Contemporary

Abbie Emmon's debut novel is a contemporary romance following Tessa Dickinson, a poetry blogger who temporarily loses her eyesight, and Weston Ludivico, who is hired to help her type her poetry onto her blog. Tessa is upset by his presence and claims he doesn't understand what she's going through - what she doesn't know is that Weston lost both of his legs three years ago and has been wearing prosethics ever since.
The idea behind this novel is something that I rarely see, and I appreciate the representation of different disabilities and how that affects the character's lives. However, the romance feels very unrealistic and unhealthy. The pacing is very slow until the ending, and I couldn't relate to Tessa at all, unlike Weston. The book felt very predictable, especially by the end, and I never felt interested in the romance or like I was rooting for the main characters. I did enjoy Weston's backstory, but Tessa felt comparatively one dimensional. However, the book did have a sweet overall message and quite a few good lines.
If you are not looking for something very serious and like a sappy, fluffy romance, I think you would enjoy this novel. Weston is a very sweet character that I enjoyed reading about, and Tessa's thought process is interesting. However, the pacing problems and lack of character development can be very difficult to get through.

Reviewer grade: 9

I am the Messenger is about an ordinary guy that makes something of himself when he gets playing cards in the mail telling him to help people. I thought this book was ok. It tried to have a quick and clever writing style, but there are other books that are much better for that. The plot is ok, and it is entertaining. While I'm not going to spoil the ending, it is kind of a disappointment. Overall, I would say that this book is ok, but there are much better books out there.

I thought to speak was a very good book. It was well written and had very deep concepts to deal with. This book made me feel and almost cry for some of the characters.
Melinda is a ninth-grade outcast who goes down a trail of depression. She has a few friends but all her old ones don't like her anymore. As the story goes on you learn about Mel's life and what happened to make her slip up at school.
I personally really enjoyed this book because it was from a perspective of a girl that doesn't live the same type of life as me but I believe even if this is your situation you'll enjoy the book and could relate to the main character. Many concepts that can be hard to deal with are shown in this book. Including depression, school slump, the act of hurting oneself, lying, untrustworthiness, and one of the hardest to grapple with harassment and being shamed for doing the right thing. throughout all the ups and downs of his life as a ninth-grader, this book will give anyone insight into what happens behind the scenes of a troubled teen. How one can fall under the challenges of modern life and what it means to keep a secret that almost ruined your life.

I chose this book because it is a genre I like to read, romance. This book was romantic and very funny. I was hooked throughout the entire book, and the plot twists just never seemed to end. To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is a story about a girl named Lara Jean. She writes love letters to boys that she’s loved, but she has never sent them. And one day, someone found them and sent them. One of the five boys, Peter Kavinsky, proposes that he and Lara Jean should fake a relationship because he wanted to make his ex jealous. The story follows their fake relationship as it grows into something more and Lara Jean realizes more things about herself and Peter. At first I thought this book might be a bit predictable, but it surprised me as it was not. There were plenty of plot twists to the story that kept me interested up until the end of the book. I really recommend this book to romance lovers and people who like realistic fiction.
Reviewer Grade: 8

Offering a nuanced understand of identify and lived experiences, Peters poses the question, “What constitutes family?” The complexities that accompany transness, family, and self expression are explored beautifully in the book.

In a teen fiction romance meets Sylvia Plath's Bell Jar, Belzhar by Meg Wolitzer is a very interesting "spin-off" from Plath's breakout novel. We follow our protagonist, Jam, a troubled high-school girl sent to the Wooden Barn, a place to help teens with mental illnesses. Jam, although wary of the Wooden Barn, soon meets an interesting circle of friends, most of them in her Special Topics English class, led by Ms. Q, a quirky and interesting teacher. Special Topics only admits very few students each year, and we soon learn why that is so.
Jam and her friends at Special Topics all suffer from prior trauma, leading each of them to the Wooden Barn. Jam is currently attempting to get over her boyfriend--of 41 days, death. To work through these traumas, Ms. Q hands out special journals to each of the students, but the journals are far from normal, and instead teleport each of the students back into the time before their lives were ruined. But the catch is this: the students are only transported to this dream world when they're writing in the journal--and there's only a limited amount of pages left.
The plot of this novel was interesting enough, however, I found that as I continued to read, I began to not be able to stand Jam. I honestly found her to be a bit self-absorbed and delusional, and maybe Wolitzer did this deliberately, but I found Jam to not be a favorable protagonist. I also really didn't like the cliche stereotypes Wolitzer scattered throughout the novel, and there was a lack of good character building and the arcs built for the side characters all seemed rushed and sloppy. Truth be told, while the plot was creative enough, everything else seemed pretty surface-level, and the huge plot twist at the end really unraveled any scrap of importance that the story had left. I wouldn't say that this novel was the worst book I read, as it was a pretty fast and easy read, but I doubt that I'd ever consider picking this book up again.

