Hunger for nourishment.
Hunger for touch.
Hunger to belong.

Alluring romance, heart-stopping danger, and sinister intrigue combine in the penultimate volume of Melissa Marr’s New York Times bestselling Wicked Lovely series.

Sorcha is mourning Seth’s absence. She’s the unchanging queen and she isn’t supposed to mourn, but still Sorcha does. She frets for Seth’s safety and agonizes that she cannot see him when he is in the mortal world. So Sorcha sends Devlin, her brother and loyal servant, to Huntsdale to check on him, to stay with him in case he should need anything. Little does she know that upon his arrival in Huntsdale, an event takes place that will change Devlin’s path for the rest of eternity.

When Devlin sees Ani in the club, his heart stops short. He’s seen that face before, and as magnificent and beautiful as she is, he knows things about her past that could break her innocent little heart. Not that knowing that stops him in the slightest. When Ani lays her eyes on Devlin, and decides that she wants him for herself, Devlin realizes that although he’s lived a lifetime of loneliness, his future doesn’t necessarily have to be that way. The only problem is, they can’t really be intimate, if you know what I mean, or they risk the possibility of Ani sucking the life right out of Devlin. Who wants to kill the one they love?

Ani is reckless and restless. That would be the hound in her, though, and is to be expected. She’s got spunk and just the right amount of attitude, but that’s not all she’s got. Even though she doesn’t realize it yet, Ani is special. So special that Bananach – Sorcha’s crazy (and evil) sister – wants her blood all for herself. As we all well know, Melissa Marr doesn’t write happily ever after fairy tales, and things don’t play out smoothly for Ani. Hearts are broken, loves are lost, relationships are forged, bruised and battered, and truths will shatter the Earth from the inside out.

Although I found it a little slow on the uptake, I now see that those chapters were necessary to lay the foundations for what shaped up to be a spectacular, gut-wrenching read. Radiant Shadows is exceptional in every way, and I’ve come to expect nothing less from this phenomenal story-teller. Marr’s characters are deep, tortured, and believable in every possible way. Their faces are burned to the insides of my eyelids, their voices ring out loudly through my ears. It’s as if they’re really my friends, instead of a bunch of fictional people that I obsessively follow in their pursuits.

The Wicked Lovely world is definitely one of my favorite places to visit. Radiant Shadows does not disappoint.

Pages: 340

Publication Date: April 20, 2010

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Teaser Quote:

“Go upstairs Ani.” Irial swung his feet to the floor. He didn’t glance her way. His attention was all for the Dark King now. “Tell me what you think I should have done differently, Niall. I spent the night talking and giving her a safe place to rest. I gave her the nourishment she can’t find elsewhere without compromising her already absent virtue.”

The Dark King didn’t respond.

As if being a purrfect cheerleader isn’t enough responsibility! Tessa Crimson’s the sweet and spunky leader of the SOS (Society of Smitten Kittens), a cheer squad–turned–spy society dedicated to bringing dastardly boyfriends to justice, one cheater at a time. Boyfriend-busting wouldn’t be so bad . . . except that so far, every suspect on the Naughty List has been proven 100% guilty!

When Tessa’s own boyfriend shows up on the List, she turns her sleuthing skills on him. Is Aiden just as naughty as all the rest, or will Tessa’s sneaky ways end in catastrophe?

The Naughty List. Is your boyfriend on it?

Meet the Smitten Kittens. Sounds kind of sexy, huh? Alluring in that mysterious way. If you knew what they were doing, though, sexy wouldn’t even come into it. In fact, the Smitten Kittens are all about busting cheating boyfriends from doing the sexy with people other than their other half. The male adolescent population of Washington High is more than a little naughty, it seems.

The squad – which double as a cheer squad by day – have high tech spy equipment and have a well organized system of spying on the boys at their school. They take requests from girlfriends who suspect their boyfriends are cheating, and investigate till the allegations are either cleared, or confirmed. Unfortunately, they’ve never had the opportunity to clear anyone’s name because every single suspect has been found guilty. Every single one.

Tessa is the only girl left on the squad who actually has a boyfriend. Over time, the others all dumped theirs because they were caught cheating. Then, Tessa’s boyfriend’s name shows up on the list, and with a one hundred percent confirmed cheating rate so far, it isn’t looking good for Tessa and Aiden. But maybe he’s innocent, he seems like a nice guy, after all. Could he be the first boyfriend to ever be cleared of all charges?

Initially, I couldn’t decide exactly how I felt about this book, or for whom exactly the target audience might be. Tessa comes across as a good, wholesome character. She doesn’t curse, and always corrects those around her that do. She uses expressions like strawberry smoothie, for example, instead of actual curse words. She’s an excellent friend to her fellow squad members, a great student, and an all-round shiny, happy girl. At first I thought this was going to be a clean and wholesome novel for younger readers, but then I discovered that Tessa sleeps with her boyfriend and sneaks around in the middle of the night, lying to her parents and Aiden about what she’s doing, and spies on people till dawn. And Tessa is the only one that doesn’t curse; it seems the book is littered with swear words and over active adolescent hormonal activity. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, either, I’m just saying that Tessa’s character confused me.

I found myself trying to decode the messages that came attached to Tessa’s character. By creating a character like Tessa, is Suzanne Young is attempting to send a message that teen sex is okay? After all, Tessa is a really nice girl that is seemingly good in every other way. Does the fact that she’s sexually active make her a bad role model for teen girls? I really couldn’t decide. I’m inclined to say no, but I felt uncomfortable making that judgement alone. What I did like about Tessa is that, especially at the beginning, she is committed to Aiden and although she is well aware of her sexual allure and uses that on Aiden a lot, she doesn’t really flounce it around in front of everyone else. She isn’t promiscuous and she obviously has a lot of self-respect, which I think is important when setting up a potential role model for teens today.

The whole book left me feeling a little uneasy, which I suppose is actually a good thing because I thought about it for hours after I finished it, trying to figure out whether I liked it, how to categorize it, what the underlying messages were. While there was obviously a formula that went into the plot, it seemed there was a lack of formula that went into creating the characters, setting, tone, etc. I found this quite refreshing and I think others will too.

I think this book would be a great jumping point for book clubs and discussion circles that wanted to talk and debate the issue of teen sex and teen relationships.

Pages: 239

Publication Date: Febraury 2010

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Teaser Quote: Cassandra was less than thrilled to see the glossy eight by tens of Marcus and Red Heels. It nearly broke my heart, especially when I considered her recently departed virginity. All of it left me feeling, well, bummed.

Some nightmares never end.

For Janie and Cabel, real life is getting tougher than the dreams. They’re just trying to carve out a little (secret) time together, but no such luck.

Disturbing things are happening at Fieldridge High, yet nobody’s talking. When Janie taps into a classmate’s violent nightmares, the case finally breaks open – but nothing goes as planned. Not even close. Janie’s in way over her head, and Cabe’s shocking behavior has grave consequences for them both.

Worse yet, Janie learns the truth about herself and her ability – and its bleak. Seriously, brutally bleak. Not only is her fate as a dream catcher sealed, but what’s to come is way darker than she’d feared…

Janie has slotted into her new life as an undercover detective well. It seems to give her a sense of purpose, that her gift is being used for the greater good. But it does have its downsides – like not being able to be seen publicly with Cabe. They’ve been an item for a while now and they’ve never even been on a real date. Janie’s friends don’t know that she’s even involved with someone. That part really sucks.

