My Life in…

Although most of the reviews for this book are raves, many complained that the beginning was too slow and Sam was too unlikeable. When I was reading the book, I was into it, but when I put it down, I didn’t really care about picking it back up until I entered the second half of the book. Sam is unlikeable and so are her friends and her boyfriend, but as the story goes on, they all become a little more complex (well, maybe not Rob, but the second love interest certainly does). Lindsay is a monster, but she’s a monster filled with insecurities, and this story certainly show the power of making changes in your life for the better. This was an enjoyable read, though I think the people who have mentioned it for Printz are crazy. This is sure to be a crowd-pleaser for fans of 13 Reasons Why and lighter chick lit fare.

I thought this was a fitting end to an incredible series. It was so dark that it wasn’t very enjoyable to read (I mean, obviously the first one was dark but it was sort of propelled by adrenaline, while this one was slower and more thoughtful). I agree with pretty much everything positive in everyone else’s reviews, but do think there were some weaknesses, although many of those were necessary to the storyline.

Two reviews that do the book more justice than I do (contains spoilers): Bookshelves of Doom, Sarah Ockler

This was a Mock Printz nominee from a colleague, and I liked it, but it wasn’t my favorite. I thought the plotline seemed too similar to a Skins episode, and the journey wasn’t very interesting. I liked some of the revelation of detail about Blake’s relationship with a certain girl, and thought that the details of Ross’s death were interesting, but I didn’t feel connected with Sim at all.

So this is a novel about bridge. And like most people my age, I thought bridge was kind of stupid even though I knew nothing about it. But Louis Sachar is Louis Sachar, so I read the Cardturner and it is every bit as lovely as most of his other books. Alton is a great character, and even the bridge is interesting. The sentence level writing is just magical in parts. Sachar’s way of giving lots of detailed bridge information without it being boring (but admitting it might be boring and skippable if the reader is so inclined) is just brilliant. After reading the whole book I still don’t think I could make a bet to save my life, but I’d love to try it out. This is certainly not going to be as popular as Holes but as far as writing goes, it’s right up there.

This was a cute beginning to the quartet. The more I thought about it, the whole city really bothered me, particularly how hapharzardly everything was set up (You pick your career out of a hat? And why all the to-do if it doesn’t even matter if you switch?). But Lina and Doon were sweet and adventurous and I am curious as to how it all turned out, though I’m not sure I’m patient enough to read three more books to find out.

This book has been reviewed very positively everywhere, but it didn’t quite work for me. The elements that made Echols’ Going Too Far so successful such as characters with fantastic, desperate chemistry and smart writing, were present; however, I could not suspend my disbelief that Zoey really believed she was in a relationship with Brandon. It’s one thing that she had memory loss, but quite another that she missed all of the glaringly obvious evidence in the present that Brandon didn’t really having feelings for her and was in fact dating someone else. Although this sets up the will-they, wont-they relationship with Doug, it just seems like such an obvious contrivance to keep them apart. The book might have been stronger if it was less about Zoey’s romantic issues and more about her relationship with her parents, which she could have dealt with especially with Doug by her side. This book is hot and intense, but only if you can pretend Zoey’s issues aren’t all in her head.

I usually love all of Moriarty’s books, but this one took most of the book to win me over. I read the Year of Secret Assignments back in 2004 and I had forgotten a lot about these characters, and the book didn’t do much to establish them as unique characters at first, since they are all writing the same type of essay (so the characters become distinguishable by writing style alone, but not really their personality since the gothic fiction conceit creates an odd affect to all of the stories). I liked Em’s blog posts the best, because it felt more authentic and was lighter in tone. I liked how the stories came together in the end, but I wasn’t fond of the Toby’s interludes. This book seems to be getting glowing reviews all over the place, so maybe it’s just me.

I was looking forward to reading this for a while (I was a big fan of Gordon Korman’s Everest trilogy) and was not disappointed. The characters in this are great, from Peak to his sisters and stepfather, and his developing relationships with Sun-jo, the reporter, and his father. There is a lot of suspense on the climb and Smith doesn’t gloss over some of the rougher aspects.