Just Listen by Sarah Dessen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 4.08
Goodreads Summary:
Last year, Annabel was "the girl who has everything" — at least that's the part she played in the television commercial for Kopf's Department Store.
This year, she's the girl who has nothing: no best friend because mean-but-exciting Sophie dropped her, no peace at home since her older sister became anorexic, and no one to sit with at lunch. Until she meets Owen Armstrong.
Tall, dark, and music-obsessed, Owen is a reformed bad boy with a commitment to truth-telling. With Owen's help, maybe Annabel can face what happened the night she and Sophie stopped being friends.
Actual Rating: 4.8
Ohhhhh my goodness this was adorable.. Seriously, just.. heart swellingly touching.
This book actually made me pretty emotional for unknown reasons... Nothing super tragic happened it was just full of really heavy issues. This is another one of those books where I wonder what I would have taken from it if I had read it as a teen or pre-teen.. Being an adult and reading about something like this is totally different.
Annabelle was a sweet innocent little girl and she took us through an epic journey of her first time falling in love.. Her prime year of discovering herself. I feel like I watched Annabelle grow up a lot in this book.
Owen was a total sweetheart and EXACTLY what Annabelle needed.. Their love story was so sweet. The timing was perfect and there was so much meaning behind everything they did and said..
It's books like these that keep me hooked on YA.. Teenage/college age characters are my absolute favorite to read about because they're so impressionable and impulse and their struggles are so real. I really enjoyed this book for that reason and I plan to read more stuff by this author.
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Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 4.10
Goodreads Summary:
Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris--until she meets Étienne St. Clair. Smart, charming, beautiful, Étienne has it all...including a serious girlfriend.
But in the City of Light, wishes have a way of coming true. Will a year of romantic near-misses end with their long-awaited French kiss?
Actual Rating: 3.6
Finally I got around to reading this.. It's only been on my to-read shelf for two years. I also got a few recommendations to check this one out so I had to.
I was excited but unfortunately was a little disappointed. The story starts slow and I really didn't connect to any of the characters for a good half of the book. Around 60% I was like d'ahhh Étienne.. so cute.
It was kind of a roller coaster of a book. A lot of feelings and a lot of people were involved. Anna wasn't the most interesting main character ever, a bit annoying, but I got used to her. The happy ever after was cute and I can't deny the fact that Anna & St. Claire are pretty good together.
On to the next!
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Fallen Too Far by Abbi Glines
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 4.27
Goodreads Summary:
To want what you’re not supposed to have…
She is only nineteen.
She is his new stepfather’s daughter.
She is still naïve and innocent due to spending the last three years taking care of her sick mother.
But for twenty-four year old Rush Finlay, she is the only thing that has ever been off limits. His famous father’s guilt money, his mother’s desperation to win his love, and his charm are the three reasons he has never been told no.
Blaire Wynn left her small farmhouse in Alabama, after her mother passed away, to move in with her father and his new wife in their sprawling beach house along the Florida gulf coast. She isn’t prepared for the lifestyle change and she knows she’ll never fit into this world. Then there is her sexy stepbrother who her father leaves her with for the summer while he runs off to Paris with his wife. Rush is as spoiled as he is gorgeous. He is also getting under her skin. She knows he is anything but good for her and that he’ll never be faithful to anyone. He is jaded and has secrets Blaire knows she may never uncover but even knowing all of that…
Blaire just may have fallen too far.
Actual Rating: 2.7
Booooooo. What a bunch of trash. Blaire officially takes the spot of least favorite main character ever.
This book looked promising for a little while but I snapped out of that notion real quick. This book toe'd the line of "YA" and "Erotica" and it was the most awkward thing ever.
Rush is a bad ass rocker dude with a tendency to sleep with randoms and then forcefully remove them from his bed the next day. But then Blaire comes into his life and changes everything. Now, you'd think there'd be some catastrophic reason for Blaire being the one that changes Rush's outlook on women and life but there is literally NONE.
Also, the thought of it being weird that Rush was her step brother and they were sleeping together never once crossed Blaire's mind.
It was just SO unrealistic! And the author made it seem like there was this big huge secret, this reason why Rush was they was he was and Nan hated Blaire so much... and when it finally came out I was like REALLY? That's it?!
I don't even know how I got all the way through this book... Blaire made me want to punch things. I literally rolled my eyes at her at least once a chapter.
No thanks!