But it’s necessary, and they both know it. That doesn’t make it any easier, though. Especially when Janie gets assigned to a case that entails Janie trying to seduce a teacher. Someone at Fieldridge High is doing the dirty with students, and Captain wants Janie to find out exactly who it is.

And Cabel hates every single second of the assignment. When Janie gets herself into a bit of trouble, Cabel does something that only adds to her already big pit of bad.

As if having to seduce her teacher wasn’t enough, Janie starts noticing that stuff with her body isn’t working quite right either. She does some digging and stumbles across a piece of information that breaks her already busted heart.

Although it’s only 248 pages long, a whole lot happens in this novel. Janie and Cabel take their relationship to several places of unchartered territory. I’m sure girls all over the country will swoon, scream in despair, sigh in relief, and throw their books against bedroom walls as the events unfold before their eyes.

McMann has mastered the art of ‘less is more’ and crafts her tale in surprisingly few words. Her writing style is unique, enjoyable, and more than a little addictive. The narrative moves along at an engaging pace and never once did I find myself wanting to skip over paragraphs, sentences, or even single words.

With just the right amount of romance, heartache and suspense, Fade is a real page-turner. I recommend that you set aside a block of time before beginning this one, though,  because once you start, there will be no stopping till you hit the end.

Janie and Cabel’s world is one that I love to lose myself in. I am one hundred per cent invested in their story and I can’t wait to see what happens next.

Publication year: 2009

Pages: 248

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Teaser Quote:

“Are you familiar with these?”

Janie smiles, reaches inside her bag, and pulls out an identical package.

“Excellent.” Captain nods. “Cabel. What’s your job?”

“Watching in agony, sir.”

Captain supresses a smile.

What happens when your life doesn’t go according to plan?

Ryden Malby had a plan. Step One: Do will in high school, thereby achieving Step Two: Get a college scholarship. Step Three: Limit her beer intake in order to keep said scholarship (which wasn’t always easy). Now that she’s finally graduated, it’s time for Step Four: Move into a gorgeous loft apartment and land her dream job at the city’s best publishing house. So far, Ryden’s been three-for-three, but she’s about to stumble on Step Four…

When Jessica Bard, Ryden’s college nemesis – the prettiest, smartest, most ambitious girl at school – steals her perfect job, Ryden’s forced to move back to her childhood home. Stuck with her eccentric family – a stubborn do-it-yourself dad, an overly thrifty mom, a politically incorrect grandma, a very odd little brother – and a growing stack of rejected job applications, Ryden starts to feel like she’s going nowhere. The only upside is spending time with her best friend, Adam – and running into her hot next-door neighbour, David. But if Ryden’s going to survive life as a post grad, it may be time to come up with a new plan…

Ryden Malby seems to be on the up. College scholarship, best friend that she has known forever, and promising prospects at top publishing firm Happerman and Browning. It’s The Plan after all. Moving away from home and an eccentric family that Ryden wishes she weren’t related too is all Ryden has ever wanted. It’s graduation day, and if she can get through the ceremony without some form of disaster, tomorrow will be the start of her new life.

And to being with, everything seems to be going great. Until Adam, her best friend who is driving her to look at the gorgeous loft apartment and to her interview crashes. From there everything seems to fall apart. Being beat out for the dream job but perfect, valedictorian college classmate Jessica, being denied the keys to the apartment, Ryden is forced back to the last place she ever wants to be – home.

Facing countless months of un-employment when she can’t even keep a job at her own father’s luggage store, Ryden feels that nothing will ever be right again. A small light in that future however is David – her older and hotter next-door neighbour. Scoring her a small job as an assistant on the set of the commercials that he directs, Ryden finally feels like she has some to talk to. That is, until she messes up again, angering Adam to the point that he decides to take the offer of a law course in New York. Completely on the opposite side of the continent to Ryden, and it seems no amount of apologies will get Adam to talk to Ryden.

In a world with plans go off track, Ryden must work out exactly what it is she wants, and what she is willing to give up to get it.

Post Grad by Emily Cassel is adapted from the screenplay of recent movie release of the same name, starring Alexis Bledel. I haven’t seen the movie from which the novel was adapted, but I have it on good authority that it was a fun, easy film to watch. Shame that the same can’t be said from the novel. I found the plot weak and that the characters lacked development over the course of the events. Nothing ever happened for a reason, things just happened. With an entirely predictable ending, there was nothing in this book that really got me caring about what actually happened to Ryden.

The most notable parts of the book were Ryden’s eccentric family. They at least, made it interesting to read – their bizarre and somewhat random acts breaking up the monotony of the rest of the plot.

To me, Post Grad was a concept that had a lot of potential, but was poorly executed in terms of plot and character development.

Pages: 243

Publication date: America 2009, Australia 2010

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Teaser quote: If you ever truly want to be stared at, try driving down Wilshire Boulevard in your mother’s pink Le Baron with an enormous, half-shattered coffin strapped to the roof.

Her friends once thought she was perfect. Now she must face the mirror–and herself–to discover what true beauty is.

Ellie Summerfield has everything a girl could want–she’s beautiful, she’s Senior Class President, has a calendar full of social engagements, volunteer commitments, and church activities. In short, she’s perfect, according to most of the students at West Redding High School. But something is bothering Ellie, like a loose string on a dress she can feel but can’t see. Does she really love her boyfriend, Ryan? Who are her true friends? And is she really happy in her picture-perfect life?

Then in the course of a few minutes, the loose string in Ellie’s life completely unravels. Forever changed, she must face herself as she discovers what it really means to be beautiful.

Ellie is that girl. You know the one I mean: the one with the hot boyfriend; the one with the flawless grades; the one that everyone admires; the one that is most likely to succeed in life. There’s one in every school, and although you’d love to hate her, there just isn’t anything about her to hate.

But then something happens, something bad. Ellie and her friend Stasia are involved in a car accident. Ellie suffers a lot of injuries and winds up in the hospital with severe burns to one side of her body.

Stasia doesn’t even make it out of the car alive.

The doctors assure Ellie, that after a few years and a whole lot of surgery, that she’ll recover and the scarring will almost definitely disappear. But a few years is a long time to walk through life looking like a mutant, and suddenly Ellie decides there is plenty about herself that’s worthy of hating.

In a fit of depression, she cuts herself off from her friends. Every single one of them, including her boyfriend, Ryan. She’s no longer beautiful, so what’s even the point?

Ellie spirals further and further into a pool of depression and self-pity until one day, an old friend from way back in her past, someone that she sees as imperfect and flawed in his own way, walks back into her life.

Will has always had a crush on Ellie, even when they were little kids, and nothing has changed now. Just because her face isn’t the same as it used to be, doesn’t make her any less beautiful, in his eyes. For Will, beauty isn’t something that’s just on the outside. For Will, beauty comes from within.

Will he be able to save Ellie before she hits the bottom of the barrel? You’ll have to read for yourself to find out.

Although Ellie’s horrible self-pity was hard to endure, it was not unrealistic. As a character, I found the way she responded to the events and issues thrown at her to be very believable. I felt sorry for Ryan and her friends when Ellie simply cast them aside, but I never once thought that she was being unfair, or that her character was unrealistic.
Of all the characters within Beautiful, I admired Will and Ryan the most. Although Ellie pushed Ryan away with everything she had, he never stopped loving her, and just like Will, believed that her beauty went far deeper than the scars on her face.

