Will Grayson Will Grayson

Will Grayson Will Grayson is the story of two young men, both of which are (unsprisingly) named Will Grayson, coming to terms with themselves. One of the Will Grayson's is gay and the others best friend, Tiny Cooper is also gay. One of the main themes of the book is coming to accept yourself and others.
Even thought the book has a lot of good messages, I think that the style of one of the authors(David Levithan) wrote in is rather annoying and badly done. I much perfered John Green's writing style. Also, there is an excesive use of profanity. I found this to be unnecessary. They didn't have to curse on every single page.
I would recomend this book to mainly mature young adults and adults.

Eclipse

Still catching up.........
OK. I read Eclipse, the third Twilight book, a few days ago. The third book is about Victoria (the evil one) creating a bunch of new vampires so she can kill Bella. During this time, Bella is worrying about her wedding, becoming a vampire and breaking Jacob's heart. This is really where the whole love triangle shows. Jacob and Edward both love Bella. Bella has to choose one. The other gets his heart broken. End of story. Until the wolves and the vampires get together to kill Victoria's army.
I liked Eclipse. I thought it was really good. It wasn't as lovey-dovey as the second book, which was good. It isn't the best in the series. So far I like the fourth one best. It's about as good as the first Twilight book.
I would recommend this book for Twilight Movie Haters (the books aren't that bad!) and werewolf/vampire lovers.

Extra

In the fourth and final book in the Uglies series, the focus switches from Tally to young Aya. Aya's face rank is 451,359. She's tired of being out shined by her older famous brother who's ranked in the top thousand. With her hovercam Moggle by her side she is ready to launch the biggest story since the mind-rain. Until she stumble upon a grave secert.. With her friends, brother, and Tally Youngblood (and the rest of the cutters) behind her it's up to Aya to save to world!!!!

This book was very different. The writing style of all of this series is very unquie the content was strange. All of the books provoked thoughts on governmen. Most of all this book gave a unquie point of view on self-worth. When everyone around you is supermodel pretty and you're, you start to think they know everything. You start to think less of your self, and not even notice the change in yourself. I loved this book and would recommend it to middle school girls.

~Dana

Real Time Review

I finished Real Time by Pnina Moed Kass. This book was a little harder to read than some others I’ve been reading lately, which is a nice change of pace. The story jumps in between times and people to tell the story of how their lives converge around one traumatic event.

Because there are so many characters, summarizing each of their stories would take too long. The point at which their stories converge is when a new volunteer to a Jewish farm is picked up at the airport by another, older volunteer and their bus is bombed. We slowly learn how each of them, along with other people from the farm came to be there.

I liked the overall story of this book. I think it gave a unique view of how life works inside Israel. The different viewpoints make you think about different ways one could view an experience like this, and some of them take you just a bit out of your comfort zone.

While I liked the different viewpoints, I didn’t really like their presentation. The story was broken up with large headings which contained the persons name, the place, and the time. It was confusing to have to keep up with different time zones and so many different people.

I would recommend this book to pre-teens and up. The writing is at a higher level, and the main subject (a bus bombing) is pretty graphic. However, this is a real-world issue, one that should be dealt with.

I would compare this book to books like Little Piece of Ground for subject matter. They do have opposite viewpoints but it is about the Palestinian-Israeli issue.

Half Way Home Review

I recently finished Half Way Home by Hugh Howey and absolutely loved it!!! Hugh Howey is a relatively new author who I think has tons of potential. I’ve also read the other books by him, the Molly Fide series, and really enjoyed them too. I really can’t say enough good things about them.

Half Way Home is set in a futuristic world where colonies of people are sent out to explore planets and are born as full grown adults. We follow a group of young people who were “born” too soon, only halfway through their training for their jobs in the new colony. The main character, Porter, struggles with his own emotions as he accidently becomes the leader of a group that has broken off from the main colony. This second group goes on an exploration mission and discovers the true, dark reason their mission was nearly aborted.

I really like the way the plot and the characters were developed. In some books by other authors I’ve read, I’ve felt I didn’t get to know the people well enough. In this book, I really felt that I knew Porter and Kelvin and Tarsi. I felt their pain, their losses, and their happiness. I loved the pacing as well. The story didn’t move too fast that your head was spinning, but I never felt it dragged. I hate to use this old line, but here it is: I laughed, I cried, I loved it!!!

I would recommend this book to older teens and adults. There are some pretty mature themes in this book, such as homosexuality, abortion, and fairly graphic death. I would only recommend this book to mature people who would be able to handle this.

