quickly, and I’m sure he would be someone I would be hesitant to interact with in real life, but in the end he has this soft core and tries to do good and has this humble way about life and work.

I’m trying to figure out what it was about this story I liked so much. I guess, to me it was oddly comforting. It feels like as close to a fairy tale as real life can get. There are all of the hardships and disappointments, but at the end of the day life keeps moving providing alongside the broken hearts moments of joy and healing and light.

Add it to your Goodreads TBR shelf HERE

Warning: the book does discuss suicide, so if this is a triggering topic you might want to tread carefully. If you want to learn more specifics so you can decide to read or not read, just let me know and I can let you know more details.

A BOOK : We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

B L O G M A S   D A Y   8

We Were Liars
by E. Lockhart

A beautiful and distinguished family.
A private island.
A brilliant, damaged girl; a passionate, political boy.
A group of four friends—the Liars—whose friendship turns destructive.
A revolution. An accident. A secret.
Lies upon lies.
True love.
The truth.
 
We Were Liars is a modern, sophisticated suspense novel from National Book Award finalist and Printz Award honoree E. Lockhart. 

Read it.
And if anyone asks you how it ends, just LIE

I am joining the ranks of everyone going all “ishddfiubwfiub” over this one. Because seriously. ;ibgikubrgiebng.

The writing style used in this book is pretty much one of my favorite all time writing styles. Lockhart gives her main character, Cadence, a very distinct voice and the story is told completely from Cadence’s perspective. As a result we get to experience the roller coaster Cadence is on. I love how poetic everything sounds. I love how because of the way this is written, it feels very raw.

There is also a little bit of a play with fairy tales, and it was interesting to see how those fairy tales progressed and how they connect to reality.

This book is just one big puzzle, and it does it in a way where the answer to the puzzle is hinted at and hinted at a lot, but it is still super unreachable. Because I’ve read so much, I tend to at least have ideas that are in the right ballpark as to what will come next, but my reading sleuthing skills completely missed the mark on this one.

On the front cover John Green uses the word blisteringly, and I have to say that word hits the feel of this story right on.

If you haven’t yet, add We Were Liars to your tbr shelf on Goodreads! It was this year’s reader’s choice winner for teen fiction, which is pretty neat :).

Warning: Spoilers in comments!

A BOOK : Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

Cruel Beauty
by Rosamund Hodge
Published January 2014

Since birth, Nyx has been betrothed to the evil ruler of her kingdom-all because of a foolish bargain struck by her father. And since birth, she has been in training to kill him.

With no choice but to fulfill her duty, Nyx resents her family for never trying to save her and hates herself for wanting to escape her fate. Still, on her seventeenth birthday, Nyx abandons everything she’s ever known to marry the all-powerful, immortal Ignifex. Her plan? Seduce him, destroy his enchanted castle, and break the nine-hundred-year-old curse he put on her people.

But Ignifex is not at all what Nyx expected. The strangely charming lord beguiles her, and his castle-a shifting maze of magical rooms-enthralls her.

As Nyx searches for a way to free her homeland by uncovering Ignifex’s secrets, she finds herself unwillingly drawn to him. Even if she could bring herself to love her sworn enemy, how can she refuse her duty to kill him? With time running out, Nyx must decide what is more important: the future of her kingdom, or the man she was never supposed to love.

Photo and summary from Goodreads

I ended up really enjoying Cruel Beauty for a smattering of reasons:

1.  I listened to the audiobook of this Beauty and the Beast retelling, and I have to say it was one of my best decisions in the last week. It’s narrated by Elizabeth Knowelden who exactly fits the tone. She has a smooth, flippant sounding voice and perfectly fit into the Gothic feel.

2.  Nyx is just awesome. She is a young girl given away to fix her father’s mistakes and she is angry. So angry. Yet, still determined. I love that she admits to feeling certain ways, and also admits to the flaws of those feelings. It made her more complex to me and thus more interesting.

3.  There are plenty of romantic bits, but the romance isn’t necessarily the main story. It’s more about duty and maintaining yourself even while in a bad situation. It’s about trying to figure out the truth, when your entire life you have been inundated with different information.