A solid read that I’m sure the girls will love.

Pages: 266

Publication Date: 2009

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There were no surprises in Gatlin County. We were pretty much the epicentre of the middle of nowhere. At least, that’s what I thought.

Turns out, I couldn’t have been more wrong. There was a curse. There was a girl. And in the end, there was a grave.

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she’s struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town’s oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.

Ethan has lived his whole live in Gatlin. He knows everything, what is expected of him, where he can go and his exact place in town. A place that Ethan desperately wants to break out off. Each day is the same. School, basketball practice, dinner, sleep. A routine that Ethan could repeat in his sleep, that is, if he got any sleep. Ethan has been plagued by dreams. Dreams so real that Ethan wakes up covered in dirt and water, dirt and water that can’t be explained away. Something is happening in Gatlin, and Ethan is at the centre.

Enter Lena. If being an outsider isn’t bad enough, Lena is the niece of Macon Ravenwood, commonly referred to as Old Man Ravenwood by the people of Gatlin, and living out at the old Ravenwood plantation, which superstitions has it is haunted. To top it all off, Lena isn’t what you would call ‘normal’ for Gatlin. For one, she has no interest in being a cheerleader, instead plays the viola, wears more black than the average person and sits at the front of the English class. To top it off, strange things seem to happen around Lena – windows exploding, thunderstorms appearing and changing room arrangements are just the beginning.

Ethan is drawn to Lena in a way that can’t be explained. Something about Lena reminds Ethan of the presences felt in his dreams. Suddenly, Lena becomes the centre of Ethan’s world. As everyone at Jackson High is doing everything they can to make Lena a nothing, Ethan is absorbing as much of her world as possible. Ethan is the only one who has noticed the sharpie-drawn number on her hand, and while his classmates are quick to blame Lena for the strange occurrences, Ethan tries to get Lena to open up and give her a chance to explain why they are happening. With Ethan not taking no for an answer, Lena eventually lowers her guard, slowly by slowly letting Ethan into her life.

And as more strange events occur, even Lena can’t deny that she feels the same connection that Ethan feels for her. Ethan is thrown headfirst into the world of the Casters and discovering an ancient connection to the past, along with Lena, they are pitted against the universe. As Lena’s 16^th birthday draws closer, Ethan and Lena must discover the key that could change Lena’s future.

Beautiful Creatures is one of those books that don’t happen very often. Fresh and new, Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl have woven an urban fantasy novel that gives the often over-done young adult romance genre something different. A love story told from the male perspective. Seeing the story and reading through Ethan’s perspective was something that I loved about this book. Too many romance books have the female character constantly fawning over the male lead. This didn’t occur, and it was the differences that made reading from Ethan’s point of view work. Ethan didn’t overtly say that he was in love with Lena, yet it was his attention to the small details surrounding Lena that allowed me as a reader to see the true depth of his love before Ethan would even admit it to himself. The material of the Caster’s was also something that I enjoyed immensely. Their whole world was this rich culture that was thought out and developed in fine detail, yet at all stages seemed plausible and read, especially the way that Lena and her family moved around the topic of their special abilities with people not of their family. Linked in with this was Ethan’s aunt Amma, a character that I fell in love with by the end of the novel. Along with the many members of Lena’s family and Ethan’s friends at school, there were many a variety of characters that made the world of Beautiful Creatures enriching and enjoyable to read about.

Beautiful Creatures is one fantasy world that I would like to visit.

Pages: 626

Publication date: Australia - 2010, USA - Dec. 2009

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*Beautiful Creatures is also our Book Club read for the month of January.  Join the discussion here.

There’s something achingly familiar about Daniel Grigori.

Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price’s attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He’s the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.

Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce–and goes out of his way to make that very clear–she can’t let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret . . . even if it kills her.

When Luce wound up at Swords & Crosses, a reform school for disturbed kids, she never thought she’d meet anyone worth knowing. I mean, it’s a school for kids with problems – naughty, psycho, crazy and messed kids. The place even looked and felt like a jail. But this is life, and things never turn out the way we expect, do they?

Meet Daniel. The moment Luce lays her eyes on him she feels it. This thing. A connection. Like she’s met him before or something. All this in one little glance. But if he felt it, he certainly isn’t showing it. Daniel makes it more than clear that he’s not interested in Luce, that she should stop stalking him, stop harassing him. He doesn’t want her, so why can’t she stay away from him? Why can’t she get him out of her head? She knows there is something off about him and she’s determined to figure out what it is. Only then will she be able to shake her heavy heart.

I hate the way Daniel treats Luce. He’s more than just a little rude. Even more than that, I hate the way Luce shamelessly keeps going back for more. I kept asking myself where this girl’s self-respect was, and how she could let a boy treat her so badly. I’ve read enough books like this to know by now that often, my initial reaction to characters like Daniel is wrong and that much more lays beneath the surface. Even though I was aware of this, as I was reading, I couldn’t help but feel ticked off by him. The question is you should be asking yourself is, did I stay this way, or did he win me over in the end?

Enter Cam. He’s the guy you love to hate. He’s charming, he’s beautiful, and he’s definitely interested in Luce. He flocks to her immediately, stepping on anyone else’s chances of even attempting to score with her. And Luce likes him back, she does. That’s why she’s not backing away from his advances. But there’s just something … missing, and she can’t quite figure out what it is. Maybe it’s that everything with him is just so easy. There isn’t any inner emotional struggle, no deep pain caused from simply being around him. But is easy what she’s even looking for?

Like all good complex characters, there is more to Cam than meets the eye. Just when you think you’ve got him figured, he turns around and does something that will totally throw you off course. Cam is surprising, in many ways.

Actions speak much louder than words, so if you want to know the truth about these boys, watch what they do, rather than what they say.

This is the kind of book where not a lot happens, yet everything happens. It takes a while to get going, but it’s definitely worth the wait. This is one of those character-intensive kinds of reads that focuses a lot on relationships and friendships, but there is a bit of action too. It’s right at the end, though, so make sure you stick it out.

Fallen is an effortless, engrossing read. This is an excellent first book in what I expect is going to be a mind-blowing series. Hold onto you shorts, folks, this one is going to be big.

Pages: 452

Publication date: 2009

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Can changing places change their lives?

Two girls on opposite sides of the globe both want a quick getaway. The answer? They switch places through a last minute global exchange program. The catch? It’s a direct swap. They swap classes, accommodation and universities. No exceptions. Feminist political theory for film studies. On-camps accommodation for an share-apartment. A university where attendance is expected to one that doesn’t take a roll.

Tasha’s life seems to be coming to pieces. After the disastrous ‘hot-tub incident’, Tasha’s parents wont even talk to her. She can’t go anywhere without being recognised – for all the wrong reasons. She’s desperate to get out. To go anywhere. Emily thought she was on-track. Every aspect planned until she is dumped by her boyfriend for being too studious and up-tight. Every step of her life has been because it is the right decision for the future. The future that her parents what for her. Until now.