This book is definitely unique. I have a hard time coming up with a point of comparison in books. This book is remotely similar to Star Trek, but even that is a stretch. It is about exploring a new planet with new creatures and a “crew” of sorts, but it is definitely different and worth reading. It is not only well-written, but thought provoking as well. It’s a “make you think” book, one that I would certainly read again.

Where Men Win Glory

Where Men Win Glory is about football star Pat Tillman. 9/11 Terrorist attack occurs. Pat decides to join the "Army Rangers" and help the fight. Pat gave up a 3 million dollar contract to do this. Pat goes on 2 tours of Afghanistan but is later killed.

I really liked this book. Because I like books where it felt like you were there just watching battles. It had very much detail and that is what I like in a book.

I would recommend this book to a military veteran either past or present. Or a person who wants to learn about the War on Terror

I have read a book kind of like this before I can relate to a book called Purple heart. But that is the only book I ca relate this to.

Elsewhere

***********************SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!**************************
This book was about a girl that died in a bike/car accident. When she died she was on a boat. All of the people that die they go onto that boat. The boat goes to a place called Elsewhere. Elsewhere is a place like a earth off of earth. There you can have a job, a car, a pet, and even a home. There in Elsewhere they have things called observation decks where the dead can see the living but can't communicate with them. There is a place where the dead can communicate with them it is called the Well. This place is forbiden becaues it makes the living and the dead crazy. It makes a lot of people very upset. Lizzie went to this place and she got pulled up by a boat in a net. There was a man on the boat that was a lot like a FBI agent. He had the sunglasses and everything. (that is how they discribed him) She got really mad and only got a warning and if she did it again she will be taken to prison. She also got a job. She is working with the animals that dont know they are dead. There was a dog drinking out of a towlet named Susie. Lizzie told her that was nasty water (if you know what I mean) and she got freaked out.

I loved this book. It was very well written. I found nothing that I didn't like.
I would recomend this book to people that don't really get all that upset if someone out side of there family dies. I will also recomend this book to people that don't get grossed out really easily. I can't relate this book to anything that I have read.

New Moon

If you haven't read the book but seen the movie, the movie is close enough to the book it doesn't matter if you've read it or not. If you haven't done either STOP READING RIGHT NOW!!! My short summary isn't so short.
Okay. It is time to catch up on my reviews. I'm way behind. Anyway..........
I read the second Twilight book the weekend after I finished the first one. I may have actually spoken too soon (see my original Twilight post if you wanna know what I said about it). Bella was waaaay more flaky in this book than she was in the first one. Edward left less than a hundred pages in (I think) because his dad was supposed to be ten years older than he looked. They didn't really want anyone to get suspicious of the fact that they are vampires so they moved to Italy. So Bella spent most of her time trying to get adrenaline rushes so she could hear Edward's voice. She heard his voice every time she did something dangerous. Some of these activities were crashing a motorcycle and jumping off a cliff. Oh and walking up to a guy she thought tried to attack her before (She's soo smart, isn't she?). The motorcycle thing is actually important, because she has her friend Jake help her rebuild them from complete and total scrap metal. Jake actually turns out to be a werewolf later, which is really cool. Werewolfs are cooler than vamps in my opinion. Speaking of vamps, did I mention Victoria is back? You know, the red headed vampire who was dating the vampire that tried to kill Bella last year? Yeah, she came back cause Edward killed her boyfriend, so she was trying to kill Edward's girlfriend, who also happens to be Bella. The werewolves tried to keep her in Canada and eventually we didn't hear from her for a while. She did show up when Bella jumped off the cliff, but that was the last time. After Bella jumped off the cliff, Alice (Edward's "sister") came back. Edward ended up thinking Bella was dead and tried to kill himself. This is where the Volturi comes in. He tries to reveal that he is a vampire so the Volturi will kill him so he doesn't have to live without Bella (aaaw so romantic. btw i'm being sarcastic). He ends up failing because Bella shows at the last minute and proves she isn't dead. Then the Volturi comes and takes Edward to Volturi HQ (as I will call it here). They have a long conversation, mostly about how Bella can resist their powers and how mad the Volturi are because Edward told Bella about vampires. It ends up that Bella has to turn into a vampire or be killed by the Volturi. Edward doesn't like this idea. The basic end of the book is the Cullens taking a vote on whether or not to turn her. They didn't even turn her (even though they voted to). Edward refuses to turn her, but he said he will if she marries him, which she says she will.
Now if you're still reading and you haven't read the book or seen the movie, didn't I tell you to stop??? I mean, if you're Ms. Kesler it's different, but seriously if you didn't want to know all of this, then you should have stopped. Anyway...............................................
I liked this one, but Bella was way more flaky this time around. Kristen Stewart did good for once! Edward wasn't even in most of the book, but that was cool. I like Jacob better anyway. Werewolves are waaaay better than vampires. They are like giant fluffy dogs. Of course, if you get one to go wolf you've probably really ticked him off. They only go wolf when they get mad. Jacob was definitely my favorite character this time around. I think I liked this book better anyway. Maybe it had something to do with Edward's absence. I don't know for sure.
I'm going with the same recommendations, but I'm adding werewolf fans. You can't ever forget werewolves. Same age recommendation too. This one wasn't even as violent as the first one. It just kind of tells kids that you can jump of cliffs recreationally, which isn't a good thing.
~Ashleigh