4.  This goes slowly, yet still keeps moving. There were parts where I was pretty ready for something new to happen, but thankfully just when I started feeling that, something new DID happen. Some things got a little repetitive, but I think that is mostly because the bulk of the book was set in the house Nyx is trapped in.

5.  This is a retelling of The Beauty and the Beast story and as a fan that likes Beauty and the Beast but doesn’t know much about the main story and the variations of it, I enjoyed trying to figure out in what ways Cruel Beauty would be similar and what ways it would be different.

If you are a fan of fairy tale re-tellings, dark romances, interestingly built new worlds, and complex characters, you should take a gander at Cruel Beauty.

A BOOK : Breakfast Served Anytime by Sarah Combs

Breakfast Served Anytime
by Sarah Combs
Published April 2014

When Gloria sets out to spend the summer before her senior year at a camp for gifted and talented students, she doesn’t know quite what to expect. Fresh from the heartache of losing her grandmother and missing her best friend, Gloria resolves to make the best of her new circumstances. But some things are proving to be more challenging than she expected. Like the series of mysterious clues left by a certain Professor X before he even shows up to teach his class, Secrets of the Written Word. Or the very sweet, but very conservative, roommate whose coal-industry family champions mountaintop removal. Not to mention the obnoxious Mason, who dresses like the Mad Hatter and immediately gets on Gloria’s nerves — but somehow won’t escape her thoughts.

Summary and photo from Goodreads.com

This is one of those titles that really show me the power of blogging and sharing books. Wayyy back in April I read GRead’s post raving about Breakfast Served Anytime and since then this book has been sitting on my mental “READ THIS ASAP” list. FINALLY, I did.

And I’m really glad.

Breakfast Served Anytime is seriously one big emotional treat. Soon to be senior Gloria is at Geek camp for the summer and is at the cusp of trying to figure out where to go next in life. Should she go to New York with her best friend and try to become an actress as they had originally planned? Or should she stay in boring old Kentucky because she will be getting a really good scholarship? And of course, just because you have your eyes on the future doesn’t mean every day life stops. There are still infuriating boys to deal with, surprising friendships, and  trying to figure out your stance on the world.

This book largely exists in Gloria’s head, and as a result, I feel like it is a ball of EMOTION. She is gloriously sentimental and nostalgic. I think that is what stuck out to me the most, especially as an adult reading this. There are times when she seems to love the moment she is in so much, that she starts to fret about when it will be over. I get that. I really, really get that.

And that is pretty much the sum of my experience reading Breakfast Served Anytime. I kept saying, “I understand. I get that.” It’s one of those books that is very unique in some ways, and because of that it I can see this as very divisive emotionally. It’s either “I get that!” or “What the heck is she on about?”

Bonus: There is something really enjoyable about reading about someone that isn’t afraid to love things. Gloria loves things passionately and shares that love. She loves her dad, she loves the anticipation before things, she loves reading, she loves To Kill a Mockingbird, she loves music, and so many other things. One of my favorite quotes about reading:

“I guess what I’m trying to say is that sometimes you can love a book not so much because of what it’s about or what happens in it, but because it belongs to a certain time or person in your life- like you’ll always remember where you were when you read it for the first time, or who gave it to you, or what season it was, or who you were before you read it and how you were different when it was over.”

So for those looking for a quieter book about interacting with the world and change and growing up or for those looking for a young adult novel that strongly stands on its own, you should check out Breakfast Served Anytime.

Add it to your TBR list on Goodreads

A BOOK : I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson

I’ll Give You the Sun
Jandy Nelson
Published September 2014

Jude and her twin brother, Noah, are incredibly close. At thirteen, isolated Noah draws constantly and is falling in love with the charismatic boy next door, while daredevil Jude cliff-dives and wears red-red lipstick and does the talking for both of them. But three years later, Jude and Noah are barely speaking. Something has happened to wreck the twins in different and dramatic ways . . . until Jude meets a cocky, broken, beautiful boy, as well as someone else—an even more unpredictable new force in her life. The early years are Noah’s story to tell. The later years are Jude’s. What the twins don’t realize is that they each have only half the story, and if they could just find their way back to one another, they’d have a chance to remake their world.

