Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Across the Universe by Beth Revis ☆☆☆☆☆

Take young adult romance and coming of age, add a dystopian society and a murder mystery, and top it off with a little science fiction and you have this book. I don't usually read science fiction, it's just not my thing, but a few reviews of this book and some classic shelf placement at the book store made me pick it up. And I devoured it.

One of my favorite things about this book is its usage of social commentary. On the surface is a story about assuming responsibility and a budding romance. But below the surface is thinly veiled critique of society in the past, present, and possible future. Revis takes our world histories of violence and racism and shows the many different ways that it can be misconstrued. At the same time she plays off of the idea of the differences between crazy and normal and flips what/who can be filed into the categories created. I loved just how many levels this book worked on.

The other thing I really loved was how much emotion I had for the book. I felt angry when the characters were angry and angry when they couldn't see what was right in front of them while I could. I felt helpless with the conditions they were faced with and wanted so badly to take them and give them happy endings before I even reached the ending myself. I really felt for this book and the characters in it. And this is especially purposeful when a large portion of the book questions the lack of emotion in people and the desire to feel anything even if the feeling is rage.

Now while I wasn't entirely satisfied with the book, and while I wouldn't necessarily read it again, I still give it five stars instead of four because I like what it said underneath and not just on top. I liked how it had more layers than I could ever possibly explain. And it's because of those layers that I would recommend people I know to read it.

Night Star (The Immortals 5) by Alyson Noel

Night Star by Alyson Noel ☆☆☆☆

I gave this series another shot and for once wasn't disappointed. So here is a breakdown of what happened with my feelings toward The Immortals series:

Evermore -> couldn't put it down, loved how it was a different supernatural element than vampires or witches, etc

Blue Moon -> also couldn't put down and subsequently ignored the then bf in favor of immersing myself in the book

Shadowland -> (help me, oh please!) this book was filler than only served to frustrate me and make me sad

Dark Flame -> and then I was further saddened, every single time you thought a plot line was about to be tied up she added yet another plot line, if I remember right by the end there were about five different plots and only one had been tied up

And so we get to Night Star. I pre-ordered this book before it came out and it's been sitting on my shelf ever since. The last two books really changed my mind about the series and I was hesitant to go any further, however, I can never seem to put down a series until it's over so I bought the next book anyway. I still put it off obviously....until I saw at the bookstore that the final book just came out so I decided to just read it and get it over with. I had no hopes of this book being any better, but I was pleasantly surprised. Enough to give this one four stars. While it did have several running plot lines, they all seemed to run smoothly together in this book and at least attempt to tie themselves up if they didn't actually reach that point. In a six book series, books three and four apparently fell victim to the middle-filler-bridge of the story arc. I'm actually looking forward to the final book now.

If you're willing to read this series, the first two books are incredible and the fifth is too. Just try and hold out through three and four and know that it'll get you where you need to go eventually. At the very least, you'll be lucky enough that you don't have to live with that unresolved feeling while you wait a year for the next book to come out, you can just pick up the next one immediately and push through it.

Bumped by Megan McCafferty

Bumped by Megan McCafferty ☆☆☆

Not the best book I have read. I had a hard time getting into it and that feeling never really let up. I don't like books that have their own languages without explaining it and this was one of those books. While I was able to pick up on some of the meanings as I read, I still felt lost most of the way.

This book did elicit emotion from me though. I was angry at Harmony for most of the book. And I felt a helplessness for Melody. I was anxiously awaiting everything to turn around and go the way it was expected, but it didn't make it. Part of that doesn't make me want to read the sequel that I discovered is in the works, however, the ending did leave some interesting ideas open that I wouldn't mind exploring out of pure curiosity.

While I did score this book low it doesn't mean I hated it. It's between 3 and 4 stars for me. It's definitely a good book at looking at what a world would be like if teen pregnancies were profitable and overmarketed, and a jab at the overpopularization already present with shows like 16 and Pregnant or even the Octomom. The warring alternating POVs of Harmony and Melody show deep contradictions in not only how the girls were raised, but also contradictions within themselves against how they were raised. It's a working dystopian society novel, but it just didn't work on all levels for me.

