Perks

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a book I had intended to read for a long time, but I guess I just thought it was too trendy or too cool or too something.  I was very wrong.  This is an incredibly sweet story.  I love this book.  While some have commented that Charlie, the main character, is too young to to really be 15, I don't think so.  There are some 15 year olds who are sweet and caring and sensitive. Charlie is one of them.  The story is told in letter form.  Charlie writes to someone we don't know or meet and writes from the heart, honestly.  And it is lovely.  What a wonderful book about growing up, the good and the bad.
Okay so I admit, I wrote this review when I was about 1 hour from the end of the audiobook.
Now that I finished it, what a joke. This is not the book I thought it was. The ending is just so not good. It is just so bad. Unbelievable and it ruined the book for me completely with its bizarre conclusion. I feel cheated and manipulated and foolish.

The Truth

Man.  Okay.  So The Truth about You and Me was a tough book.  Like Amanda Grace's But I Love Him, it deals with a hot and hard topic.  A teacher and a student, in a relationship.  The deal with this book was that it is told from the POV of a sixteen year old girl who is in a fast-track program at a local community college.  Her teacher thinks she is eighteen and while that is bad enough, it wouldn't be illegal.  But Madelyn just keeps the lie going.  She has a lot of issues of her own, with her tough, always-gotta-be-the-best family at home.  With her teacher, she feels she can be herself, even as she is living a lie.
The book was a page-turner for sure and while it was hard to sympathize with Madelyn, she is a very real, well-drawn character.  She is a typical sixteen year old and that comes out in her obvious immaturity.  I didn't buy that the teacher, Bennet, didn't know something was off.  And that was another neat part of the whole story.  He was pretty immature, too.  Great book.

Man...

Even though I felt that last year's Newbery was a good choice, now that I have read Inside Out and Back Again, I feel like maybe it should have won.  But Dead End in Norvelt was awesome...so I don't know.  It is close.  It is def not like 1954.  For sure.  But wow, Inside Out and Back Again was incredible and heartbreaking and eye-opening, well, eye-opening to a dummy like me who didn't know much about Vietnamese refugees, after the Fall of Saigon.  What a beautiful story about ignorance and understanding and human folly and the human heart.  I loved this book. 

The Year Ends on a High Note

Also Know As was my last book of 2012 and what a great book it was!  Super-fun!  I loved every page of this eARC from netgalley.com.  Never read anything from Robin Benway, but will now look for her name, for sure.  I do hope that this is a series, because I know teens will love this.  Maggie and her parents are parents are spies for the Collective, an international group of do-gooders.  Maggie's expertise is safe-cracking.  She hasn't ever lived a normal life, as you can imagine, but now she has her first solo assignment.  She must pose as an ordinary teenager at a private school in Manhattan.   She has to make friends and gain the trust of the son of a man who may be writing an article that will expose the Collective and ruin the fate of the free world!  Yes, the book is over the top and so is Maggie.  She is great fun, very likable, as all of the characters are.  There is a bit of romance as Maggie starts to fall for the young man she is spying on, the son of the writer.  Loved the book, the setting, the characters, the pacing.  Great book!  Great fun! 

Great Fun! Yet, meaty, too.

I don't know much about current pop events. I know that is terrible. I don't read US or People and I have no idea who Channing or Jenna are, so I didn't know about Warm Bodies, the movie, coming out in February.  But when a friend recommend the book to me I thought, what the heck, it is thin!  So I read it.  And man!  It was awesome!  What a great book!
It's a zombie book and I don't think it is a YA book, I think it is an adult book, I think.  But I could recommend this to teens and adults.  I mean, it is just a great book that brings up a lot of good questions, like what is going to cause the end of the world?  Is it going to be us?  Our hate and greed?  Will we know even when we are at the end of the world or will it happen so gradually, it will just be here?  What makes a person a human being?  Can a person be so full of hate and distrust and hopelessness that they are "walking dead?" And is there hope?
Great, great book and funny, too!

Original and Creepy

This month I read Fracture by Megan Miranda and I really enjoyed it so I was excited to see Hysteria on netgalley.com.  Hysteria is definitely one I will buy and recommend to folks at the library.  This is the story of Mallory who killed her boyfriend, Brian, in self-defense.  After that, naturally, she can't go back to school or even live in her home town because Brian's mother and brother, Dylan are angry.  Brian's mother beings to stalk Megan and throw red paint on the family's home.   

Mallory's parents send her to a New Hampshire boarding school, the same school her father attended. At boarding school she feels that she is still being stalked, perhaps by Brian's mother, perhaps by something even worse.  

