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Audience Pick!

Title: Catalyst
Author: Laurie Halse Anderson
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4.5/5
Why I Read It: Because you told me to!

Summary: High school senior Kate is at the top of her class. She could attend just about any school, but it’s MIT she wants. All that matters is getting that acceptance package, but that’s okay because Kate’s got everything under control. After a fire in her neighborhood, Kate’s father the reverend opens up their house—more specifically Kate’s room—to the one girl from school she can’t stand, and suddenly Kate’s not so in control anymore.

Review: LHA hit the overachieving nail on the head with Kate’s character. This woman can WRITE. On just about every page of this book, I found myself marveling at a turn of phrase. Case in point:

I shiver and hustle to my sad excuse of a motor vehicle, a Yugo named Bert.

I usually drive to school on autopilot. Not today—leaving late has landed me smack in the middle of rush-hour traffic. This is bad. Bert fears traffic. Bert is a wuss, a tissue box on tires with a bulimic hunger for motor oil. I pet the dashboard as I turn onto the main road, and promise him a filter change if he can get me to school without overheating.

I was completely and utterly in love with this book…until one plot point threw me out of the story world because it affected me so much. I don’t want to give spoilers, but does anyone who’s read this know what I mean? Maybe it’s just me.

Even so, I loved this book, and I think you will too.

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Did you like this book? Try:

• Speak—My rating: 5/5
• Twisted
• Fever 1793—My rating: 4/5
• More Recommendations from LibraryThing

Can you trust me? Compare our taste!

Title: Jack Tumor
Author: Anthony McGowan
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4.5/5
Why I Read It: It released in 2009, and I was in the mood for something new.

Summary: Hector’s hearing voices—well, one voice—and that’s never good. And this particular voice happens to be a talking brain tumor. Also not good.

Review: Hey, writers! Are you grappling with how to tackle a heavy topic like mortality without making a total downer of a book? Here’s a little known technique that might do the trick: Add a talking brain tumor!

I know, this book sounds weird. I picked it up at the library without reading the premise, so when I got home and saw what it was, I pawned it off on my partner.

And then he started laughing. Out loud. A lot.

So I had to see for myself. I’m here to report that yes, this book is weird. But it’s also bloody brilliant. Note: I can get away with saying “bloody” because of the aforementioned brain tumor but also because the author is British, which serves as further proof that non-American English-speakers can write a damn good book.

Sometimes, the funny bits turned into tangents that seemed to exist for funny’s sake and not the story’s sake. But they were awfully funny, after all, and it was only a couple times that the tangents interrupted the flow of the story. (I hesitated even saying anything because I loved this book so much, but I wanted to explain why it didn’t get a full 5 stars from me.)

Check it out for yourself:

“Hector?”

A man looking a lot like a doctor was staring at me. …

I nodded.

“I’m Dr. Jones.”

I nodded again. He hadn’t said anything yet that I felt like disagreeing with.

“As you know, this is a teaching hospital. Would you mind if some ah, observers sat in?”

Before I had the chance to mind, a group of gormless-looking students began filing into the room. Not all gormless-looking. There was one exceptionally pretty girl, with the kind of straight black hair I like.

It meant I was going to get an anal probe for sure.

I felt the electric tingle of a blush as the whole scene played out before me: the pink rubberized truncheon they were going to use, the sparking electrodes at the end of the probe, the giggle from the students at the farting noise produced as the probe was extracted, my stuttering efforts to say it wasn’t me but the probe that made the noise.

“So, you’ve been having some problems?” said Doc Jones.

Problems! Where did I start?

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Did you like this book? Try these recommendations from LibraryThing.

Title: Paper Towns
Author: John Green
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4.5/5
Summary: High school senior Quentin can’t believe his luck when his crush Margo chooses him as her partner in crime in an elaborate all-nighter around town. But then she disappears, and he doesn’t know whether she’s just being Margo or if something bad actually happened.