Rules of Attraction (Perfect Chemistry 2) by Simone Elkeles

Rules of Attraction by Simone Elkeles ☆☆☆☆☆

I had to order this online because I was on a waitlist at the library and didn't want to wait! Luckily Amazon even had it on sale! Unluckily I waited longer to read it then I would have if I had just waited for the library to send it. Irony at its best.

I loved this book! Getting to that in a second, I'd like to add what I didn't like: the epilogue. This is the same problem I had with the first book. To me both felt like they had the perfect ending (which I don't say often) to where I wasn't anxious for anymore information and just felt satisfied with what I was given. And then you come to the unnecessary epilogue that felt like reading bad fan fiction. In Perfect Chemistry the epilogue was set 23 in the future and in this book it was 26 years. It's not necessarily tying up loose ends (especially since there aren't any); it's just, in both cases, showing history repeating itself in a humorous way. Without the epilogues they would be perfect books.

However, I do still love the book in so many ways. This book mimicked my own high school life (without the gangs): an arrogant Mexican boy that continues to get in trouble and a down-to-earth gringa that doesn't care about her appearance and is willing to give herself fully if it means getting love. Honestly, I wish I would have had this book to read a decade ago and maybe the choices I made would be very very different. That being said, if I identified with it that much then I'm sure there are many other girls (or guys) that would as well, and so I am very glad that this book is out there for them to read and look at the choices they're making in an entirely different way.

This book pulled me in so easily and so tightly that I didn't want to give it up. I was literally dreaming the book while I slept, just waiting until I could pick it up again. And I anxiously handed it off to my friend so that she could love it as much as I did.

Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler

Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler ☆☆☆☆

Box of tissues required!

I knew this book was about death and grieving, but as I began to read it I was holding up pretty well, it wasn't overly emotional, so I didn't think anything of it. Until they sat down on the beach and the weight of everything hit. I couldn't stop crying and I cried and cried for several chapters. Luckily I had tissues by my bed from the last time I my allergies acted up so I was good to go, just stuffy as I was falling asleep.

The reviews on the back of the book declare that Ockler will break you heart to pieces and put it back together again and she definitely delivered. While the book may not have ended the way I hoped for, it did end perfectly. She takes you complete through the grief of the protagonist who had finally begun to live her dream of being with her best friend's brother until he dies before they can label it, and without anyone knowing about it she is left to grieve on her own while she helps her friend grieve the death of her own brother. But more so, she takes you through the grief of the entire family as they try to piece their lives back together on a summer trip they had never made without him before.

I say it ends perfectly because in the aspect of the grief, they are forced to deal with their emotions and come full circle back through them until they reach something short of normal. So why did it not end how I hoped? Because in true "twenty boy summer" context I fall for a boy on the beach and hate that they had to leave. So now in my head I am recreating an epilogue ending in which they return to the beach the following summer and she moves out there for college the summer after that. There is my classic happy ending. But truthfully it was about the girls and the family and not about the boys so I can't ask for anything more.

There is only one thing I have a hard time believing (and this is where it loses a star) and that is the fact that this brother doesn't seem to have any friends of his own. While I admire his bond with his sister and her best friend that he falls for, he spends all his time with them and there is a two year age difference between them. I don't know many teenage boys that would fit that picture. Everything else is completely believable though and spot on.

Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme posted by The Broke and the Bookish. A new top ten question is posed every week. I encourage you to start your own Top Ten Tuesday list. This week:

Top Ten Rebels In Literature (characters or authors)
Those people who stood up for what they believed in despite the cost of doing so.

1. Harry Potter - The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling
Ok, so this is partly because the final movie is next week, but really he is one of the biggest rebels in literature. He went against the Ministry of Magic to destroy an evil they didn't believe existed anymore.


2. Dumbledore - The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling
Where there is a Harry Potter rebel there is a Dumbledore rebel. He risked his position as Headmaster, getting sent away and replaced by the Ministry for supporting Harry. He risked his life to protect him and the wizarding world. And we come to realize he was a rebel even as a young adult.

3. Rose - The Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead
Rose is one of the biggest rebels there ever was. She drops out of school to protect her best friend, ignores any and all school rules, drops out of school again to hunt down someone special, ignores any and all Court rules, breaks someone out of jail, breaks herself out of jail, you name it she's done it.

