Category: Contemporary

Books, Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone

by Zaheerah2 Comments on BOOK REVIEW: Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone

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goodreads summary:

If you could read my mind, you wouldn’t be smiling.

Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has Purely-Obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can’t turn off.

Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn’t help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Yet Sam knows she’d be truly crazy to leave the protection of the most popular girls in school. So when Sam meets Caroline, she has to keep her new friend with a refreshing sense of humor and no style a secret, right up there with Sam’s weekly visits to her psychiatrist.

Caroline introduces Sam to Poet’s Corner, a hidden room and a tight-knit group of misfits who have been ignored by the school at large. Sam is drawn to them immediately, especially a guitar-playing guy with a talent for verse, and starts to discover a whole new side of herself. Slowly, she begins to feel more “normal” than she ever has as part of the popular crowd . . . until she finds a new reason to question her sanity and all she holds dear.

my review:

Rating:
★★★☆☆

~ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~

This is the first book I’ve requested from NetGallery, and I’m so glad that they accepted. I’m not a big fan of contemporary YA novels- to be honest, they bore me. But I’ve enjoyed Tamara Ireland Stone’s previous novels,so when I read the description for this, it sounded interesting. And it was.

The main character Sam was diagnosed with OCD as a child, and she’s been hiding it from her friends ever since- worried that her ‘perfect’ friends would find out that she isn’t like them. She keeps it well hidden, trying to be as ‘Normal’ as possible.Tamara Ireland Stone does a decent job of making Sam real. Her portrayal of OCD felt truthful, and it was obvious that she spent some time researching the topic and taking great care in depicting the struggles that Sam must go through. The novel was engaging and I felt an intensity I truly didn’t expect. Her relationship with her therapist as one of my favourite through the book. She’s a strong presence in Sam’s life, and is such an amazing character.

Sam also meets Caroline who introduces her to the Poet’s Corner. A place hidden beneath the school where a small group of students meet, sharing their burdens in the form of poems. This gives Sam an outlet, and soon becomes more confident and comfortable here. It felt right seeing her happy when she spends so much of her time miserable.

I loved the development between Sam and AJ, but I didn’t like their story. Sam used to bully AJ. This wasn’t just childish jokes, it was extreme bullying to a point where he just stopped speaking and wasn’t until he found music/poems as a way to speak again. This is probably the reason it didn’t get a 5 from me. The way it dealt with the issue of bullying was completely false. Sam may not be a bully, but she does so out of peer pressure.. Bullying is a very serious issue, and this book does not give weight to it. It glosses over the fact that Sam was a bully, peer pressure or not, it was still unacceptable. She feels bad about it, but there is never any feeling of sincerity upon her reflection into it.

Overall, Every Last Word seems like a typical contemporary book but it was enjoyable.

Books, Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: The Fault In Our Stars by John Green

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: The Fault In Our Stars by John Green

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goodreads summary:

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.

my review:

Rating:
★★☆☆☆

(This review is a reposted one from my old GoodReads Account but my opinion on this book has changed making it a 2 instead of a 5 )

My initial reactions to this book were pretty similar to the rest of Green’s fans. I enjoyed the story and characters, and it was an exciting read in the end. I liked how it was about coming to terms with the fact that your life will almost never rise above insignificance. However, three years have passed since I first read TFIOS and my view on the book has changed considerably. TFIOS isn’t a bad book, but it’s standard and very similar to the other works of Green. And I understand why so many readers would have had such an emotional response to the book. Books about death are often upsetting & thought to provoke- looking back on this, I didn’t find it either.

I don’t believe in Hazel and Augustus the same way anymore. Their dialogue is contrived and ridiculous. Augustus was just created to spew a plethora of metaphors.And there’s the other problem I have with Augustus and Hazel: their romance feels like a plot construction far more than it feels like a real passion. In Green’s other books, although I didn’t enjoy them, I understood the romance. Augustus Waters just shows up in Hazel’s cancer support group and stares at her, and she just swoons at him. That’s almost as bad as Bella Swan falling in love with Edward Cullen even though he apparently hates her. Green attempts to play it cool by having Hazel recognise that she’d be creeped out if it were an ugly guy staring at her, but that doesn’t make their love affair any less sudden, but the plot won’t work if they aren’t in love, so it happens.