Review: From the first page:

Most of my friends were in the band, and most of my free time during school was spent within twenty feet of the band room. But I was not in the band, because I suffer from the kind of tone deafness that is generally associated with actual deafness.

That totally cracked me up, but maybe I just have an odd sense of humor. Here’s another one you can try on for size. Quentin is trying to convince himself to stay somewhere a little, um, rustic:

I resolved right then to stay until morning. If Margo had slept here, I could, too. And thus commenced a brief conversation with myself.
Me: But the rats.
Me: Yeah, but they seem to stay in the ceiling.
Me: But the lizards.
Me: Oh, come on. You used to pull their tails off when you were little. You’re not scared of lizards.
Me: But the rats.
Me: Rats can’t really hurt you anyway. They’re more scared of you than you are of them.
Me: Okay, but what about the rats?
Me: Shut up.

But this book is more than funny. I loved exploring what happens when you put someone on a pedestal. I loved the adventure of the road trip. I loved learning about paper towns.

The only thing I didn’t love about this book—and it’s just the eensiest teensiest thing—is some of the dialogue at the end of the book revealing what happened to Margo. The dialogue felt a little too speech-y to me, but I also don’t know how that could be avoided given what we had to learn about at that stage of the story.

I look forward to reading more from this author. Plus, he’s on LibraryThing, which makes him even cooler in my book and therefore more likely to move up in my to-read list.

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Title: Prom
Author: Laurie Halse Anderson
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4.5/5
Summary: High school senior Ashley Hannigan has 0% interest in going to the prom. But after a teacher is busted for stealing the prom committee’s money and the head of the committee (who just so happens to be her best friend) begs for help, Ashley finds herself trying to pull together a dance she doesn’t even care about.

Review: While I enjoy Anderson’s historical fiction (Chains, Fever 1793), I’ve now come to the conclusion that I prefer her modern setting novels. Speak is one of my all-time favorite YA novels, and I loved loved loved this book too.

Prom was a quick, fun read, but don’t take that to mean it’s superficial. It’s a sweet story but set in the real world for once—a real world where kids go through metal detectors to get to school. Girls like Ashley are out there, and a lot of them. She’s smart and funny, but she doesn’t have a magical power or a perfect face or even a terribly dysfunctional family. She’s real, true. And her story was an absolute treat to read.

Here’s a little taste of Ashley’s story for you:

Second period, English 12: American Literary Connections, Basic, was a waste. Mr. Fugal yelled at us for not reading this poem by Langston Hughes. It was about a bird.

I liked Fugal at the beginning of the year, but he lost me when he made us read The Old Man and the Sea. Birds! Fish! Why couldn’t we read about people?

Since nobody knew the stupid bird poem, Fugal told us to take out our persuasive essay outlines. Persuasive essay? Not even the kids who paid attention had a clue what he was talking about. Fugal exploded.

Then the first miracle happened.

A fire drill.

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Title: Cracked Up to Be
Author: Courtney Summers
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4.5/5
Summary: High school senior Parker Fadley has it all—a perfect boyfriend, perfect grades, perfect control over her cheerleading squad. But something horrible happens, and it might be her fault. And her whole perfect world comes crashing down.

Review: I got this book free through the LibraryThing early reviewers program, so I didn’t have high expectations. Because if a publisher is pawning off free advance copies to book geeks like me, how good could it be?

Oh, how wrong I was. This book is excellent.

Parker is a perfectionist grappling with the fact that she made a mistake, and a big one at that. So of course she freaks out. And that freaking out, that pain, is delicious in a way. Delicious because the author completely and utterly captured the anxiety and sick logic of a perfectionist.

But Parker’s not just a messed up girl. She’s also wicked funny and sarcastic! Ah, to have the gift of the quick comeback. I so envy her for that.

I’m glad I gave this book a chance, even though it was free. It was well worth it. (And I know I need to rethink my prejudice against free books. It’s really not fair to them!)

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