Tasha winds up in Oxford, England. Not something you would expect of a typical beach going, class-skipping and all round party girl from America. Finding herself wadding Ugg-deep in feminist theory, Tasha just wants people to see her for who she really is. Not who they all think she is. Yet when the whole university seems out to get her for her rather different views on feminism, blending in seems to be an impossible feat. Emily heads to the University of California, Santa Barbara. Suddenly she is in a world that is the opposite of organisation, planning and preparation. From a class size of three to a lecture hall of 200, Emily is in for a semester of film critiquing, script re-writing and filming. However, her ‘English’ image of perfection and organisation seems to be alienating the rest of the student body against her.

Before long, the two girls make contact from opposite sides of the globe, each offering the other tips and strategies on how to fit in, navigate the difficulty of love and figuring out who they really want to be. Can Tasha and Emily help each other before they each make the best or worst mistake of their lives?

First off, I loved this book. It was extremely well-written and captivating from the first page until the end. Life Swap is debut novel from Abby McDonald, who is a recent graduate of Oxford University providing an excellent platform to satire the collage experience. McDonald’s spin on what could have potentially be seen as stereotypical characters gave a fresh new insight into the way different cultures work and operate against each other. The language choices are fresh and real – McDonald knows how to talk in the language of a teenager, and it transfers into the truth and reality conveyed in Life Swap. With interesting plot developments for both characters and an equal division of both characters story, McDonald manages to create two diverse universe’s that operate in sync with each other. For me, the characters where real people that I could relate to.

I saw a reflection of myself in both Tasha and Emily’s actions, and were able to relate to the choices and situations that both characters found themselves in. From Tasha trying to re-gain some sense of pride and belief in herself after a past mistake that the world wouldn’t forget, to Emily trying to let loose and relinquish her almost obsessive-compulsive to have everything this in her life organised. Emily’s defiance of her parents in the face of, for once, choosing to do what she wants and the events that influence this decision was an interesting look for me, and I feel that many young adults who read this book will relate to it in the same way.

Life Swap was a joy of an adventure that had you laughing, crying and cringing with every decision made.

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Against all odds, Katniss Everdeen has won the annual Hunger Games with fellow district tribute Peeta Mellark. But it was a victory won by defiance of the Capitol and their harsh rules. Katniss and Peeta should be happy. After all, they have just won for themselves and their families a life of safety and plenty. But there are rumors of rebellion among the subjects, and Katniss and Peeta, to their horror, are the faces of that rebellion. The Capitol is angry. The Capitol wants revenge.

After Katniss and Peeta won the Hunger Games, their lives changed forever. They’re now totally loaded, for one, and Katniss and her mother and sister moved out of their old shack into newer, more desirable living quarters in District 12. That means no more scavenging just to make ends meet; no more hunting for food; no more cold showers. They’ve got everything they could possibly need in the district. Everything except freedom, that is.

Even though they’re home, the Capitol still controls their every move. It’s less obvious at first, and life assumes some kind of normality for Katniss and Peeta for a little while. But then the Quarter Quell is announced – another version of the Hunger Games – and Katniss, Peeta and Hamish find themselves in the middle of another Capitol scheme to ensure complete and utter control over all citizens everywhere.

But the people aren’t having it, and those with enough guts and manpower are revolting against the Capitol’s regime – and they’re using Katniss as their inspiration. If Katniss can defy the capitol in the arena, like she did with the berries, then they can too. If Katniss can manipulate the Capitol through her ‘relationship’ with Peeta, then surely they could find a way to do the same. Their freedom, their quality of life depends on it. Katniss hopes like hell they do, because in the meantime, her and Peeta are the Capitol’s pawns. They have to do what the Capitol wants, or they risk the lives of the people they love.

Love.

It’s certainly an issue that is dealt with in Catching Fire. Although he seems to have accepted that Katniss’s affections for him in the arena were fabricated, Peeta still loves Katniss. And it’s not that Katniss doesn’t feel for Peeta, it’s just that she feels for another, too. Does she love Gale? It’s clear that Gale loves her. It seems no matter whom she chooses, someone she cares about is going to suffer. Then the Capitol picks up on to Katniss’s little dilemma and interfere in a way that makes life almost impossible for her. Can’t choose? No problem. Katniss’s choice is made for her…

After the hugely popular The Hunger Games, I bet a whole stack of you have the Mount Everest of expectations for Catching Fire. No problem. Suzanne Collins takes those expectations, stamps all over them, and proves that she’s a force to be reckoned with.

Her prose is effortless and her characters shine brightly in a world of chaos. Katniss is brave, logical, and she certainly has her priorities in order. When the going gets tough, she doesn’t forget what the important things in life are. She’s an outstanding role model for teenagers everywhere.

You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. You’ll gasp, and your heart will break. I can’t wait for the third book. Pity the release date is so far away!

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Half-human, half-angel, Meridian Sozu has a dark responsibility.

Before she can fully recover, Meridian is told that she’s a danger to her family and hustled off to her great-aunt’s house in Revelation, Colorado. It’s there that she learns that she is a Fenestra—the half-angel, half-human link between the living and the dead. But Meridian and her sworn protector and love, Tens, face great danger from the Aternocti, a band of dark forces who capture vulnerable souls on the brink of death and cause chaos.

On Meridian’s sixteenth birthday, life takes an unexpected change. Imagine waking up only to be told that you’re not normal – not even human, in fact. Fenestra is not a word that she’s familiar with, but when she learns what they are, things suddenly start making a whole lot of sense. She’s like the window to the other world, people (and things) need the Fenestra in order to pass from this life into the next.

So that’s why things have always died around her… she’d always thought that there was something cosmically wrong with her, that they were dying because of her. It is comforting for Meridian (in a creepy kind of way) to learn that they don’t die because of her, but because they need her. Helping people cross to the other side is dangerous stuff, though, and Meridian must learn how to harness and control her powers. Nothing would suck more than getting dragged into the other world by a soul who doesn’t know how to let go…

And now, more than ever, Meridian has reasons to stay in this world.

Meet Tens. He’s Meridian’s assigned protector. It’s his destiny, his purpose in life, but what he doesn’t tell Meridian is that if he dies trying to protect her, she dies too. This is a relationship of an entirely different calibre. They’re going to be spending their entire lives together, trying to keep each other alive, so it’s a good thing they seem to be falling deeply in love with each other, too. I can’t imagine having to spend my whole life with someone that I didn’t love… can you? It’s not all roses and candy, though, and learning to trust someone with your life doesn’t come so easily.

How will Meridian cope with her new responsibilities as a Fenestra, and will she be able to carry the torch after her mentor is dead and gone?

Upon arriving at her Aunts house, considering her circumstances, I thought she learned to trust her new friends all too quickly. While I understand that Auntie is the kind of character that makes people feel comfortable immediately, I thought Meridian could have spent a little more time questioning her motives. She was, after all, ripped from her family and told she may never see them again. Her relationship with Tens develops at a nice pace, though. Readers are kept waiting just long enough to incite a bit of a frenzy within.

Meridian has all the elements of a good supernatural story. Readers both young and old will love this one! I’m interested to hear what you guys think about this one!

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For years, Grace has watched the wolves in the woods behind her house. One yellow-eyed wolf–her wolf–is a chilling presence she can’t seem to live without. Meanwhile, Sam has lived two lives: In winter, the frozen woods, the protection of the pack, and the silent company of a fearless girl. In summer, a few precious months of being human . . . until the cold makes him shift back again.

