Review: Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic

Posted on February 11, 2012 by

Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic
Title: Never Eighteen
Paperback, 204 pages
Author: Megan Bostic
Publisher: HMH
Publication Date: January 17, 2012
Source: Purchased
Buy: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Book Summary:
I had the dream again. The one where I’m running. I don’t know what from or where to, but I’m scared, terrified really.

Austin Parker is never going to see his eighteenth birthday. At the rate he’s going, he probably won’t even see the end of the year. But in the short time he has left there’s one thing he can do: He can try to help the people he loves live—even though he never will.

It’s probably hopeless.

But he has to try.

Review:
Sigh. I kind of expected to connect with Never Eighteen in that emotional way, since the whole thing is based on someone who isn’t going to live to the age of eighteen, which seems like quite an emotional topic. But that was not the case for me.

I found the journey of Austin to be important and interesting, but the things that he said often realistic. He seemed to know exactly what to say to everyone he visited, enough so that things some of them had been struggling with for years were suddenly changed because of one visit from Austin. And while I can imagine that a visit from a young adult who knows he doesn’t have much time left could be life changing, I just didn’t always connect with his conversations or believe that they were realistic.

I will say that the end of the book had me tearing up a bit, as Austin came to terms with the end of his life. I found this part much more profound than his journey leading up to it, but sadly this was only a small portion of the entire story.

I have seen some very good reviews for this book, so I feel like maybe I just read it at the wrong time.

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Review: In Honor by Jessi Kirby

Posted on February 9, 2012 by

In Honor by Jessi Kirby
Title: In Honor
Hardcover, 288 pages
Author: Jessi Kirby
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: May 8, 2012
Source: Publisher
Buy: Amazon
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Book Summary:
Honor receives her brother’s last letter from Iraq three days after learning that he died, and opens it the day his fellow Marines lay the flag over his casket. Its contents are a complete shock: concert tickets to see Kyra Kelly, her favorite pop star and Finn’s celebrity crush. In his letter, he jokingly charged Honor with the task of telling Kyra Kelly that he was in love with her.

Grief-stricken and determined to grant Finn’s last request, she rushes to leave immediately. But she only gets as far as the driveway before running into Rusty, Finn’s best friend since third grade and his polar opposite. She hasn’t seen him in ages, thanks to a falling out between the two guys, but Rusty is much the same as Honor remembers him: arrogant, stubborn. . . and ruggedly good looking. Neither one is what the other would ever look for in a road trip partner, but the two of them set off together, on a voyage that makes sense only because it doesn’t. Along the way, they find small and sometimes surprising ways to ease their shared loss and honor Finn–but when shocking truths are revealed at the end of the road, will either of them be able to cope with the consequences?

Review:
TIM. RIGGINS.

This is the only “review” I put up on Goodreads directly after finishing and felt it was appropriate to keep at the beginning of my actual review because, well… TIM RIGGINS.

Fact of the matter is, Rusty is a direct correlation with one of the best (hottest? I don’t say that much) characters from the best television show ever made. If you haven’t caught on, that character is Tim Riggins, football bad boy from Friday Night Lights.

I didn’t catch on to the correlation right away… it took about half the book until Rusty said a phrase and my mind instantly snapped them together. I am happy to report that Jessi Kirby confirmed Rusty is in fact inspired by Riggins (when I asked on Twitter), which makes this a must read for FNL fans. Or, you know-bad boy football fans in general.

BUT WHAT IS THIS BOOK ABOUT? (You are asking me this because I have only talked about Rusty and you don’t even know who Rusty is unless you’ve read the book synopsis.) Honor’s brother Finn is killed in Iraq, and after receiving a late letter from him including concert tickets to a show in California, she decides she needs to road trip there immediately to make it to the show. Rusty is Finn’s best friend and ends up tagging along.

So not only do you get to meet Rusty, you get to hang with Honor (who is pretty sweet too) on a road trip(!) while they figure out what life means after Finn is gone. That last bit sounds kind of poetic, but it’s a good explanation and they definitely do that by the end.