One of the particularly rotten students Mallory's new school ends up stabbed to death, in Mallory's room.  Of course, suspicion falls on Mallory.  

This book kept me guessing up until the end.  There is a bit of romance, as Mallory is reunited with a young man she met a few years before, the son of her father's best friend.  The character of Mallory can be really unlikeable, but that's okay.  She is very human and real.  Her best friend is also very cool.  

Very good story, and I read it quickly.  Looking forward to more from Miranda.  

Also it is set in New Hampshire!

Clint Eastwood

So I never really liked Clint Eastwood.  I mean, he is hot and everything, but I just never really liked him.  I especially didn't like like him after the ridiculous stunt he pulled at the Republican National Convention.  The anti-veteran ticket of Romney-Ryan was so ridiculous that anyone affiliated with it, really dropped in my estimation.  I guess that a Dirty Harry kind of guy would be anti-veteran, maybe.  I am not sure.  I don't know much about Dirty Harry.   It just surprised me that a guy who really likes the patriot image could support an unpatriotic candidate like that Ryan who wants veterans benefits to be cut.  So Clint Eastwood truly is an unpatriotic, anti-veteran cartoon.

Once upon a time I loved Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch.  I loved that he was named after one of my favorite painters.  I loved everything about him.
But then Clint Eastwood ruined it for me.  He was in the movie Blood Work.  And he was so awful and wooden and way too old to play the main character.  And the book was written by Connelly.  And so in my mind I tie up Harry Bosch with Terry McCaleb.  Which is ridiculous I know.  But I have tied Connelly and Eastwood so tightly in my little mind that I just can't even read a Bosch book without thinking of the comedian Clint Eastwood and his dislike of veterans.
So going into Suicide Run, the book already had that against it.
Also going against it was that this week I had just finished another short story by Lawrence Block and one by Brian Freeman.  I love Freeman and Block and Jonathan Stride is way cooler than Bosch.  And even Keller, though a killer and bad dude, is way cooler than Bosch as well.
But over all, these were good stories.  They were just good, not awesome, but then again, remember what this book was up against! 

Snowy Day, Snowy Book

Finished Let it Snow and I have to say it was quite enjoyable.  It is written by three different authors:  Lauren Myracle, John Green and Maureen Johnson.  The three stories are really one big story and all of the characters are a bit related and well, it really was quite a fun little book to read!  It all starts with a big old snow storm on Christmas Eve Day.
I really liked all three of the stories and I love Green and Myracle, so I wasn't surprised to enjoy their stories, but the wonderful surprise was the first story by Johnson.  Very funny.  Loved the characters and their sense of humor.  I hope to read a Johnson book soon!

Newbery?

The Newbery Award will be announced at the end of January and I will be blessed once again to be there!  This will be my third time, God willing.  Goodreads has a list of books tagged as Mock Newbery Books and Liar and Spy is third on the list.  When You Reach Me won the Newbery and wow, I just did not enjoy that book at all.  I disliked it so much I didn't want to read L and S at all.  But I broke down because I saw it sitting on the shelf so many times, looking so lonesome and I read it today, in one sitting and it wasn't nearly as bad as WYRM.  I was really, really enjoying it, until the end.  I just didn't buy into it and it just went flat for me.  This is the story of Georges and his life now that his family has moved from their house to an apartment.  There is bullying and friend-making and friend-losing and quirky characters.  I did love Georges a lot.  And his friend Safer, too.  But I don't know.  Just not my thing.

Keller is a Killer

but he is very lovable.  I can't help it, I really like Keller. And I really liked Keller in Dallas.   He isn't a bad guy.  He has a wife and a baby and regular job, and he collects stamps.  It's just that he is a hired killer.  And this time his job is in Dallas.  There will be a full novel coming out that will start with this story.  Great, quick read.

Jonathan Stride!

Set in Duluth, of course I love the Stride books by Brian Freeman.  There hasn't been one in a while!  But then I found this little story on iTunes and it made me so happy!  This is a grim and creepy tale with a great name, The Spitting Devil, about a woman who suspects that her husband is the killer of three women in the city.  Great and I didn't guess the ending.  I love Stride!

Remember Starters?

If you didn't read Starters, you probably should download it right now from iTunes, it is really good!  I had forgotten how good!  But fortunately I discovered some little teasers, new stories, set in the Starters world.  Enders won't be out until next year, but these will hold you over!  Portrait of a Starter and Portrait of a Marshal are really good little stories.  I have no idea why one book cover is so small and the other is normal size.  I saved them both exactly the same way.  Anyway, good stuff!  And glad for electronic books!