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Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 3.78
Goodreads Summary:
In her strongest work to date, Lois Lowry once again creates a mysterious but plausible future world. It is a society ruled by savagery and deceit that shuns and discards the weak. Left orphaned and physically flawed, young Kira faces a frightening, uncertain future. Blessed with an almost magical talent that keeps her alive, she struggles with ever broadening responsibilities in her quest for truth, discovering things that will change her life forever.
As she did in The Giver, Lowry challenges readers to imagine what our world could become, and what will be considered valuable. Every reader will be taken by Kira's plight and will long ponder her haunting world and the hope for the future.
Actual Rating 4.0
Interesting! This book was a lot more "mysterious" than the first book. I didn't understand how it tied together, didn't really even understand how it was similar until about half way in. [ The children were receiving memories from their parents without knowing! (hide spoiler)]
In the first book we get introduced to the idea of "giving memories" and in this book it seems that giving memories has been taken on a revolution. Now instead of just one giver, giving memories to a receiver, a lot of people give memories to other people.
I liked all the characters and I really really liked Matt the little tyke.. Especially at the end when he goes on a journey to find Kira a "giftie" and comes back with the most amazing gift anyone could ever give her. (view spoiler)[ Her father! (hide spoiler)]
I'll definitely read the next one.. I can already see how Kira is going to unite the kingdoms. I just hope book 3 takes place right after this one ends not 60-70 years later.
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Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 3.96
Goodreads Summary:
On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne's fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick's clever and beautiful wife disappears from their rented McMansion on the Mississippi River. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn't doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife's head, but passages from Amy's diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media--as well as Amy's fiercely doting parents--the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he's definitely bitter--but is he really a killer?
As the cops close in, every couple in town is soon wondering how well they know the one that they love. With his twin sister, Margo, at his side, Nick stands by his innocence. Trouble is, if Nick didn't do it, where is that beautiful wife? And what was in that silvery gift box hidden in the back of her bedroom closet?
Actual Rating: 4.0
This book really threw my mind for a loop. It was a definite page turner, I couldn't stop reading until I had all the pieces to the puzzle. That's what earned the 4 star rating.
I knew something whacky was going on from the very beginning.. the husband being the actual suspect is just too easy. There had to be more. And boy was there. Amy is, and I mean this is the nicest way possible, literally bat shit crazy. She took her husband, the cops and us readers on an insane journey.. A plan formulated over the course of a year. Every single detail thought out, planned for, meticulously, ingeniously thought out.
I kept trying to guess what was going on.. Who was lying, who was hiding what.. I was wrong. Every time. In the beginning I was like okay Nick didn't do it but I still don't like him.. The person Amy was in the beginning made me feel like she was the good guy and he was the bad guy but by the end I had totally flip flopped sides.
All in all it was a good read.. I think it'd be interesting to see hollywoods spin on it.. Maybe make a good lifetime movie or series.
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City of Heavenly Fire by Cassandra Clare
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Avg rating: 4.49
Goodreads Summary:
In this dazzling and long-awaited conclusion to the acclaimed Mortal Instruments series, Clary and her friends fight the greatest evil they have ever faced: Clary's own brother.
Sebastian Morgenstern is on the move, systematically turning Shadowhunter against Shadowhunter. Bearing the Infernal Cup, he transforms Shadowhunters into creatures out of nightmare, tearing apart families and lovers as the ranks of his Endarkened army swell.
The embattled Shadowhunters withdraw to Idris - but not even the famed demon towers of Alicante can keep Sebastian at bay. And with the Nephilim trapped in Idris, who will guard the world against demons?
When one of the greatest betrayals the Nephilim have ever known is revealed, Clary, Jace, Isabelle, Simon, and Alec must flee - even if their journey takes them deep into the demon realms, where no Shadowhunter has set foot before, and from which no human being has ever returned...
Love will be sacrificed and lives lost in the terrible battle for the fate of the word in the thrilling final installment of the classic urban fantasy series The Mortal Instruments
Actual Rating: 4.2
That book was like holding your breath under water for a set amount of time... I wanted it to be over way before it was. I wanted to come up for air aka for it to be over.
Don't get me wrong, I liked the book and I like how it ended and I wasn't too heart broken at any time so that's good. Cassie Clare is an extraordinarily talented author.. The way she made everything tie together, even characters and stories from TID (The Infernal Devices) were woven into the story in a beautiful way and we were promised more of them in the series to come, TDA (The Dark Artifices).
I'm thankful for this series, I'm thankful for every character, every story, every twist and turn. I will miss them forever but I will rest assured knowing most of my favorite characters can and will make appearances in the following series.
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