The Wednesday Wars

In “The Wednesday Wars”, Holling Hoodhood is in seventh grade, where everyone in his school is either Jewish or Catholic. Everyone except Holling gets out of class early to go to church, leaving him alone with Mrs. Baker, whom he is convinced, hates him. During the time when he is alone, Mrs. Baker has him read Shakespeare. Eventually, it comes of use because his classmates find out he ate a cream puff, so he must go and buy one for each person in the class. He gets all the money he can, but comes up short, so the baker of the cream puffs makes a deal with him. If Holling performs Shakespeare, which he was in need of someone who knew some, he could have the cream puffs. A lot of stuff happens afterward that doesn't connect with the other parts of the story and I really feel compelled to say this, this was a terrible book. It had no flow, very slow, the characters were hard to relate to.

First, the story was talking about how Mrs. Baker hated Holling, then it talked about him being the only Presbyterian, then it talked about rats. It was just very lacking, story-wise. It jumped around too much and I didn't enjoy it.

It was also very slow. It had so little action that I felt like I had to force myself to read it. It was unbelievably boring. I kept thinking to myself “Why is this taking so long?” It took way too long to get its point across, that I had almost forgotten what that point was.

And, another reason is that the characters are hard to relate to. They seem so unnatural around each other and within themselves. They were very static, flat, and, for lack of a better term, boring.

This book was extremely slow paced, poorly written, and I don't understand why anyone would give this an award.

Words of Wisdom: Contrary to my belief, this book is not about war, nor two people named Wednesday in a fist fight. Buy this if you hate yourself, or if you are an English teacher who hates your students. If neither of the two, don't buy it.

Similar titles: None that are this incredibly dry and drawn out. Might I suggest the dictionary?

Things Not Seen

In “Things Not Seen”, Bobby is turned invisible and he has to go about his normal life still being invisible, well, as normal as he can. He can't go to school, go to public places without being completely naked or being completely covered in clothes. After he shows his parents he is invisible, which takes some time, his dad tries to figure out why he is invisible.

All that changes after he meets Alicia, a blind girl, at the library. He can talk to her without being exposed as the “invisible child.” And, after she finds out he is invisible, she has her parents help Bobby's figure out why Bobby is invisible. They encounter many obstacles during their quest, including the school board, a truant officer, and the government. They don't actually discover the cure for invisibility, though. They stumble across it when Bobby goes to sleep one night and wakes up visible.

Would I recommend this book? Yes, but I would suggest reading it only once. I read it a second time and didn't think the book was as good as I did the first time. I thought the plot was a bit dumb, I didn't enjoy the characters, I really just did not enjoy reading it the second time. Throughout the book, I was thinking to myself, “Maybe this is the part where it gets good.”

It didn't.

I was very disappointed when I read it the second time, for two reasons, mainly. Reason one: I loved the book the first time. I couldn't wait to start the second book in the series. That one was even worse. The second reason: I thought the story was very poor. Poorly thought out, poorly written, just didn't think it was a very good book.

You can go out and buy the book and see for yourself.

Words of Wisdom: Don't read it a second time.

Similar titles: “Things Hoped For”, “Things That Are”

Suicide Notes

Let me start off by saying, this was a phenomenal book. It was funny, the characters were all likeable and believable, the description and actual writing was great, it was just an all around great book. Let me also say this has some very mature themes in it, such as sex, language, and creepy, morbid death/suicide, though it isn't depressing. It describes his graphic sexual encounters with the other patients, as well. SPOILERS! One of them is a dude.