Shades of Vincent Brothers

The whole Fifty Shades of Grey obsession was lost on me.  I for some reason I found myself too old for them.  But the Vincent Brothers is pretty graphic and yeah, it seems like it is as Fifty Shades as I would like to go.  If you don't like graphic stuff, then just read through those parts quickly, that's what I did.  This is the sequel to the Vincent Boys and it is really easy to whip through and I did like it, but the boys themselves are awful.  Jealous and violent and just pretty much jerks.  They have an Edward Cullen-type obsession with their girlfriends, but not the excuse of being a vampire.  Trashy fluff, but it kept me turning the pages.

Carnival of Souls! Read the Book! Watch the Movie!

They are totally unrelated, but both Carnival of Souls, the book and Carnival of Souls, the movie are really good!  Both are little hard to figure out at first, for me, anyway, but the pay off is worth it.
The book is set in a totally weird world with witches and daimons and fights and magic and all that jazz.  And I really can't explain it well, so it is good to just click on the link up there and read what others have said.  If you are into dark fantasy for teens, then you will like it, for sure.  It is the first book in a series and the main characters are daimon and witch teenagers.  And there is a little bit of love.  There is a lot of fighting and some dying.  Magic and stuff I usually don't get into, but the book moves quickly and I listened to it and the narrator did a really great job.

Boys Will Be Boys

And the Vincent Boys are something else.  There's All-American Sawyer Vincent.  Football QB, regular church-goer, great grades, great family, great looking.  And there's his cousin, Beau Vincent. Football Star, bad boy, great looking, trailer-trash, serious fighter.
Sawyer great up with the best family, great successful dad and mom.  Beau's mom works as a bartender and is bad-butt.  His father is dead but when he was alive he was a hell-raiser and a drunk.
Ashton is in the middle.  She grew up with these boys, who are cousins.  She's been Sawyer's perfect girlfriend for three years but man...she has a deep down  wild side and is secretly attracted to Beau and his badness.  The deal is, Ashton is the preacher's daughter and well, she's got a rep to uphold.  But in her senior year, it is killing her.  And Sawyer is away...and Beau is around...
and this isn't a serious book, it's a fun book.  And I enjoyed it a lot and am going to read the sequel.  Yeah, yeah, lots of criticism because it is trashy.  But it's fun!  Liked it a lot and it's a very quick read!  And the Road Trip goes on!  It is set in Alabama!

The Third Funniest Adult Book I've Ever Read!

Stuff White People Like is hilarious!  I found myself laughing at myself more than a few times.  Liberal Arts degree- check, blogging- check, mentioning what I heard on NPR- check.  Really aware and super-funny book.  Great to laugh at yourself! 

Second Funniest Adult Book I've Ever Read!

And I have read some very funny ones!  But man, these last two have been excellent.  Stuff Christians Like is an admitted rip-off of Stuff White People Like and the result of Jon Acuff's blog.
I can see why some folks think it should be titled Stuff Evangelical Christians like, but any Christian will love this book and see him or herself in it!   Great stuff!  Looking forward to reading more from this author!
Oh I know what I really wanted to say, too, is that the serious parts of the book (and there aren't that many) really spoke to me.  This guy is truly gifted and I love and admire the way he uses the gifts God has given him to bring glory to God and draw folks closer to Him.

Hilarious and Eye-Opening

How to Be Black is the funniest adult book I can remember ever reading.  It is also a book that reminded me of how much African Americans have been through here in the US and so it was I don't know, heart-breaking and sickening and guilt-inducing, but encouraging to know that nothing dirtbags racists have done have been able to stop the amazingness of blackness.
Baratunde R. Thurston is an extremely brilliant man and comedian.  I bought this book on iTunes and need to figure out how to share it with people.  That's the only problem with the downloadable stuff, too hard for me to figure out how to lend!
This is a must-read, well, a must-listen, because the author reads it and the people who were on his Black Panel also recorded their parts of the book and it is great to hear the real people reading their real words.  I can't say enough about this book!  A great gift for anyone!

Finally

Next time I choose a book I must remember that I am not a fan of psychology. There is no one to blame but me for suffering through iDisorder. This is seriously one to skip.

Maine!

Fracture is set in Maine. How lovely! Maine in winter and so there is, of course, ice and snow. And Delaney falls through the ice and dies but then she comes back to life. She's a medical miracle, they say. But she is seriously messed up. She is like those cats and dogs in nursing homes who visit the rooms of the folks who are going to die. She feels drawn to death. Can feel it pulling at her. She meets Troy, a guy who was also dead and then alive, and he can do the same thing.
It's a very different and creepy story and I didn't like the characters much but I did like the story. Of course, it's a series. Don't know if I'll read the next one, but glad I read this.