I liked Moonglass (Kirby’s debut novel) quite a bit, but undoubtedly love In Honor more. Fans of contemporary, this is the one for you!

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Waiting on Wednesday: Miracle by Elizabeth Scott

Posted on February 8, 2012 by

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. It is a weekly meme that allows you to share a book you can’t wait to read!

Miracle by Elizabeth Scott

Miracle by Elizabeth Scott

June 5, 2012 from Simon Pulse

I sat there and wondered again why I’d lived…

Megan is a miracle. At least, that’s what everyone says. Having survived a plane crash that killed everyone else on board, Megan knows she should be grateful just to be alive. The truth is, she doesn’t feel like a miracle. In fact, she doesn’t feel anything at all. Then memories from the crash start coming back. Scared and alone, Megan doesn’t know who to turn to. Her entire community seems unable—or maybe unwilling—to see her as anything but Miracle Megan. Except for Joe, the beautiful boy next door with a tragic past and secrets of his own… All Megan wants is for her life to get back to normal, but the harder she tries to live up to everyone’s expectations, the worse she feels. This time, she may be falling too fast to be saved…

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Review: Graffiti Moon by Cath Crowley

Posted on February 7, 2012 by

Graffiti Moon by Cath Crowley
Title: Graffiti Moon
Hardcover, 272 pages
Author: Cath Crowley
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: February 14, 2012
Source: NetGalley
Buy: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Book Summary:
Senior year is over, and Lucy has the perfect way to celebrate: tonight, she’s going to find Shadow, the mysterious graffiti artist whose work appears all over the city. He’s out there somewhere—spraying color, spraying birds and blue sky on the night—and Lucy knows a guy who paints like Shadow is someone she could fall for. Really fall for. Instead, Lucy’s stuck at a party with Ed, the guy she’s managed to avoid since the most awkward date of her life. But when Ed tells her he knows where to find Shadow, they’re suddenly on an all-night search around the city. And what Lucy can’t see is the one thing that’s right before her eyes.

Review:
Welllllllllll.

Graffiti Moon has received a lot of awards and has been vetted by many bloggers. When I say many, I mean MANY many. That plus the fact that it’s contemporary put it immediately on my wishlist.

Unfortunately, this is a case of a book connected with lots of other people and not with me. The basic storyline seemed interesting – Lucy wants to find Shadow, a graffiti artist she is convinced is the boy for her. Her and her two friends meet up with three other boys at the beginning of the night, and they all decide they are going to go to places that Shadow may be hanging out in attempts to find him.

This was a very very slow moving book for me. Lucy was a fine character, but I didn’t connect with her, and I didn’t connect with Ed (the boy she hangs out with) either. The graffiti aspect was interesting, but the book spans one night where they are looking for the graffiti artist so there wasn’t much actual painting going on.

I am sad that this one didn’t work with me, but I know that a lot of other bloggers would recommend it. I’m sorry, Graffiti Moon!

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New Feature: In The Wild: Robin Mellom, Ditched

Posted on February 6, 2012 by

Today I am introducing a new feature at Chick Loves Lit: In The Wild (Stories of Release Day)! One of my favorite things is following authors on Twitter and hearing what they did for the release day of their book. I’ve featured one such story on this blog before, but my goal is to gather more!

To kick off the feature I have Robin Mellom, author of Ditched!

High school senior Justina Griffith was never the girl who dreamed of going to prom.

Designer dresses and strappy heels? Not her thing. So she never expected her best friend, Ian Clark, to ask her.

Ian, who always passed her the baseball bat, handle first.

Ian, who knew exactly when she needed red licorice.

Ian, who promised her the most amazing night at prom.

And then ditched her.

Now, as the sun rises over her small town, and with only the help of some opinionated ladies at the 7-Eleven, Justina must piece together — stain by stain on her thrift-store dress — exactly how she ended up dateless. A three-legged Chihuahua was involved. Along with a demolition derby-ready Cadillac. And there was that incident at the tattoo parlor. Plus the flying leap from Brian Sontag’s moving car…

But to get the whole story, Justina will have to face the boy who ditched her. And discover if losing out at prom can ultimately lead to true love.

