Waiting For Wentworth

Saving June - Review

Saving June by Hannah Harrington

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Saving June was a good story, but I think it could have been much better. It just didn't have enough depth for me and I really didn't connect with the characters at all. Maybe because I am older and the characters were very immature. I especially never understood Harper. She was completely unrelatable to me.

The way all of the characters dealt with their pain and loss were were so diverse. Harper wasn't able to show any grief or shed any tears over her sister's death. And Harper couldn't be bothered to comfort her own mother when she was falling apart.

I have to give an honorable mention to Harper's selfishness. That was a huge part what propelled this story. It was Harper's selfishness that caused her to steal her sister's ashes and take them to California, because, well, going to California was her sister's dream. And because Harper knew her sister so well, she just had to do this for her. Only Harper didn't know her sister very well.

The music - there was lots of music in this book - was 99% stuff that I don't listen to. I guess Jake was supposed to be hip and cool because he was an obscure music junkie. I just wasn't feeling that part either. Analyzing lyrics and making them relevant whatever situation you are in isn't something I spend my time doing, so again I couldn't relate.

And Jake. I think he was mostly an asshole with a touch of 'depth'. You know, because of the whole music thing. He and Harper had a love hate relationship for most of the story, and their relationship just wasn't believable.

The whole roadtrip was disjointed and there were pointless side trips along the way. (On a personal note, calling The Gateway Arch 'the arch thingy' really pissed me off. Yes, I live in St. Louis. But I have never heard anyone, kid or adult, call it the arch thingy. Show some respect for a National Park. AND no mention of how awesome to photograph The Arch from underneath it. Because it really IS awesome.)

After finishing this book, I still don't know any more about June than I did when the book began. I don't know what it was that caused such unhappiness in her life. There were some hints along the way that were dropped. Remember the girl at the beach that was upset with Jake for bringing Harper around after..... what? And the hint about the same girl maybe 'liking' June.... no one ever mentioned these things again.

Saving June was not an engrossing read for me. It failed to grab my attention and draw me into the story. I see a lot of 5 star ratings, but this was just a 3 star read for me.

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Follow Friday is a weekly feature hosted by Alison Can Read and Parajunkee. Follow Friday is an opportunity to discover and follow other book related blogs.

Question: Keeping with the Spirit of Giving this season, what book do you think EVERYONE should read and if you could, you would buy it for all of your family and friends?

Not everyone I know reads. In fact, I think some are allergic to reading. There is no better way to improve the mind than by reading.

My choice for everyone to read is On the Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta. Simply amazing! If YOU haven't read it yet, then you should. Now.

Waiting For Wentworth

Third Sentence Thursday is a weekly feature that is currently being hosted by Proud Book Nerd.

1) Take the book you are reading now and post the third sentence
2) Review this sentence anyway you want (funny and silly reviews encouraged)
3) Post a link to your sentence here (in the comments) or if you don’t have a blog, just post your sentence in the comments!

"It happened on the last day of school."
Deadly Little Secret (Touch #1) by Laurie Faria Stolarz

I know that it's deadly. And it's a secret. But can you really classify a deadly secret as 'little'? I think I will keep reading and find out!

I am re-reading the first 3 books in this series before reading Deadly Little Voices which came out Dec. 6.

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking The Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week's pre-publication "can't-wait-to-read" selection is:
Enchanted by Alethea Kontis
Hardcover, 320 pages
Expected publication: May 8th 2012 by Harcourt Children's Books

Description from Goodreads:
"It isn’t easy being the rather overlooked and unhappy youngest sibling to sisters named for the other six days of the week. Sunday’s only comfort is writing stories, although what she writes has a terrible tendency to come true.
When Sunday meets an enchanted frog who asks about her stories, the two become friends. Soon that friendship deepens into something magical. One night Sunday kisses her frog goodbye and leaves, not realizing that her love has transformed him back into Rumbold, the crown prince of Arilland—and a man Sunday’s family despises.

The prince returns to his castle, intent on making Sunday fall in love with him as the man he is, not the frog he was. But Sunday is not so easy to woo. How can she feel such a strange, strong attraction for this prince she barely knows? And what twisted secrets lie hidden in his past—and hers?"

Top Ten Tuesday is an original weekly feature created at The Broke and The Bookish.

Up this week is Top Ten Childhood Faves. I have been checking out everyone's Top Ten this week, and boy do I feel old. Most of the books I am seeing I read to my kids when they were young. So my Top Ten may not go ever so well.

These are my earliest memories of reading. 1st grade circa 1974-ish. We were allowed to read at our own pace. Each of these text books had workbooks that went with them. You would read a story, do the pages in the workbook, then move on to the next story. After finishing an entire book, you would move up a reading level and start the next book. I remember carrying the books around school to show off what reading level we were at. It was always fun to be reading at a higher level than the kids in the grades above us.

I actually can't remember what books I read in elementary school. By 6th grade I had read everything in the school library and I started reading my mom's books. This was back before they wrote such explicit sex scenes in 'romance' books. Fond memories of sneaking those. I still have a few of my favorites packed away. Hee.