In “Suicide Notes”, Jeff tried to kill himself and he wakes up in the Psych ward of a mental hospital. His 45 day program doesn't allow him to leave the ward until his “sentence”, as he calls it, is up. There he meets Sadie, Bone, Alice, and Juliet. Eventually, Bone leaves and Sadie kills herself, so two other patients move in. Before those things happen, he goes about his routines for about two-thirds of the book, and then the “juicy” stuff starts to happen. That's also when Rankin, Bone's replacement shows up. Coincidence? Rankin starts bringing back feelings of why he killed himself. Jeff has sex with Rankin, and it goes into detail about the “encounters” let's call them. During his third, Juliet freaks out. It's not because she walked in on them having sex, but she finds Sadie dead after she OD'ed on some pills. After Rankin is sent away for harassing Jeff, Jeff finally starts actually talking to his therapist. Then, he remembers why he tried to kill himself, because he found out he was gay. That was my main pet peeve with this, was that one cliché. “Oh, I'm gay so I have to kill myself. No one can know.” Yes, I know it happens, but that is the one thing that's in almost every story about a gay teenager.

I really enjoyed this book. It was just the way he told it, from Jeff's perspective. He told it with sarcasm and snarkiness. He just did it really well.

Words of Wisdom: Go and buy it. It's a phenomenal book and it's really funny. It only starts dealing with homosexuality about two-thirds in and gives no real indicators the Jeff is gay until he wakes up naked, with Rankin, naked as well, next to him.

Unbroken

Unbroken was an amazing book. This book was about a famous runner named Louie. He ran in the 1936-Olympic games and won many awards. But Pearl Harbor is bombed so he decides to join the Air Force. He and his friends fly a B-24 called the "Super Man" the plane is put out of service, so they get a new plane named the "Green Hornet". He and others members aboard get shot down by Japanese planes and crash in the Pacific Ocean. They have survived in the Pacific Ocean for many days. Then they hit land where they are captured and put in POW camps. Where Louie is usually beaten and abused. I would recommend this book to a person who is a retired veteran or still in the military and anyone who want to learn about POW camps. But I cannot compare this to other books because this was my first book I have read about POW camps.

Specials

I absolutely loved this book. It was my favorite out of the Uglies Series. It's about how a girl named Tally who is a special. A super-amped fighting machine engineered to keep the uglies down and the pretties just plain stupid. But when she is offered a chance to stamp out the rebels of the new smoke permanently. Now it is up to Tally to do what she is programmed to do. Her life will never be the same. That is pretty much what it is about. What I liked about this book was its details were a little better and it really got me interested into the book. I didn't like it because the more I read I began to realize that it wasn't a really challenge for me. I just wish that it had a little more detail and explained the book a little more. I would recommend this to a young adult or a girl because I think a girl can relate to it more than a boy would if he read the Uglies Series. I would compare this book to Extra’s even though it is written by the same author it sort of has the same content to it. I loved the Uglies Series.

Never Let Me Go

I finished Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro several weeks ago. Even though it has taken me a while to write the review, I really enjoyed the book. This book is technically an adult novel, so there are lots of mature themes throughout. The main people in this book are clones, which adds an interesting layer to the already fairly complex plot.

The plot centers around Kathy and her two best friends, Tommy and Ruth. They went to school together at what was apparently one of the better schools for clones. The book is divided into three parts, which are the three parts of clone life, childhood (their schooling), adulthood (life in the cottages, most freedom), and donors (where Kathy is a “carer” or nurse for both Ruth and Tommy). The Donor stage is the part of life for which clones were bred: to make donations to help the medical community.

I really liked that this book was complex. It’s not just Kathy’s story, it’s the story of Kathy uncovering the truth about clones, her school, and her future. The plot is never void of surprises, and it never really gets dull, even when the life being described was. It was a great “make you think” book.

The only problem I had with this book at all was some adult content. I mean, I was able to handle it just fine, but it was there. The book talks about things like sex and death quite frequently, plus some other things. Nothing very graphic, however.

I would recommend this book to any adult looking for a thought-provoking read and any mature teenager looking for the same. This is adult fiction, so the content is the only snag point, but with a certain level of maturity, it should be fine.

I would compare this book to books like Ender’s Game. The plots are nothing alike, but the “make you think,” the dark twists, and the skewed view of the future (even though this book was supposed to take place in the 90s). Both are very interesting to read and I would recommend both very highly.