Photo and Summary from Goodreads.com

I. Loved. This. Book. So much.

The narration is split between twins Noah and Jude, Noah’s sections being when they were 13 and Jude’s sections being from “the present” when they are 16. Both of the characters are poetic messes of people, struggling with parental attention, growing up, and trying to figure out how to live in the world. Maybe it’s through the use of the dual narration, but Jandy Nelson does a good job of breathing these two into real life, giving me a good idea as to their inner worl, and how they interact with the outer world.

I am trying to put my thoughts into words, but my ability to string them together is FAILING today. Instead I am just going to throw fragments at you.

-Jandy is a good writer. Really good. She uses a more unique style from what I’ve been reading recently, which to me personally was a breath of fresh air. Having just read We Were Liars by E. Lockhart I would say the language and the that were tools used come from a very similar place. I loved it.

-The family dynamics were really interesting, because from the two different narrations of siblings you end up getting two perspectives of the same thing. I found it really enjoyable that as a result of this you get to see the tension between perceptions the characters have versus reality in the book.

-The characters that fill up Jude and Noah’s life are really interesting. From a mysterious gruff stone sculptor to a boy with a mismatched face to a kid that searches for space debris- these characters shine in their own ways on their own. Sometimes it feels like all of the characters in a book are just created to build up the narrator and progress the story. This book didn’t feel like that. It felt like I had zoomed into a town, and then just chose to zoom into Jude and Noah’s lives.

I’ll Give You the Sun is all about art and creating things and understanding people and understanding yourself and falling in maybe love and being okay with who you are and guilt and responsibility and it is just bursting with beauty. Bursting! Plus, the cover. Look at that! Plus plus, I love the title even more now that I understand how it relates to the book. So read it. Okay?

Add it to your to-reads shelf on Goodreads!

A BOOK : Conversion by Kathrine Howe

Conversion
Katherine Howe
Published July 1, 2014

It’s senior year at St. Joan’s Academy, and school is a pressure cooker. College applications, the battle for valedictorian, deciphering boys’ texts: Through it all, Colleen Rowley and her friends are expected to keep it together. Until they can’t.
 
First it’s the school’s queen bee, Clara Rutherford, who suddenly falls into uncontrollable tics in the middle of class. Her mystery illness quickly spreads to her closest clique of friends, then more students and symptoms follow: seizures, hair loss, violent coughing fits. St. Joan’s buzzes with rumor; rumor blossoms into full-blown panic.
 
Soon the media descends on Danvers, Massachusetts, as everyone scrambles to find something, or someone, to blame. Pollution? Stress? Or are the girls faking? Only Colleen—who’s been reading The Crucible for extra credit—comes to realize what nobody else has: Danvers was once Salem Village, where another group of girls suffered from a similarly bizarre epidemic three centuries ago . . .
 
Inspired by true events—from seventeenth-century colonial life to the halls of a modern-day high school—Conversion casts a spell. With her signature wit and passion, New York Times bestselling author Katherine Howe delivers an exciting and suspenseful novel, a chilling mystery that raises the question, what’s really happening to the girls at St. Joan’s?

Summary and Image from Goodreads.com

Do you ever read a book where you just kind of want to talk about it in ALL CAPS? For some reason, that is this one for me! I just find this novel so dang interesting and as a result I have been pretty much talking about it to everyone and anyone who will listen. Which is why I am now back to blogging. BECAUSE THIS BOOK IS INTERESTING.

-I like that it is based on a true story while taking large fictional leaps. In the last few pages Katherine Howe explains how she was inspired to write Conversion and as a result she mashed together these two separate stories that might seem different, but have more in common than we think.

-The mystery element is what kept me reading. I NEEDED to know what was going on with these girls, and yes– you do find out so you aren’t left hanging!!

-It’s all about girls and society– their role in society and how they are treated by society. This would make a great discussion book for that topic alone. I loved that Howe explored that and I loved how she did it in an artful way.

-A lot of the book centers around Colleen, and something about her– her obsession with getting into school, the comfort she finds with her friends, her voice in general– made me really enjoy reading about her. I think part of it is because she felt like a complete person with flaws that drove the story and endearing qualities that made me want to root for her.

So if you are looking for a book to really sink into (this one is longer clocking in at 432 pages) that will grab your attention, make sure to add Conversion to your to-read shelf on Goodreads.com!