Seeing my book, DITCHED, in “the wild” for the first time was beyond exhilarating. Mostly because the act itself had become a comedy of errors, which is ironic since my own novel has been described as a comedy of errors also.

Since the book released on January 10th, there was a back-up on deliveries for Barnes & Noble and my little town doesn’t have any other independent bookstore so seeing it on the B&N shelf was my only hope. Every manager in that store knew I was waiting on the arrival of my book, and they were all rooting for a speedy arrival also! (Love them!)

When the email came saying that my book had come in, I hurried in to catch my first amazing glimpse. But when I got to the teen section…no book. It turned out only my one copy had come in and it was sitting behind the counter. There were seven other copies sitting on the back of a truck—probably in Idaho.

Sigh.

But finally, a few days later, one of the store clerks wrote me a personal email to say the books had arrived and she had proudly stocked them on the New Teen Fiction shelf that morning.

So I busted it down there and snapped some pictures of me and my book hanging out…in the wild. It’s true, I felt like a dork for doing it. But I’m a happy dork and it all feels so very, very real now. Finally.

Sniff.

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Review: Shooting Stars by Allison Rushby

Posted on February 5, 2012 by

Shooting Stars by Allison Rushby
Title: Shooting Stars
Paperback, 272 pages
Author: Allison Rushby
Publisher: Walker Childrens
Publication Date: February 28, 2012
Source: NetGalley
Buy: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Book Summary:
Meet Josephine Foster, or Zo Jo as she’s called in the biz. The best pint-sized photographer of them all, Jo doesn’t mind doing what it takes to get that perfect shot, until she’s sent on an undercover assignment to shoot Ned Hartnett—teen superstar and the only celebrity who’s ever been kind to her—at an exclusive rehabilitation retreat in Boston. The money will be enough to pay for Jo’s dream: real photography classes, and maybe even quitting her paparazzi gig for good. Everyone wants to know what Ned’s in for. But Jo certainly doesn’t know what she’s in for: falling in love with Ned was never supposed to be part of her assignment.

Review:
If you take a minute to think about the title, you can pretty much figure out what this book is about without reading the summary. Jo and her father are paparazzi who spend their time taking pictures of celebrities – Jo’s father is a big deal in the paparazzi industry and Jo is famous among the paparazzo because she uses her young looks to get into places they can’t.

Because of this, Jo gets hired for a super secret job shooting a famous younger star while he is in a rehab retreat. Except it’s the only star that has ever been nice to her, so she has to decide between liking him as a real person and completing her paparazzi job.

It was pretty entertaining to read about a young girl paparazzi, but I did have trouble connecting with Jo for a good portion of the book. I was reading along fine, but I didn’t feel invested in the story.

About halfway through some events twist and things get quite a bit more interesting – I was actually caught quite off guard by some of the developments, and I appreciated Rushby taking her paparazzi story and making it more developed and involved than the romantic comedy I expected it to be after the first few chapters.

Fun change of topic with the paparazzi, a little deeper than you originally expect, but not one of my favorites because of my lack of connection with Jo.

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Review: Not That Kind of Girl by Siobhan Vivian

Posted on February 4, 2012 by

Not That Kind of Girl by Siobhan Vivian
Title: Not That Kind of Girl
Paperback, 336 pages
Author: Siobhan Vivian
Publisher: Scholastic Inc
Publication Date: September 1, 2010
Source: Purchased
Buy: Amazon
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Book Summary:
Natalie Sterling wants to be in control. She wants her friends to be loyal. She wants her classmates to elect her student council president. She wants to find the right guy, not the usual jerk her school has to offer. She wants a good reputation, because she believes that will lead to good things.

But life is messy, and it’s very hard to be in control of it. Not when there are freshman girls running around in a pack, trying to get senior guys to sleep with them. Not when your friends have secrets they’re no longer comfortable sharing. Not when the boy you once dismissed ends up being the boy you want to sleep with yourself – but only in secret, with nobody ever finding out.

