So...I haven't been feeling the best lately. A stomach flu can do that to you. Anyways, I decided to reread some of my favorite YA (realistic/general--meaning no sci-fi/dystopian/fantasy) fiction books to cheer myself up a bit :-) Hopefully you'll find a book that catches your eyes in the list below!
Rating: 5 stars
Review blurb: This wonderful and inspiring novel is told from the point of view of three main characters: TC, Augie and Alejandra (also known as Alé, not Allie). Each character have their very own and unique personality. TC is a true Bostonian baseball fanatic who just can't seem to stay out of trouble. For Augie, it's all about the drama--the world is the stage and he is the main actor. And Alé is something else altogether--there is no other way to describe her (I mean really, she has her own Secret Service agent!)...This book made me laugh, it made me cry and it made me appreciate all the "little" things in life. A must-read! (click here to read full review)
Rating: 4 stars
Review blurb: Ari can't swim. Dante can. Dante's also friendly, brave, smart and quirky. Ari accepts Dante's offer to teach him how to swim and they quickly befriend each other. There really is not "climax" of the book (unless maybe if you count Ari getting severely injured to push Dante out of the way of an out of control truck...but that happens like 1/3 into the novel so I don't think that's the climax). I think the plot of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe is more of a slow burn type of plot. What I mean is that the novel is engaging enough so that it keeps you flipping the pages and then the tension increases some, and some more and some more until you HAVE to finish the book. (click here to read full review)
Rating: 5 stars
Review: This brutally honest novel really throws life into perspective. Hazel, the main character, is a teenage girl with cancer. To her, life is pretty crummy at the moment and her mom is constantly nagging her to get a social life. Hindered by her oxygen tanks and carts (her lungs suck at being lungs), Hazel often loses herself in books in her bedroom to escape reality. That is, until she meets Augustus. (click here to read full review)
Rating: 5 stars
Book blurb from Goodreads (because I haven't written a review for it yet): Lina is just like any other fifteen-year-old Lithuanian girl in 1941. She paints, she draws, she gets crushes on boys. Until one night when Soviet officers barge into her home, tearing her family from the comfortable life they've known. Separated from her father, forced onto a crowded and dirty train car, Lina, her mother, and her young brother slowly make their way north, crossing the Arctic Circle, to a work camp in the coldest reaches of Siberia. Here they are forced, under Stalin's orders, to dig for beets and fight for their lives under the cruelest of conditions.
Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously--and at great risk--documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives.Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart
Rating: 4.5 stars
Goodreads blurb: From the day she arrives at quiet Mica High in a burst of color and sound, hallways hum “Stargirl.” She captures Leo Borlock’s heart with one smile. She sparks a school-spirit revolution with one cheer. The students of Mica High are enchanted. Until they are not. Leo urges her to become the very thing that can destroy her - normal.
Rating: 4.5 stars
Goodreads blurb: Noah's dad has a little problem with anger control. He tried to stop theCoral Queen casino boat's illegal dumping . . . by sinking the boat. But his bold protest fizzles: within days the casino is back in business, and Noah's dad is behind bars and out of action.
Now Noah is determined to succeed where his father failed. But even though pumping raw sewage into the waters of the Florida Keys is both gross and against the law, turns out it's near impossible to catch the flusher—especially when he's already bamboozled the prosecutors, the local press, and even the Coast Guard.
No comments:
Post a Comment