Reviewer Grade: 11

Donna Tartt and her debut novel The Secret History is one that will stick with me for quite a long time.
The Secret History follows insecure Richard Papen, a somewhat timid boy from Plano California. Richard, desperate to leave Plano and his unattentive parents, decides to go to college at Hampden, a school in Vermont, specializing in Humanities. Of course, when Richard arrives, he completely falls in love with Hampden and its very "Dead Poets Society" vibe to the school. Previously wanting to be in the medical field, but soon after developing a distaste for the field, Richard promptly decides to turn to studying the classics. We discover Julian, the only teacher of Greek in the college, who only takes five students a year in his class. Somehow, Richard makes it into this selective course, becoming the sixth member. We as readers are introduced to the slightly odd and quirky members of the Greek class, and come along with Richard as he slowly develops a friendship with each of them. However, Richard deduces that something is off about his new friends, and with this, dark secrets are unraveled, and we watch as each of the classmates descend into madness.
The Secret History touches upon the study of human morality, and the concept that terrible things hold a kind of beauty to them. I really enjoyed reading this novel and being forced to face psychological dilemmas. What is good? What is evil? What makes someone good or evil? The Secret History really led me around by the nose, and I enjoyed the twists and turns I experienced because of this novel. There were many influential quotes in this story and the writing was beautiful. Even though the novel might have a darker mood, I couldn't help but be enraptured by every word Tartt set out for me.
Overall, if you enjoy a "dark academia" style of book, and is willing to read this novel with an open mindset, The Secret History is definitely for you.

Reviewer Grade: 11

My Life Next Door is a romance book about a girl named Samantha who is explicitly told by her mother not to associate herself with the Garrett’s, a family with a great number of children next door. Despite the warnings, Sam falls in love with one of the Garrett boys, Jase, and he ends up being an essential part of her life when things get wild with her mother’s political career. I really enjoyed this book, and it had an involved storyline with many twists and turns. The one reason I wouldn’t give it 5 stars is because the characters weren’t very relatable (at least for me), but it’s definitely worth a read! I would recommend it for teen girls looking for a good love story about kids their own age. It is also the first book in a series, so if you enjoy it there’s more where it came from!

Neil Gaiman has written a lot of different books. His writing has been hit-or-miss for me, but nothing that's truly middle-of-the-road average. That was until I listened to Neverwhere. I appreciate how Gaiman narrates most of the audiobooks of his works that I've listened to so far, and Neverwhere was in line with the narration quality I expect from him. However, the content felt so mediocre that I honestly wouldn't have been surprised if it came from any other different British authors like Terry Pratchett or Douglas Adams (both of which are talented writers, mind you).

There's a distinct flavor of British comedy that comes through in the absurdist naming of characters and places in Neverwhere. Perhaps it's why I felt this book was so generic. It's your classic "Institutionalized" story where a man has (what seems to him) a stable life, only to have this life upended by a fantastical parallel world introduced by a character he eventually ends up falling in love with. While his interaction with this "London Below" made the main character invisible to his old life, he takes far too long to realize that the status quo he seeks is no longer desirable to him.

Maybe it's that I don't connect with these kinds of stories. They just seem so "meh" with bland characters trying to go back to their bland lives that it's always so obvious to the reader their life would be so much better in this new reality. Of course, I probably wouldn't pursue this fantastical new reality given the choice in my own life, but that's beside the point. Neverwhere contains all the trappings of this type of story, which is certainly entertaining for a bit but gets annoying the longer the main character refuses to change into their new selves.

An average institutionalized story with average British humor, I give Neverwhere 3.5 stars out of 5.

The Inheritance Games is about a 17 year old named Avery who mysteriously is put into someones will and inherits billions of dollars. But, she has to live in the owner of the will's house for a year with his four grandsons. Within the year, Avery goes through a series of riddles to figure out why she was the random person chosen to inherit this mans fortunes. He could have chosen any of his family members, but he chose her. Battling some hate and jealousy, Avery works with the boys to figure why it was Avery and not the family.

I loved this book! It was such an amazing book! The mystery of what would happen next kept me intrigued the whole time. I could not put down the book! I reccomend this book to anyone and everyone who can read!