Slut or saint? Winner or loser? Natalie is getting tired of these forced choices – and is now going to find a way to live life in the sometimes messy, sometimes wonderful in-between.

Review:
There are a few contemporary YA authors with published books that I haven’t read much of, and Siobhan Vivian was one of them. I have no idea why I never picked up her books – and it actually made me feel a bit pathetic, since this is my genre of choice.

SO. I procured a copy of Not That Kind of Girl. Then when we moved to Nevada I left in it Michigan for whatever reason. Over the holidays I found it and rescued it, and now it has been read! (Go, me!)

Siobhan Vivian writes in a contemporary style that I love. It all flows very well, and has a great amount of dialogue vs description. Something bad that happened, though? I really did not like Natalie, the narrator.

Natalie is described as someone who wants to be in control, and that is definitely evident with the choices she makes and the things she says. And it’s impossible for me to not like the author because of Natalie, because I KNOW that people like Natalie exist, 100%. She is very authentic in her wants/needs. But I still didn’t like her. At all, really. Ever.

She learns things, as (good) characters do, but I still wasn’t much impressed with Natalie, even at the end. Which made me sad. I really liked the guy she talks to, and sometimes liked Spencer (I actually think the book from Spencer’s point of view may have been a better fit for me, she had some major growth)… but the book as a whole was brought down because of Natalie.

HOWEVER! I will be reading every other Siobhan Vivian book. I know that not all characters or situations will mesh with me, and it wasn’t the author’s fault – so I am excited to have read this one and have other great contemps to add to my list.

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Review: Wanderlove by Kirsten Hubbard

Posted on February 3, 2012 by

Wanderlove by Kirsten Hubbard
Title: Wanderlove
Hardcover, 352 pages
Author: Kirsten Hubbard
Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: March 13, 2012
Source: NetGalley
Buy: Amazon
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Book Summary:
It all begins with a stupid question:

Are you a Global Vagabond?

No, but 18-year-old Bria Sandoval wants to be. In a quest for independence, her neglected art, and no-strings-attached hookups, she signs up for a guided tour of Central America—the wrong one. Middle-aged tourists with fanny packs are hardly the key to self-rediscovery. When Bria meets Rowan, devoted backpacker and dive instructor, and his outspokenly humanitarian sister Starling, she seizes the chance to ditch her group and join them off the beaten path.

Bria’s a good girl trying to go bad. Rowan’s a bad boy trying to stay good. As they travel across a panorama of Mayan villages, remote Belizean islands, and hostels plagued with jungle beasties, they discover what they’ve got in common: both seek to leave behind the old versions of themselves. And the secret to escaping the past, Rowan’s found, is to keep moving forward.

But Bria comes to realize she can’t run forever, no matter what Rowan says. If she ever wants the courage to fall for someone worthwhile, she has to start looking back.

Review:
I LOVED Wanderlove. LOVED.

I read Kirsten Hubbard’s first book Like Mandarin a few months ago and liked it but didn’t really connect with it. I was intrigued enough by it to be very interested in her second novel, and on a whim I read the first few pages of Wanderlove to see how it was… and ended up not wanting to stop.

The entirety of the book covers about a month in time, and it doesn’t take long at all for Bria to find herself on a trip to Central America. As the synopsis says, she doesn’t quite fit in with the others in her tour group, and finds herself lured away to a group of backpackers.

I honestly think that this book is excellent because Kirsten Hubbard is a traveler and artist herself. There are drawings from the author in the text (which I didn’t realize were by Kirsten until I did more research after finishing the book – and wow are the drawings good!), and you can certainly tell that the author is writing from a genuine viewpoint as Bria travels through Central America.

Bria is an excellent character, as are Starling and Rowan. They are incredibly real, and the interactions they have with each other keep you involved in the story. Since we’re reading from Bria’s viewpoint, we also get to watch as Bria discovers things about herself, which really pulled the book together.