My Sweet Audrina by V.C. Andrews is the most f'ed up book! Especially when you are a young teen and reading this type of stuff for the first time.

I remember reading Summer of My German Soldier after the movie with Kristy McNichol came on tv in 1978.

I read Sooner or Later after seeing Rex Smith in the movie version in 1979. I still love this movie. Yep, I'm a dork. I have this book along with the 2 follow up books.

Where The Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls. Tissue Alert.
P.S. I Love You by Barbara Conklin.
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton.
Nantucket Summer by Phyllis Green.

And these from my younger days that I picked up over the summer from our library sale:
Rumble Fish by S.E. Hinton.
Tex by S.E. Hinton. (Huge crush on Matt Dillon in the movie.)
The Pistachio Prescription by Paula Danzinger.
Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume.
Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson.

Unearthly (Unearthly #1) by Cynthia Hand

Hardcover, 435 pages
Published January 4th 2011 by HarperTeen
Source: Library

Synopsis from Goodreads:

In the beginning, there's a boy standing in the trees . . . .
Clara Gardner has recently learned that she's part angel. Having angel blood run through her veins not only makes her smarter, stronger, and faster than humans (a word, she realizes, that no longer applies to her), but it means she has a purpose, something she was put on this earth to do. Figuring out what that is, though, isn't easy.

Her visions of a raging forest fire and an alluring stranger lead her to a new school in a new town. When she meets Christian, who turns out to be the boy of her dreams (literally), everything seems to fall into place and out of place at the same time. Because there's another guy, Tucker, who appeals to Clara's less angelic side.

As Clara tries to find her way in a world she no longer understands, she encounters unseen dangers and choices she never thought she'd have to make between honesty and deceit, love and duty, good and evil. When the fire from her vision finally ignites, will Clara be ready to face her destiny?

Unearthly is a moving tale of love and fate, and the struggle between following the rules and following your heart.

I was very reluctant to read Unearthly, especially after reading so many positive reviews of it. And the blurb/description of this book in no way made me want to read it. I am glad I ignored that and decided to give it a chance. It far exceeded my expectations.

The writing is terrific. Especially for a debut author. At over 400 pages, I was afraid it would have a lot of 'filler' moments, but that wasn't the case at all. The beginning may have started off a little slower than I prefer, but I soon got caught up in the storyline. The rest of the book flowed quite nicely.

Even though there was a love triangle of sorts, there was no insta-love going on (thank goodness). I liked that the characters actually took the time to get to know each other. Their relationship took time to develop, and we get to follow along as they fell in love.

Unearthly is different from a few of the other angel books that I have read recently. Clara actually has a purpose, a reason that she is here on earth. And figuring out that purpose isn't as simple as Clara thought it would be.

There was no real ending to the first book in this series. It wasn't a cliff-hanger either. Just a sort of stopping point. And all of the unanswered questions will make you want to read the next book to find out what is going on.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Follow Friday is a weekly feature hosted by Alison Can Read and Parajunkee.

Question: What is your biggest pet peeve when it comes to books? Maybe you don't like love triangles or thin plots? Tell us about it!

As a parent of 2 teenagers, I really don't like when parents or guardians in books are conveniently absent or just plain clueless to what is going on. I like to think that I would know if my child and/or their friend(s) were a vampire, werewolf, angel, fairy, etc.

A slow moving plot is a real killer for me. Just get on with the story already.

I'm not fond of Insta-love. Give me something worth liking the boy or girl for. Love, like characters, needs time to develop.

Dash & Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I wanted to read something Christmas related, so I chose Dash & Lily's Book of Dares. I really liked how it started. Lily purposefully leaves a notebook on a shelf in a bookstore. Dash finds the notebook and follows the dares written inside. He then leaves the notebook where instructed. Lily gets the notebook back and discovers that Dash has left her dares to follow and instructions on where to leave the notebook for him. This goes back and forth, and it's cute and funny, and you get to really know the characters.

It's not a completely light read. There are some slightly deep moments. Dash and Lily are great characters - if a little too pretentious - but unrealistic. They both have a set of ideals and a particular view of the world. They get to know each other through the notebook. They don't meet right away, and they both wonder if they will even like each other outside of the notebook.

The other characters were unrealistic. Dash and Lily's friends and family were all quirky and had cool jobs and lived all over New York and would do pretty much anything for them. Even keep secrets and accommodate Dash and Lily set ups. It was all a bit much.

Overall, it was a good book. It ended up not being overly romantic (at least not to me). The writing was good, not great. I think this is a book you could read any time of the year, not just at Christmas.

View all my reviews

Pages

Saving June - Review

Follow Friday #2

Third Sentence Thursday

Waiting On Wednesday December 7

Top Ten Tuesday (2)

Review: Unearthly (Unearthly #1) by Cynthia Hand

Follow Friday #1

Dash & Lily's Book Of Dares - Review