Also, Hazel is not a believable character, we learn nothing about her. She just hates Support Group and loves Augustus for reasons that were never adequately announced throughout the book. The idea that he spends money just so he can act out a metaphor that doesn’t do anything but make him look like a pretentious idiot.

But the strength of The Fault in Our Stars is that it refuses to offer false comfort regarding a subject matter that we all know doesn’t have a happy ending. We are all going to die, but we live our lives pretending that words like “forever” or “always” have meant something to us. Maybe that’s why it worked so well with so many readers, it did for me at first.

I guess this book would have been better for me to read if it had been about what happened to Peter Van Houten and his life in Amsterdam with Hazel and Gus coming to see him or Hazel with her actual terminal cancer. It would have been better to read Hazel’s cancer to conflict with her ability to be with Gus, rather than give her a weird miracle drug.

And that’s why The Fault in Our Stars no longer impacts me as much as it did the first time reading it.

Books, Contemporary

BOOK REVIEW: Carter Reed By Tijan (SPOILERS WITHIN REVIEW)

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Carter Reed By Tijan (SPOILERS WITHIN REVIEW)

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GoodReads Summary:

Emma decided to skip the gym and went home early. It was the last easy decision she made because she found her roommate being raped by her boyfriend.

She had two choices. Call the cops and be killed by his family’s mafia connections or kill him first and hope to survive. There was no choice to her.

She killed the bastard first and went to the one person who could protect her. Carter Reed. He’s a weapon for the rivaling mafia family, but he’s also Emma’s secret. Not only was he best friends with her brother, but she’s the reason he became that weapon in the first place.

My Review:

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

There’s so many things that I dislike about this book. The character, the story and just everything in general.

Emma, as a character, is so irritating, too demanding,and acted like a spoiled brat. She has killed someone, abandoned her equally irritating friends, and let them be hunted by the mob, while she look for shelter , to another mobster. When a mobster also happened to be your dead brother’s best friend and after seeing his GQ body, she basically forgot about the murder she JUST committed and starts lusting over him.

Also, I can’t believe this girl thinks she can have a say in all that was happening. She really believed she has the right to complain when a Mob is trying to kill her and she seeks protection; you need to sit yourself down and don’t put yourself in danger just because you feel like it, or because you were lonely. And about Carter? Im pretty sure even he was 100% done with Emma, with the disappearances he has made even when Emma begged him to stay.

Carter could’ve been a good character but he was so manipulative. But his confidence doesn’t balance out how he turned into a sappy love struck guy by the end of the book, falling in love with one of the most boring characters I’ve ever read. How he could’ve fallen in love with this girl is beyond me.

The secondary characters were undeveloped and flat, and it was impossible to connect with any of them. The writing style is not enjoyable, filled repetitive sequences and cringe lines. This book was neither romantic or thrilling, the premise had so much potential for an action-driven storyline, when in reality the story unfolded at a snail’s pace.

There was always something missing with this book. Perhaps a better backstory or Carter’s pov from the past? Added depth from the characters was desperately needed and I just wasn’t connected with the two main characters in the slightest. There is zero chemistry at all between Emma and Carter.

Books, Contemporary, Science Fiction & Fantasy

BOOK REVIEW: The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

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goodreads summary:

On the eve of her ninth birthday, Rose Edelstein bites into her mother’s homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother’s emotions in the slice. All at once her cheerful, can-do mother tastes of despair and desperation. Suddenly, and for the rest of her life, food becomes perilous. Anything can be revealed at any meal. Rose’s gift forces her to confront the truth behind her family’s emotions – her mother’s sadness, her father’s detachment and her brother’s clash with the world. But as Rose grows up, she learns that there are some secrets even her taste buds cannot discern.

my review:

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake is a combination of both strange and unorganised, but I still enjoyed reading it. The main idea of the story was exciting but wasn’t taken far enough. It took me a few chapters to achieve mild interests, but then when Part II came along all the way to the conclusion, I was completely confused with the shift in the story’s theme.