Now, Grace meets a yellow-eyed boy whose familiarity takes her breath away. It’s her wolf. It has to be. But as winter nears, Sam must fight to stay human–or risk losing himself, and Grace, forever.

When Grace’s community decides that they need to do something about the ‘wolf problem’ in the woods, Grace flips. Her wolf is in those woods. She has to stop them before its too late. Thankfully, it doesn’t take much of a commotion to get the hunters to pull back. A little screaming about her friends being in the woods here, a little pleading helplessly there, and its done. But when Grace goes home, she almost can’t believe what she’s seeing. There’s a boy on her door stoop, bleeding half to death, and instantly she knows instantly who it is. She’d know those eyes anywhere. She’s been looking into them for the last six years, wistfully hoping – wishing – that things were different. Well, it seems that life is about to give her what she wants for a change, even if it is for a short time only.

Sam can’t believe it’s her. He can’t believe she’s here, seeing him, looking at him like that. He can’t believe that he was shot and it brought on a change. A few minutes ago he was a wolf, and now … well, now he was human, but unless he did something about the bleeding he wasn’t going to be anything soon.

And so starts the snapshot in time that is Grace and Sam. It seems that there isn’t even a question of whether they’re together or not. Sam and Grace, although hesitant to assume the other’s intention initially, are instantly an item. They’ve been watching each other – falling in love with each other – from a distance for six years now. The time for formalities has long passed, especially considering they have so little time together in the first place. Sam knows it in himself, he can feel the end coming – this is the last year that he’ll change back to a human. Ever. The problem is, it’s the middle of winter. The cold is what makes him change in the first place. In order to keep Sam in his human form for a long as they can, Sam and Grace do everything they can to keep Sam warm. But Minnesota winters are tough, and sometimes, nature is unbelievably unpredictable. Will their race against the weather be all in vain, or will they get their happily ever after?

As far as paranormal romances go, this is, hands down, the best one I’ve read in a long while. Grace is a formidably strong character that will go to great lengths to protect her own. When it comes to her heart, there’s no messing around. I reckon girls everywhere are going love Grace; they’ll love who she is and what she has.

Sam is more than just the lust-worthy teenage heartthrob that we see in YA fiction so often these days. He’s got the emotional maturity of someone who far surpasses his years and seems to understand the ins and outs of love entirely. He loves Grace – completely and absolutely – and he knows exactly how to treat a girl. It doesn’t get better than this, girls. Sam is, without a doubt, the Edward Cullen of 2009.

Maggie Stiefvater totally steps up to the plate with Shiver. I’ve been a fan of hers right from the beginning, but I have to say, Shiver completely blew my mind. Once I started reading, there was positively no stopping. I felt drunk – love drunk! Too much Sam and Grace will do that to you.

Watch out for the ending, though. As I’m sure it will leave some ambling around despairingly. I know I was! As angsty as it was, the ending was totally appropriate and totally necessary. I commend Maggie for taking the path she did – this one is definitely an example of the road less travelled in YA lit, and is a breath of fresh air! I am totally in love with Shiver, and I plan on telling absolutely everyone I meet about this one.

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How far will Rose go to keep her promise?

The recent Strigoi attack at St. Vladimir’s Academy was the deadliest ever in the school’s history, claiming the lives of Moroi students, teachers, and guardians alike. Even worse, the Strigoi took some of their victims with them. . . including Dimitri.

He’d rather die than be one of them, and now Rose must abandon her best friend, Lissa—the one she has sworn to protect no matter what—and keep the promise Dimitri begged her to make long ago. But with everything at stake, how can she possibly destroy the person she loves most?

If there is one thing Rose is good for, it’s a promise.  And she made Dimitri – her trainer, mentor, and the love of her life – the promise of a lifetime. When Dimitri is taken by enemy Strigoi at the end of the last book, Rose knows that she owes it to him to make good on her promise, no matter how much it will destroy her to do so. After all, he’d do it for her if the situation were reversed. But what would you do to preserve the honor of someone you loved? How far could you go to carry out their last wish? If it meant destroying a part of yourself, would you be able to follow through?

So Rose sets off on a mission from which she knows she may never return. Fighting Strigoi is deadly stuff – especially when that Strigoi has the man of your dreams. He knows your every move, your every weakness.  Rose has no idea what exactly happened to Dimitri, but she knows that whatever it is, it can’t be good. There is no good anywhere where Strigoi are concerned.

Blood Promise finds Rose in Russia, searching for her once beloved – dead, alive, or turned. Russia is everything Dimitri ever said it was, and then some. Its beautiful, crazy, and feels much more like ‘home’ than she ever thought possible. When she stumbles upon Dimitri’s family, though, she doesn’t expect the greeting she’s given. Will they welcome her with open arms as she delivers them the worst news possible, or will they cast her away with cold and darkened eyes? I don’t know about you, but if a strange girl showed up on my doorstep with the same news that Rose has, I know how I’d react…

Interestingly enough, as Rose travels across Russia, it seems that Vladimir Academy is never too far away. Adrian pays Rose a dreamy visit or two, and Rose can’t help but check in on Lissa now and then. It seems that Lissa is a bit lost without Rose and lands herself in all kinds of trouble. Is she woman enough to pull herself together, or will she need her best friend to fix everything once more? My initial feelings towards Lissa were all confirmed three times over in this novel: she’s weak, fragile, and freaking annoying! Again, I disliked reading her through Rose’s thoughts and I thanked my lucky stars that she wasn’t the focalising character.

Meanwhile, back in Russia someone reminds Rose exactly why she came in the first place, and she realises that its time to move on and being her search once more. Just when she thinks she’s never going to find what she came looking for, something off-the-charts kind of crazy happens and Rose’s world is thrown completely and absolutely freaking upside down. Although I’m not going to disclose exactly what this is, I was supremely thrown by these turns of events. I was very uncomfortable as I read through this section of the narrative, always hoping and praying that what was happening would right itself once more. When I realised that this wasn’t going to happen any time soon I became incredibly frustrated. Rose’s character takes an entirely new form in Blood Promise, and I can’t say that I’m altogether happy with her transformation. She loses her edge, and although I understand that the circumstances are pretty much out of her control, I kept waiting for her to get her groove back together. I’m happy to report that she eventually did, but it took way too long for her to shizzle her way back into the Rose Hathaway we all know and love.

Cryptic much? Well, you’re just going to have to read to find out what I’m talking about…

Now I know you’re all wanting to know: Is he, or isn’t he? I could tell you but I’m feeling particularly evil right now and I think I’ll keep that particular spoiler to myself. If you want to find out whether Dimitri is Strigoi, alive, dead, or whatever, then I suggest you run out to your local bookstore as fast as you possibly can and get hold of a copy. I will, however, leave you with this piece of information….

Dimitri DOES make an appearance in this novel. Your questions will be answered and you wont have to wait too long to find out what the hell happened to him. Will you be surprised? Maybe. Maybe not. Depends what you’re hoping for!

While Blood Promise is not my favourite Vampire Academy novel to date, I did read this one in a single sitting. Once I started reading I was desperate to find out what happened. I reckon this one has a little bit of everything for everyone: love, lust, hate, anger, sympathy, empathy, envy, desire, action, skill, and the edge that we’ve all come to expect from the Vampire Academy novels.