Though it is a piece of fiction, it felt as though the story were straight from a traveler’s journal. There are occasional written entries from Bria, and the entire book is full of emotion.

An excellent sophomore novel, Wanderlove brings relationships and self discovery together in a realistic journey through Central America.

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Review: This Is Not a Test by Courtney Summers

Posted on February 2, 2012 by


Title: This Is Not a Test
Paperback, 320 pages
Author: Courtney Summers
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin
Publication Date: June 19, 2012
Source: NetGalley
Buy: Amazon
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Book Summary:
It’s the end of the world. Six students have taken cover in Cortege High but shelter is little comfort when the dead outside won’t stop pounding on the doors. One bite is all it takes to kill a person and bring them back as a monstrous version of their former self. To Sloane Price, that doesn’t sound so bad. Six months ago, her world collapsed and since then, she’s failed to find a reason to keep going. Now seems like the perfect time to give up. As Sloane eagerly waits for the barricades to fall, she’s forced to witness the apocalypse through the eyes of five people who actually want to live. But as the days crawl by, the motivations for survival change in startling ways and soon the group’s fate is determined less and less by what’s happening outside and more and more by the unpredictable and violent bids for life—and death—inside. When everything is gone, what do you hold on to?

Review:
Not going to lie – I was a little disappointed when I heard that Courtney Summers was writing a zombie book instead of a contemporary. Her book Some Girls Are is one of my favorite and most recommended contemps (I loved her other ones, too), so when I heard zombie I resolved that I would read it but only because it’s Courtney Summers. I’m not really a zombie person.

BUT. But. The best way I can describe This Is Not a Test is that it is a contemporary that has zombies. Weird, right? Hang with me here for a few minutes.

Something crazy has happened, and a zombie apocalypse has Sloane and several other high schoolers running for their lives. They end up at their old high school where they barricade the doors and figure out how to survive. So you can imagine that this is very close to contemporary, right? Besides the whole surviving and avoiding zombies thing.

Sloane, whose point of view we are reading from, is dealing with the fact that her sister ran away, and as you can imagine the other teenagers have their own demons to battle. Things get quite a bit more intense when you feel like the only ones left and you’re barricaded in a school wondering how you’re going to survive.

And those words may sound desperate but they are so true. Summers doesn’t just write about this apocalypse – she makes you FEEL it and FEAR it and wonder about your own water supply (this actually happened to me when I was washing my hands the day I finished the book). The characters aren’t just there because they happen to be there – they are intertwined, interacting, discussing. And they all don’t just get along, which is the most realistic part of the whole book. How easy would it have been to write about a group of teenagers that band together and love each other just because they are stuck together? And how unrealistic would that have been?

I felt immense hatred and fear and hope and confusion and pressure and love while reading This Is Not a Test. When I wasn’t reading, I was wishing I was reading, or wondering how many canned goods we had in the cupboard just in case.

So. Zombies? Yes. Contemporary? Not really, but yes. Teenagers working through the most difficult situations of their lives while trying to decipher their emotions otherwise? Definitely yes.

This is a must read for Courtney Summers fans (trust me), contemporary fans looking for a slight diversion from the genre, apocalypse fans. Quite honestly, I could probably figure out a reason for everyone to try this one and be satisfied that you’ll feel some sort of strong emotion from it.

Bravo, Courtney Summers. Excellent.

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Waiting on Wednesday: My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Posted on February 1, 2012 by

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. It is a weekly meme that allows you to share a book you can’t wait to read!

My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick

June 14, 2012 from Dial Books for Young Readers

“One thing my mother never knew, and would disapprove of most of all, was that I watched the Garretts. All the time.”

The Garretts are everything the Reeds are not. Loud, numerous, messy. And every day from her balcony perch, seventeen year old Samantha wishes she was one of them… until the day Jase Garrett climbs her terrace and changes everything.

Jase can sense that his beautiful neighbor is missing something in her sterile home, and as the two fall fiercely in love, his family makes her one of their own.

But when the bottom drops out of Sam’s world, which perfect family will save her–and will her perfect love survive?

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