The writing is excellent, especially in describing the food and the emotions it evokes for Rose. However, there are a few things that I didn’t enjoy about the book. Bender chose not to use quotation marks, I was hoping that after completing the book I would see a reason for the decision, but I still see none. It’s confusing to the reader and adds nothing to the experience that I can guess from. Also, the switch from the focus of Rose and her special ‘gift’ to her brother was confusing. Bender does attempt to tie the two together in the end, but for me, it was less than successful and ultimately unsatisfying. I found myself tuning in and out of the events, but it felt like it was slapped together randomly.

I was disappointed with the ending. You never know what would happen if the Dad goes into the hospital, which is okay, but I would like to know. Also the brother, I get his unique ability, but why he wants to disappear forever? What drove him to do it? His grandfather smelled, his sister tasted, what was his?

The idea was good: a girl can taste the feelings of whoever prepared her food. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much plot with characters which were uninteresting & heavily dependent on stereotypes – distant father busy providing for an unfulfilled wife who’s having an affair and geek brother. The brother also has a unique talent, which was a massive distraction from the main story, and wasn’t very well explained anyway. But most disappointing of all was the lack of a real storyline. The book describes the main character’s developing her ability to identify where her food comes from and what emotions the cook was feeling, but it never really builds to any climax.

A small part of the novel that annoyed me, Rose’s mother is having an affair, and Rose figures it out so. She tells her daughter she’ll stop the affair if Rose wants her too (not because it’s wrong and not because she feels terrible about it) but only if Rose tells her to stop, which Rose says to her to carry on with her affair. I had initially read the book at my grandmother’s house and left the book there mid-finish until I asked if I could finish it which my aunt happily gave the book over to me but I felt like I wasted my time with this book and that’s always a disappointing experience.

Books, Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Girl Online by Zoe Sugg (A.K.A Zoella)

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Girl Online by Zoe Sugg (A.K.A Zoella)

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GoodReads Summary:

I had no idea GirlOnline would take off the way it has – I can’t believe I now have 5432 followers, thanks so much! – and the thought of opening up to you all about this is terrifying, but here goes…

Penny has a secret.

Under the alias GirlOnline, she blogs about school dramas, boys, her mad, whirlwind family – and the panic attacks she’s suffered from lately. When things go from bad to worse, her family whisks her away to New York, where she meets the gorgeous, guitar-strumming Noah. Suddenly Penny is falling in love – and capturing every moment of it on her blog.

But Noah has a secret too. One that threatens to ruin Penny’s cover – and her closest friendship – forever.

My Review:

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

As soon as I heard this book was coming out, I was quick to judge it would not be a good read and has a high chance of it being ghost-written. And, sadly, I was not wrong.

(Before anyone starts moaning saying ‘why did you even read it if you thought it was going to be crap’ I only read it because I didn’t want to jump to any conclusions without having read the book)

The characters were cliché and so underdeveloped. The story itself is predictable to the point where it was boring to read. (Typical boy meets girl, fall in love, obstacle in their way which is swiftly removed and everything is good again) No hate to other books like these, I enjoy predictable books, but this was so stuffed with a cliché of characters – the gay best friend, the bitchy ex-best friend, the romantic love interest etc. Again, nothing wrong with a cliché or two, but only if they’re written well and sadly, these characters were not. And on the topic of anxiety, this blog expresses it much better than I ever could. Especially in a section where she is mixing normal teenage insecurities with real anxiety disorder.

It’s so frustrating watching people praise her for beating J.K. Rowling’s debut sales because that means absolutely nothing. (of course there was no record-breaking debut week, but Harry Potter’s broken nearly every other record there is.) Of course, she would have record sales; she already had a fanbase of millions when her book published, and not of her literary merit. You cannot compare a ghost-written book to Harry Potter!

The reason why this book wasn’t properly looked over was that it seems anything with Zoe’s name on will sell, and, with people wanting to cash in on that success, it doesn’t matter about the quality of what’s as written. Imagine if they released this under a different unknown author? It would have had a higher chance of being forgotten about. I really wanted to be proved wrong – I tried to enjoy every word but sadly I didn’t, and I’m not surprised.

If you’re a loyal Zoella fan, love fairy lights, a good scented candle and clichéd plot, and don’t mind this book wasn’t entirely hers then this is the book for you! Sadly I cannot and wouldn’t recommend this to anyone. I’m sorry. I tried, I really did!