I reckon the fans are going to lose it over this one. I can’t wait for the discussion to start.

P.S There’s a new player in town whom I think we’re going to see much more of in the future. While her presence was necessary in Blood Promise, I don’t think we were treated to everything she has to offer. Watch this space…

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When the love of Anna’s life and recently acquired boyfriend dies tragically in a car accident, she isn’t sure how she’s supposed to go on with her life. The only problem is, she can’t really grieve the way she wants to because no one knows that they were an item, especially not her best friend who also happens to be his sister. Anna never told Frankie because he wanted to be the one that broke the news. Now he’s gone, she’s doing everything possible to protect their secret and respect his wishes.

Then Frankie’s parents invite Anna to come along on their annual family holiday to California in place of their beloved (and dead) son and brother. Not really wanting to let Frankie down, Anna accepts. But she’s nervous. Zanzibar Bay was Matt’s favorite place on earth. How will Anna cope being so close to something he loved so much, without him?

Then Frankie decides that this summer is going to be all about boys. A different boy each day, making it their twenty boy summer. For someone like Frankie, twenty boys in twenty days sounds fabulous, but for someone like Anna, there is only one boy. There has only ever been one boy, and the way she’s feeling right now, there won’t ever be another one, either. Being the good friend she is, though, Anna goes along with Frankie’s game, and she becomes very good at pretending she’s participating in Frankie’s little challenge, when really she’s just watching on.

But then they meet Sam and Jake and Anna realises that maybe she’d like to play the game after all. Not for twenty boys, because that’s totally uncharacteristic for a girl like her, but Sam is special enough that maybe she could play for one boy.

Things are running along smashingly until Frankie finds Anna’s journal, and all the letters she wrote to Matt, all the details of their private affair. And Frankie is livid. The girls have the showdown of their lives and they realise that the one thing they had in common might just be the very same thing that tears them apart.

I have to say, I really didn’t like Frankie. She’s shallow, ignorant, selfish and just plain annoying. I had real trouble understanding why someone like Anna – who is none of the aforementioned things – is friends with someone like Frankie. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Frankie isn’t a complex character, but I couldn’t bring myself to care about her enough to try and decode her mysteries. Anna, however, was a joy to get to know. I loved her flashbacks to her time with Matt and I could really feel her love and adoration for him. And when she met Sam, I really felt her conflict. I can’t imagine what it must feel like to be scared of loving someone new for fear of forgetting the past, especially when the past is all you have left of someone.

Twenty Boy Summer is Sarah Ockler’s first novel and it has a very Sarah Dessen feel to it, which is a compliment of the highest kind. I can’t wait to see what she produces next.

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There are lots of interesting things about Beatle. His name isn’t really Beatle, for one, but the name ‘Beatle’ is a pretty fitting nickname, since his real name is actually John Lennon – for real. Beatle’s eccentric, astrological crazed mother is a huge fan of the pop group, The Beatles, and I reckon that’s all I need to say about that!

Another interesting thing about Beatle is the fact that he’s a twin, but he’s no ordinary twin. Beatle’s sister, Winsome, was born 45 days after Beatle, making her birthday fall on a completely different day, in a completely different year to Beatle’s. How many twins can say that about themselves?

And then there’s Beatle’s limp. Beatle had a stroke a couple of years ago and his gimp walk is something that is a constant reminder of his ordeal. A stroke sounds like something only old people experience, but Beatle is living proof that old people’s health problems can plague the youthful, too. I reckon all these things together make Beatle one pretty interesting character.

Then, on freaky Friday the 13th, in a remarkable twist of fate, Beatle meets Destiny, and his story gets even more interesting…

Destiny McCartney can’t freaking believe that this Beatle guy’s name is really John Lennon. I mean, come on, how trippy is that? He she is, Destiny McCartney, just minding her own business at the bus stop after a disastrous Friday afternoon, and along comes John Lennon. Of course, he’s not the real John Lennon – the musical genius – but you have to admit, it’s pretty freaky all the same. The irony is certainly not wasted on her, or him, for that matter.

There are lots of interesting things about Destiny, too. She’s the second youngest sibling in a family of nine kids. Although most of her siblings are in their twenties and beyond, a lot of them still live at home. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live in a house full of so much chaos!

Another interesting thing about Destiny is that she’s always up for a bit of fun. In a bout of boredom one afternoon, Destiny and her friends answer a ‘Stalker Wanted’ advertisement in their local newspaper, thinking that the person who paid for the advertisement is the one who wants a stalker, but then a whole bunch of crazy things start happening to Destiny and her family and she realises that maybe, just maybe, she’s made a huge mistake. What kind of person answers a ‘Stalker Wanted’ advertisement anyway?

The most interesting thing about Beatle and Destiny, though, is not how much they like each other, but how much their lives are already so intertwined, and they have absolutely no idea. Beatle and Destiny’s freak meeting on that uneventful Friday afternoon proves that maybe fate has a little more control over our lives than we really care to admit. Some people are just meant to be.

Beatle Meets Destiny is a belly aching, hilarious read. Destiny and Beatle are such unique characters and their story is like a breath of very fresh air. Set in Melbourne, Australia, Beatle and Destiny’s story flows effortlessly off the page into what felt like was a real-life drama. This is one book that I think would make a rocking, Indie Australian film. I hope someone out there in film-land thinks the same one day.

This is Gabrielle Williams first novel for young adult and I sincerely hope that it is not her last. I’d recommend this book to anyone, of any age, gender, or nationality.

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My mom can be confusing without even trying. If I tell her I have to something because everyone is doing it, she says, just be yourself. She says people respect that. But what if you send fan mail to romance writers? And get teary-eyes at chick flicks? What if you still get spooked during thunderstorms? These are not things that you want to share with others. Being yourself might make people reject you. People you desperately care about. Being yourself only works if you’re basically cool. Which I’m not.

There’s another problem with mom’s advice. How can you be yourself if you don’t know who that is?

David is pretty sure he’s gay. At least he knows that much about himself. He thinks about guys in sexual ways and he can’t help but perve on his team mates in the showers after practice. But David doesn’t think he should be thinking these things, so he snaps a rubber band around his wrist to snap at every time he has an ‘inappropriate’ thought about a guy.

But then Sean, the guys he’s been crushing on, sort of outs himself to David. Although its clear that Sean has no intention of outing himself to anyone else, David does pretty much anything Sean wants him to – even when its clear that Sean is not going to reciprocate.

Then David gets brave and tells Kick – the girl he’s kind of been seeing. She doesn’t flip out, like he thought he would, but she doesn’t keep the information to herself, like she said she would. Then Sean’s parents ban him from seeing David, and everything goes a little haywire.

Eventually, David grows a pair and takes a stand against Sean’s manipulative, selfish behaviour. He fixes things with Kick, and his other friends, too. While the ending is kind of nice, I wouldn’t go so far to say that this is a feel good novel. Sean – whom I absolutely loathe, by the way – doesn’t really grow at all and appears to learn no lessons whatsoever. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing. I’m not of the opinion that the characters need to grow morally in a story to make it good. I’m just saying that Sean was the same frustrating ass at both the beginning and the end of the novel.

By the end, I was convinced that Sean’s simply one of those people that’s going to live a long, lonely and frustrating life. Being gay is something that he’ll never be comfortable with and he’ll continue to manipulate people like David forever. Something deep inside me says I should feel sorry for him, but I disliked him so much that I just couldn’t bring myself to do so.

