Super Short Reviews (10)

Have you entered my Reading Road Trip giveaway yet?

Welcome to my Super Short Reviews feature. With my life being the chaotic, hectic mess it is, I'm finding it difficult to keep up with my reviews. Hence, the Super Short Review, which is basically what it says--a couple lines about some of my recent reads. All links will lead to Goodreads.

Keep Holding On by Susane Colasanti: Read for 2012 Standalone Challenge. This was a powerful novel about bullying. I have to admit, I love love love Susane as a person, and I've found her other novels to be entertaining, but this one really hit home for me and is hands down my favorite by her. This is a strong novel about bullying and neglect and it will leave you feeling hopeless and hopeful, which is a feat to pull off in one novel. I got a finished copy at BEA.

Skinny by Donna Cooner: Read for 2012 Debut Author Challenge and 2012 Standalone Challenge. This debut novel is a moving account of 15 year old Ever, who weighs over 300 pounds. She's tormented not only by her peers but by the ever-present voice in her head that Ever not-so-affectionately names Skinny. After many humiliating moments, and one in particular, Ever makes the decision to pursue gastric bypass surgery. Donna Cooner has had gastric bypass surgery, so Ever's experiences ring true. The delight Ever feels the first time she goes clothes shopping post-surgery was so realistic that I teared up a little. A wonderful debut. Skinny will be released October 12 from Scholastic. I received an ARC at BEA.

Zoe Letting Go by Nora Price: Read for 2012 Debut Author Challenge and 2012 Standalone Challenge. Zoe's mother drops her off at Twin Birch for reasons Zoe cannot understand. Twin Birch is not a hospital or a rehab, and the methodology is something that hasn't really been seen before. The other girls are obviously suffering from anorexia, but, as Zoe explains in letters to her best friend Elise, that can't possibly apply to her. I found the ending of the novel predictable but I really enjoy reading about the Twin Birch experience, and I hope that the author used a real-life example of a facility--in other words, that places like this really exist for those who need them. I borrowed this book from the library.

Enjoy your reading!
Christi

Someone Else's Life by Katie Dale

Someone Else's Life by Katie Dale

Simon & Schuster UK, February 2, 2012

Read for 2012 Debut Author Challenge AND 2012 Standalone Challenge

Summary from Goodreads:

When seventeen-year-old Rosie’s mother, Trudie, dies from Huntington’s Disease, her pain is intensified by the knowledge that she has a fifty-per-cent chance of inheriting the crippling disease herself. Only when she tells her mum’s best friend, ‘Aunt Sarah’ that she is going to test for the disease does Sarah, a midwife, reveal that Trudie was not her biological mother after all... Devastated, Rosie decides to trace her real mother, hitching along on her ex-boyfriend’s GAP year to follow her to Los Angeles. But all does not go to plan, and as Rosie discovers yet more of her family's deeply-buried secrets and lies, she is left with an agonising decision of her own - one which will be the most heart-breaking and far-reaching of all...

Look! A real review! I just found this book so compelling--I was writing up a few sentences for a Super Short Review post, but honestly, the topic of Huntington's Disease deserves an entire post. Huntington's Disease is something that is not on most people's radars, unless you know someone who has it. Unfortunately, I know about it. My mom's best friend has lost all FOUR of her children to this horrible disease. Her first husband had it, but didn't begin to exhibit symptoms until his late 40's--when they'd already had all their children. If your parent has HD, there's a 50% chance that you'll get it, too. But in the case of Mom's dear friend, those odds were much, much higher. 

If you're more interested in learning about Huntington's Disease, you can visit the Huntington Disease Center of America website.

So, it's because of Mom's BFF that I was attracted to this book in the first place, and I have to say that I absolutely LOVE what Katie Dale did to make readers aware of Huntington's Disease. It's very difficult to describe HD--I've heard it said (perhaps even Katie said it) that it's similar to having Parkinson's Disease AND Alzheimer's Disease at the same time. Basically, it's a brain disorder that causes your nerves to waste away. There's a lot of fidgeting and involuntary movement (chorea), mood swings, and cognitive problems, just to name a few. Ultimately a person with HD will require around-the-clock-care for feeding, clothing, bathing. There is no cure.

To put Huntington's Disease in a young adult novel is already a brave move, and a guarantee that you'll have an emotional read. However, Katie Dale doesn't stop there. No, we've also got a heartbreaking, switched-at-birth story, a finding-your-birth-parents-story, a pair of love stories, and even an across-the-Atlantic road trip story! Any one of these plot lines would have drawn me to this book, but Katie mixes them all together--and does it in such a way that you are immediately drawn Rosie's worlds, both old (England) and new (America). Katie has taken a smorgasbord of plots that seem completely implausible and has made them a very believable contemporary story. The characters are believable and lovable--they are doing the best they can with what they've been given, and their choices might not be our choices, but they're not made without serious thought and consideration first. 

I am so grateful to Katie Dale for exploring Huntington's Disease in this novel, and I feel she did an excellent job doing so. I'm very much looking forward to more from her!

Borrowed book from the library.

Enjoy your reading!

Christi

Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic

Have you entered my Follower Love Giveaway Hop yet?

Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic

HMH Children's Books, January 17, 2012

Read for 2012 Debut Author Challenge AND 2012 Standalone Challenge

Warning: this review contains SPOILERS. But so did the freakin' summary, so there.

Summary from Goodreads & the back of the book: (I want you guys to understand my review and the summary has so much to do with it):

I had the dream again. The one where I'm running. I don't know what from or where to, but I'm scared, terrified really.Austin Parker is never going to see his eighteenth birthday. He probably won't see the end of the year. But in the short time he has left. there's one thing he can do" He can try to help the people he loves live--even though he never will.
It's probably hopeless.
But he has to try.

First of all, this was a super-quick read. I'm talking two hours, tops. Secondly, I feel that the summary really ruined the novel for me, because Megan doesn't spend the novel talking about the fact that Austin has a terminal disease. It's alluded to, which I thought was the most brilliant thing about this debut. Austin shows up at a party and the guy charging admission takes a look at him and waves him through. There are other scenes where strangers look at him sadly, knowingly, and we don't really know why. EXCEPT THAT THE SUMMARY GAVE US THE REASON. Even the Library of Congress summary on the copyright page is purposely more cryptic: "Seventeen-year-old Austin, aware that life is short, asks his best friend and secret love, Kaylee, to take him to visit people and places in and around Tacoma, Washington, so that he can try to make a difference in the time he has left." THAT is the summary that should have been used. It alludes to what's going on, but it doesn't spell out what happens in the last few chapters.

This book could have just been about a kid who decides to spend his weekend righting all the wrongs in his life, trying to help his friends out of jams, and finally telling the girl of his dreams he loves her. AND THEN in the last two chapters he could reveal that he has a terminal disease and is dying. That is the novel Megan Bostic wrote, and it was extremely powerful (although it was somewhat convenient that so many of Austin's friends/family had screwed up so much). Unfortunately, knowing how the novel was going to end just by reading the back cover took some of that power away.

Borrowed book from the library.
Enjoy your reading!
Christi

The Catastrophic History of You and Me: review & giveaway!

The Catastrophic History of You and Me by Jess Rothenberg

Penguin Young Readers Group, February 21, 2012

Read for 2012 Debut Author Challenge and 2012 Standalone Reading Challenge

Summary from Goodreads:

Dying of a broken heart is just the beginning.... Welcome to forever. 
BRIE'S LIFE ENDS AT SIXTEEN: Her boyfriend tells her he doesn't love her, and the news breaks her heart—literally. 
But now that she's D&G (dead and gone), Brie is about to discover that love is way more complicated than she ever imagined. Back in Half Moon Bay, her family has begun to unravel. Her best friend has been keeping a secret about Jacob, the boy she loved and lost—and the truth behind his shattering betrayal. And then there's Patrick, Brie's mysterious new guide and resident Lost Soul . . . who just might hold the key to her forever after. 
With Patrick's help, Brie will have to pass through the five stages of grief before she's ready to move on. But how do you begin again, when your heart is still in pieces?

This book has been on my to-read wish list forever, and when I stumbled into Jess at the Twitterhood of the Butt-Lifting Pajants party in NYC back in December,  I jumped at the chance to read and review her debut novel.

I very much enjoyed this debut. It was at times charming, humorous, and of course terribly sad. I always love reading books about "after" life and seeing all the different ways authors describe what happens to us after we die. I like how Jess was able to show us, through Brie, what was happening on earth after she died. The level of emotion that Brie suffered, though, I have to say bothered me a bit. NOT because of the writing or anything like that, but because I don't like to think about our loved ones going through any kind of suffering after they've left us. It's a different view, and one that I don't necessarily want to agree with, but Brie's emotions definitely propelled the events in this book.

I especially enjoyed that the book was broken into the parts of grief--anger, denial, etc.--and I really, really liked that each chapter title was not only a song title but also really, really relevant to the contents of the chapter. And of course I especially loved that song title index at the end!

There were parts of the novel that were predictable to me (I spotted the whole thing with Jacob a mile away, for instance), but overall the novel rang fresh and true. The ending, especially, was an enjoyable twist. Brie's voice definitely comes through as a scared 15-year-old whose entire world has been turned upside down. Fans of contemporary novels and romance will enjoy this debut.

One lucky person can win my gently used, signed ARC (thanks, Jess!). Simply enter the Rafflecopter below. Contest ends on February 2.

2012 Debut Author Challenge

Because I was so successful with the 2011 Debut Author Challenge (32 as of this post!), I've decided to go ahead and sign up for the 2012 Challenge, hosted by The Story Siren.

Here are just some of the debut novels I'm looking forward to reading in 2012:

1. Fracture by Megan Mirand
2. Article 5 by Kristen Simmons
3. Slide by Jill Hathaway
4. What She Left Behind by Tracy Bilen
5. Cinder by Marissa Meyer
6. Love & Leftovers by Sarah Tregay
7. Where it Began by Ann Redisch Stampler
8. What's Left of Me by Kat Zhang
9. Breaking Beautiful by Jennifer Shaw Wolf
10. Cracked by KM Walton
11. The Vanishing Game by Kate Kae Myers
12. Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic

So that's my first 12, but I'm sure that I'll be reading way more than that! You still have time to sign up for this challenge; head over to the Story Siren to learn more!

Enjoy your reading!

Christi