4. Tris - The Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth
Tris makes a choice that could and does change her entire life. In the process she has to hide who she really is because the secret about her is that she is designed to be a rebel by nature. And in the end she follows her rebel nature to its limits.

5. Claire - The Morganville series by Rachel Caine
She rebels against the vampire race, facing them down even when she's told not to. She tries to save them, but ends up challenging other vampires in the process. And she rebels against her own housemates when they try to keep her locked away in the house when she'd rather be out facing the world and taking everything as it comes.

6. Shane - The Morganville series by Rachel Caine
He rebels against the vampire race too, but as a hunter. His dad trained him to be a mole for insider knowledge to hunt them. But when his dad returns, he has to put that rebel nature behind him to rebel against his father to save his own life as well as the lives of the ones he loves.

7. Cassia - The Matched trilogy by Ally Condie
As she begins to learn the truth about the Society that she's grown up in and under the control of, she realizes that what she wants and what she believes in is something entirely different and she's willing to fight for that even if it means leaving everything behind and risking her life.

8. Alex - Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles
He turns his back on his gang to be with the girl he's falling for and to protect his little brothers from meeting the same fate as him. He loses people he loves as the gang life dictates. And eventually he rebels entirely against the gang when he chooses to leave it and gets jumped out brutally.

9. Frankie - The Monster High series by Lisi Harrison
She only has a month of life behind her while her friends have years, but she doesn't want to hide who she really is behind normie makeup and doesn't want her friends to hide either. She wants equality between normies and RADs (monsters). While she doesn't exactly succeed in her attempts, she isn't entirely failing either. It's just a continuing pile of drama as she rebels and convinces others to rebel with her one-by-one.


10. Percy - The Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan
Rebel against the gods? Always. He rebels against his father for "abandoning" him. He rebels against Zeus for believing him to be a thief. He rebels against Camp Halfblood when they tell him he can't leave camp and he knows he's the only one that can do the quest no matter what they say. He knows what he has to do and learns what he's capable of in the process and doesn't let anyone hold him back.



I like rebels. I think that's why dystopian societies are starting to grow on me because they are full of rebels. Rebels make books more fun! And I try to be a rebel in my own right every day!

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Divergent by Veronica Roth ☆☆☆☆☆

I have to say that this by far is the best book I have ever read hands down. Yes, it was that good. If I could I'd give it an 11 of 5 stars.

From my creative writing background, Veronica Roth is a genius. The book was amazingly well planned out. No information seemed unnecessary. Halfway through the book I had that great moment I love as a reader where something clicks and immediately flip back to the beginning of the book to check my suspicions. (My suspicion was right!) The clues she left in the text were spot on and didn't seem out of place or like foreshadowing, well disguised. Honestly, I'm jealous...especially since she's a lot younger than I am too.

The characters in this book are above and beyond well developed. It is told from the point-of-view of Tris, a 16 year old girl who is incredibly strong and determined. While I see her determination in myself often, I could never have the bravery she has. And then there is Four.... I am in love with a boy named Four! From the moment he was first introduced in the book I couldn't stop focusing on every aspect of him. There is one quote that seems to sum him up perfectly: "He is not sweet or gentle or particularly kind. But he is smart and brave, and even though he saved me, he treated me like I was strong. That is all I need to know." It was in that moment that I realized why I was drawn to him and will always been drawn to him. The five factions of society were so interesting and exciting too (and almost reminded me of Harry Potter houses at first).

I'd never really read dystopian society stories before, but they seem prevalent now. I was hesitant to read it because they can get science-fictiony if not done right, but this didn't go there. Besides having strong, identifiable characters and an amazingly well written structure and plot, my favorite part of this book was that no part of it was slow. A lot of the books I have been picking up are slow in the first half, attempting to introduce and set up everything to not leave the reader hanging, but this story was fluid. Everything in this world was explained without leading me away, it left me no lingering questions about how things developed, and definitely didn't leave me bored. In fact I dreaded having to put this book down. And yet....this book had my heart racing with excitement, desire, and intrigue so often that I had to set it down regularly for a few minutes just to slow my heart rate down and think about what I was reading. It was fun!

I can't wait until the sequel. To me this one was left too open and I want to see so much more. Even better, the film rights have already been sold to Summit Entertainment. Oh the upcoming years look great :D