David, however, is a much more likable character. Although he’s a bit of a pushover for most of the novel, and his naivety and inability to see his relationship with Sean for what it is, is kind of annoying, he grew a pair just at the right place in the story and he restored all my faith in him once more. Like with so many other novels I’ve read lately, I thanked my lucky stars that the novel was narrated through David’s point of view, and not Sean’s. Had it been the other way around, I may not have been able to finish.

I just have one question, for anyone that might have read this novel. Why oh why did David sleep with Kick? I mean, it fits the story I suppose, but I just don’t understand. He didn’t want to. He didn’t even have to. She knew he was gay. WHYYYYYYYY? I was angry with David for following through on this… I’d be keen to hear your thoughts on this scene.

The story flows well, and it’s pretty easy to read. I reckon lots of you out there might like this one.

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Sixteen-year-old Jacob Smithson has a temper. He’s picked on because he likes boys, and fighting gets him kicked out of public school. As a last resort, his parents place him in St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Boarding School for Boys. At his first mass at St. Thomas he sees Avery Dendritch, a senior who serves as altar boy during the service. When they meet, the attraction between them is hard to deny. The two become fast friends, and as the school year progresses, their friendship deepens until Jacob feels he’s found a place where he belongs. But the other students gossip about their growing relationship. Avery can ignore them; Jacob can’t. As the rumors and slurs start up again, can he curb his temper, or will his fighting get him expelled from St. Thomas, too?

I can’t make up my mind whether or not I liked this book. I read it a few days ago and I’ve been weighing up the pros and cons ever since. I think it’s probably safest to say that I’m sitting on the fence with this one. If you want to know my reasons, continue reading.

Con: Although Without Sin is narrated by two characters (something which I normally love), I couldn’t bring myself to feel any kind of attachment to either Jacob or Avery. Their “voices” were too similar for any real distinction to be made. They both seemed kind of shallow and I felt like they fell in “love” too fast. For me, their relationship was based on physical attraction only, and this is something I can never relate to.

Pro: This novel wasn’t censored in any way. So many young adult novels portray teen characters as all too innocent, something which I feel is a misrepresentation of many youth today. Without Sin does not do this, and it explores teenage sexual desires well. I felt this aspect of this novel was truthful and dealt with appropriately.

Con: Although I was impressed by the lack of censorship, the issue of sex seemed to be all it was about. There was very little plot, except one huge build up to the point where the two boys finally have sex.  Because of this, it didn’t hold my attention that well and I found I had to force myself to keep reading.

Pro: I liked the ending. While I’m not going to tell you what it is, I found the ending to be quite realistic. It’s refreshing to find a novel where everything isn’t wrapped up in a fairy tale ending. Readers are given closure, but it’s not all happily ever after, if you know what I mean. Snaps to J Tomas for pulling this off so well.

Every time I think I make up my mind about this one, it changes right back again. So I’m not going to provide a summary opinion. You’ll just have to read it and decide for yourself this time.

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Along for the Ride is Sarah Dessen’s new novel. It follows Auden – a high school graduate living out her summer while she waits for college to start – who teaches us that messed up families come in all shapes and sizes, and that success doesn’t always make you the world greatest, most admirable person.

In a split decision, Auden decides to pack up her car and go and spend the summer at the beach with her dad. Her parents have been separated for a good long while now, and her stepmother just gave birth, so Auden figures this might be a good way to pass the summer days. What she doesn’t expect, though, is how much her summer life changes who she is inside.

For her whole life, Auden has been surrounded by academia. Her dad is a fiction writer and her mother is a literary academic, so it’s no surprise that Auden is highly academic, too. In fact, Auden is nothing but academic. She’s got no friends and no interests outside of her academic realm. Her parents raised her like she was an adult, so Auden has never really had much of a childhood, and cutesy kiddy things never seemed to hold their attention. So, Auden used the one thing she knew would work: academia. She’s spent her whole life studying like a maniac, but for what? Now that high school is over, was it really all worth it?

After spending less than a week at her dad’s place, Auden realises that marriage and a new life with someone else hasn’t changed him at all. He’s still the same selfish old man that he was before. And what about her mother? She’s an entirely different piece of work. It seems that her mother doesn’t have a sympathetic, nice bone in her body. How can Auden feel close to someone like that? How can anyone?

Enter Eli. He’s spent his whole life doing the kiddy stuff that Auden avoided, and he reckons Auden can’t leave her adolescence behind without actually experiencing some of it first. So he sets Auden on a mission: to do all the things one does when they’re young and goofy before the summer is out. The more time she spends with him, the more Auden realises that her view of the world might be a bit skewed, and very closed-minded. Eli seems to be the perfect remedy for that and Auden latches on nice and tight. What Auden doesn’t realise, though, is that Eli has some problems of his own. Problems which, according to everyone else in town, have been a permanent fixture in his life for some time now. Then Auden shows up and Eli starts to heal. Why, then, do the people around her seem so worried about all the time Eli and Auden are spending together? If Eli is getting better, shouldn’t that be a good thing?

People are very complex, but sometimes the solution is really very simple. Sometimes, all you need is a little bit of love.

Auden is a captivating character and being inside her head was a joy. I felt sad for her and at times I even felt angry with her, but most of all I found it all too easy to relate to her. High school is a time for fun, friendship and feeling free, but I think there are more Auden’s in the world than we care to admit, and something tells me that girls all over the world are going to see a little piece of themselves in her.

This, like so many of Sarah Dessen’s novels, is one of those reads where not a lot really happens, but heaps is achieved, if you know what I mean. Dessen’s writing is truly flawless, and in my opinion, she is one of the most understated young adult writers around. She deserves more credit and exposure than she gets. Her books deal with everyday teen issues that often get swept aside and chalked up to adolescent hormones. Dessen validates these issues and brings them to life, sending a message to teens everywhere that they matter, that what they feel matters. She is an asset to the world of young adult literature and someone I’ll never tire of reading. I can see myself very easily becoming obsessed with this book. Along for the Ride is one of the best I’ve read this year and deserves two very enthusiastic thumbs up.

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I’ve been trying to write my review of this novel for a few days now. Trying, and failing. So, I’ve decided to take an approach that I don’t normally follow. Instead of launching into a detailed description of plot and character, I’m going to post the blurb as shown on the back of the novel (so you at least get a little insight into what it’s all about), and then I want to discuss a few key literary devices that I thought worked well. This isn’t something I normally do, but I don’t think I can say what I want any other way. So here goes…

A lonely gay teen bides his time with trips to strangers’ funerals and Ouija board sessions, desperately searching for someone to love–and a reason to live following a suicide attempt.

Walking an empty stretch of New Jersey highway on an autumn night, he meets a strange and beautiful boy who looks like he stepped out of a dream. But the vision becomes into a nightmare when the boy turns out to be the local urban legend, the ghost of a star athlete killed in 1957–a ghost with a deadly secret and a dangerous obsession.

Vintage: A Ghost Story is an intense thriller that looks at the dark side of gay urban fantasy, where the dead can never rest and trapped spirits never find peace.

Although this novel is narrated in first person, the narrator has no name. Actually, that might not be entirely true, but if he does have a name, readers never find out what it is. The first time I read Vintage through, I felt that by not giving him a name, the author robbed the narrator of authority. Because he was nameless (and also gay), I felt like the author was trying to tell me that his identity didn’t matter, that being gay meant that he wasn’t worthy of a title like a name. I found myself getting all ticked off about the kinds of impressions that would leave on potential queer teens. However, I was so intrigued by this concept of a nameless narrator that as soon as I finished reading Vintage, I went back to the beginning and started again. I very quickly changed my mind over how I felt about this character. I realised that by not giving him a name, the author was actually empowering the character and inviting you, the reader, to assume his identity and really place yourself in the story. This, then, made the story more powerful and a whole lot more engaging than the first time I read it. This gave me the opportunity to step into his shoes, to not be myself for a few hours and really immerse myself in his world. I now saw that this gave the narrator loads of authority, unlike my previous assumptions.

I also enjoyed the fact that, while not necessarily ‘out’, and although the narrator had certainly encountered adversity because of his sexuality in the past, he seemed more than comfortable as a queer teen. He was not struggling to comes to terms with his sexuality, which was very refreshing. I thought that Vintage highlighted a really clear distinction between comfortably keeping one’s sexuality to himself, and fearfully doing so. Coming out should be the choice of the individual, and just because you’re comfortable with your sexuality doesn’t automatically mean that you have to come out. I really enjoyed this aspect of this novel.

Vintage is a quirky queer teen read that I’m almost certain would be enjoyed by readers both gay and straight. There’s something about a good old ghost story that has a real universal appeal. Watch out for the supernatural sexual encounter!
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Today is the one-year anniversary of the first day of my last period.

I’m not exactly celebrating.

When I lied to my mom about getting my period, it was the easiest escape route at the time. I didn’t think much of it because I was sure that sooner or later, it would turn out to be true. So every twenty-eight days I take tampons out of the box under the sink and flush them down the toilet to make her think that I’m cycling as I should.

But I can’t tell her now that my ovaries aren’t back from vacation. She’ll not only freak out and ground me for lying, but she’ll make me go to the gyno as well. And the very thought of getting up in the stirrups and letting a total stranger go elbow deep and up to my uterus … Jesus Christ!

This is not a book about teen pregnancy. This is not a book that advocates or condemns teen pregnancy. This is a book about Jessica Darling. Jess is many things – a runner, a daughter, an academic, a sister, and a friend – but pregnant is certainly not one of them. No sir. In order to be pregnant one would have to engage in sexual intercourse first, and that would require actually snaking the attention of her high school crush – Paul Parlipiano. But even though they run on the same track team Paul doesn’t even know she exists. So pregnancy, my dear friends, is so far from the reason Jess’s period is MIA it’s not even funny.

The real explanation is far more boring, far less scandalous, far more Jessica. Jess, you see, is a runner. She’s on the track team and she trains a lot. She has trouble sleeping and she’s really skinny. Even after her grueling training sessions, when she can’t sleep in the middle of the night, Jess gets up and goes running, hoping that she’ll tire herself out so she can sleep. She runs and runs and runs and runs. Jess knows this is the reason she hasn’t got her period, and although she knows its bad to go for so long without menstruating, her running seems to be a bigger priority.

Then one night, while out running, Jess injures her ankle. She manages to drag herself home limping and crying and moaning in pain. Exit excessive running here. In fact, exit all running here. At least now her dad can’t bug her about her track meets anymore, not being able to actually participate and all. But what about the middle of the night? How is she going to get to sleep now?

Enter Marcus Flutie. He’s the resident bad boy, the one everyone loves to hate. Turns out that he and Jess have far more in common than she originally thought – not that she was thinking of him, no sir, someone like Jessica Darling would never be thinking of someone like Marcus Flutie – and talking to Marcus in the middle of the night seems to be the only way Jess can get herself to sleep. Jess learns many things about Marcus, but the most important of all is that Marcus is so not the person she thought he was. Jess realises that she’s falling for him, but brushes it aside because she knows that Marcus doesn’t date girls like her. Besides, he’s got a floozy girlfriend anyway. She sees them groping in the hallways all the time. Gross. But Jess is beautifully naïve and often doesn’t see what’s right in front of her. Will Marcus lead good, wholesome Jess down a path of disobedience and destruction, like everyone thinks he will? And honestly, how can she stand him anyway? No one gets it… no one at all.

Jessica’s voice is raw and fresh. Megan McCafferty captures what so many teens are thinking but do not say. Jessica Darling is so real that she could be me, or you, or the girl sitting next to you on the bus. I bought every single word that came out of her mouth. Her way of looking at things brings light and humour to even the saddest and darkest of situations, and makes for one hell of an entertaining read. You’ll laugh, you might cry, but you’ll certainly feel every pang, every stomach churn that good ol’ Jess goes through. As her name suggests, she’s every bit the teenage darling.

One of the best books I’ve read in a long time. I positively cannot wait to get my hands on a copy of the next book in the series, Second Helpings.

P.S I think I’ve come down with a case of Flutie Fever. Watch out, I hear it’s very contagious.

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High school junior Marlee McAllister lives and breathes softball. She’s the pitcher for the Clarkson Cougars in the North Country of upstate New York. With the season opener approaching, Marlee and her best friend, Jeri D’Amico, go scout their rivals, the East Valley Panthers. The Panthers star pitcher, Christy Loveland, took the All County pitching title the preceding year. It’s a title that Marlee covets. Marlee and Jeri settle in for the game but as the Panthers take the field, Marlee finds herself staring at Susie Torres, the Panther left fielder.

And so starts the beginning of the biggest change in Marlee’s life. When Marlee realises that the feelings she’s experiencing for Susie are nothing like what it feels like to be with Bobby – her boyfriend – she begins to question why they’re even together. All he wants to do is make out and go parking, and that’s the last thing Marlee wants to do with Bobby. When Bobby leaves her for someone else, Marlee is shocked but also a little relieved.

Enter Susie. At a party one night, Susie tells Marlee that she thinks she beautiful. As soon as the words fall on Marlee’s ears, she feels completely unable to hold her feelings in any longer. The girls end up making out and so starts the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Unsure of how their friends will react, the two girls decide to keep their newfound love a secret. And it’s a good thing they do, because Susie’s best friend (and Marlee’s rival pitcher), Christy Loveland, wants Susie all to herself. Not in the same way that Marlee and Susie want each other, but her jealously becomes a major problem for the new couple all the same. Will the new couple survive the pressure so early on in their relationship?

What I loved about this book the most was Marlee’s immediate, unquestioned acceptance of her newfound sexuality. She didn’t go into denial, and she didn’t embark on a downward spiral of self-hate and loathing. When their friends found out that Susie and Marlee were dating, there were no homophobic reactions and certainly no friendships lost over the issue. This is the first book I’ve found for gay teens that doesn’t include the protagonist’s ‘coming out’ being met with a barrage of objections and hate. Although the two girls did express concern about how their loves ones would react, it wasn’t a huge issue and it was clear that they certainly weren’t going to let that stop them being together.  It was so refreshing (and joyous!) to read a novel for gay teens that shows the protagonist in positive circumstances, rather than the tragic ones that so often get published.

Out of Left Field is a short, punchy feel-good read that gets straight to the point (no pun intended).

If you want information about Barbara’s other books, click here

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