Prom

The Bookworm says... Maybe. Prom by Laurie Halse Anderson was an alright book. Ashley Hannigan s a very normal girl. Her best friend is in charge of the prom committee, and Ashley stays as far from prom as possible. When they find out that their math teacher stole all of the money for prom, they need to think quick. Ashley is dragged down into prom buisness, everything is crazy.  Will they pull of the prom, and will everyone manage to attend? This novel is not like other Laurie Halse Anderson book I have read. It is a very normal book, written for the normal kids out there. 

"Prom was stupid for me, but not for them, and I wasn't such a butthead that I couldn't see the difference. But I didn't know what to say or do." 

Previously reviewed: Speak, The Impossible Knife of Memory

We Were Liars

The Bookworm says... Yes. We Were Liars by E. Lockhart was a very interesting book. The Sinclairs are a perfect family. No one is a thief, no on is a liar. No one is a failure. Cadence is the eldest Sinclair grandchild, therefore heir to the private Beechwood Island. All of the cousins go to Beechwood every summer. The Liars have been a group since summer five when Gat started coming to the island. Gat and his father Ed are the only non white residents of the island. The Liars are all best friends planning revenge and crazy pranks. Cadence is in love with Gat. Was in love. Is in love. Whichever. One summer, everything goes wrong. A rebellion with a bad ending. Cadence is found on the beach unconscious after "The Accident". She lost her memory. This is the tale of Cadence, trying to remeber what happened that summer, Summer Fifteen, the fate of her loved ones, and if the motto still stands. Are the Sinclairs perfect? Or have they just created a perfect facade? 

Amazon Book of the Month.

"Someone once wrote that a novel should deliver a series of astonishments. I get the same thing by spending an hour with you." 

The Symptoms of My Insanity

The Bookworm says... Maybe. Symptoms of My Insanity by Mindy Raf was a good book. Izzy seems like a normal girl. A normal girl with a not-so-normal mom, and a not-so-normal bra size. Izzys mom has a rare stomach cancer, and her condition is worsening. Izzys sister is at college, leaving her to care for her mom. Also, she is constantly self conscious of her large breasts. On top of this she is extremely paranoid about everything, and tends to self diagnose herself with various diseases using Symptomaniac.com. Plus, she has a huge art portfolio due. In three weeks. Her best friend starts to act strange, and Izzy has no idea what is going on. Then, her major-long-time crush starts hitting on her. She tries to handle everything, but were her impressions of people wrong? Does he really like her, or is he using her? Is her mom keeping things from her? And at this rate, will she ever make it to graduation? In my opinion, the book itself was great. But, there is always a hamartia (fatal flaw). This story's fatal flaw is the subplots. There are subplots upon subplots upon subplots, which I was not a fan of. 

"The only prescription is a dose of reality." 

Willow

The Bookworm says... Yes! Willow by Julia Hoban was a fantastically real book. It was a dark and rainy night, and Willows parents had an extra bottle of wine at dinner, so they asked Willow to drive them home. On the way home, Willow hit a tree and both of her parents were killed. Now she is stuck living with her older-college professor-brother David and his wife and daughter, and the pain that she killed her parents. She has to move out of her house, and start a new school. The only way she is able to deal with the pain is by cutting herself. She engages in this activity daily, and it is her secret. Until a student she is helping at the library names Guy spots the bleeding scar ripped open. He immediately makes Willow his project- but she eventually becomes less of a project and more of a friend. Will they become more than friends? Will Willow be able to talk to her brother like a normal person? Will she stop cutting? Will she ever turn the page of this tragedy that happens to be her life? This book was brutally honest, which isn't something you see every day. The only thing I didn't like was the ending. The book ended with a "..."  The story actually finished with a dot dot dot. I HATE books that end like that. The three little dots almost killed the book. But, aside from the dot dot dot, this book was stunning. 

Florida Teens Read Nominee

"It's hard to keep a secret when it's written all over your body..."

Hate List

The Bookworm says... Yes! Hate List by Jennifer Brown is a very original story. A good original. Valerie is going out with a boy named Nick, and couldn't be happier. They are the "losers" at school, and are picked on often. To vent, Valerie starts a "Hate List". Nick helps her with this list, and they hate the popular kids together. On May 2nd, 2008, one of these "popular kids" broke Valerie's MP3 player, and Nick says he has the perfect revenge. Valerie assumes he is going to insult her, maybe spit on her shoes or punch her boyfriend. But instead, he walks over to Christy Bruter, and says "You've been first on the list for a long time", pulls out a gun, and shoots her. He then proceeds to shoot many people on the list, and some that were just in his way. Valerie jumps in front of a girl named Jessica Campbell, with whom she is not even close to friends, and saves her life. Nick then turned the gun on himself. It is a long recovery for those injured,and a long grieving process for those who lost loved ones. Valerie is a suspect of the shooting, because it was her hate list. Valerie struggles to get her name cleared, her leg healed, and her conscience cleared. Will the stress of this event be too much to handle? This book was excellent, and surely not anything I have ever read before. 

ALA Best Book for Young Adults

VOYA Perfect Ten

School Library Journal Best Book of the Year

"The list was my idea. I didn't mean for anyone to die. Will you ever forgive me?" 

Love and Other Perishable Items

The Bookworm says... Maybe. Love and Other Perishable Items by Laura Buzo was not a bad book, it just wasn't outstanding! Amelia is 14 years and 9 months old, and working her first job at a supermarket. Leave it to Amelia to fall in love with her co-workers. That in itself is an issue, but this particular co-worker happens to be a 22 year old uni student named Chris. Amelia tries to keep her cool around Chris, and succeeds. They become close friends, but nothing more. Until one night at another co-workers birthday. They are both drunk, and Chris kissed Amelia. They both leave the party with very different expectations of where their relationship will go. This book starts out in Amelia's point of view, then transfers into Chris's point of view through his journal entries. 

William C. Morris Debut Award Finalist

"Love is awkward. Amelia should know."

Brain on Fire

The Bookworm says... Definitely. Brain on Fire -My Month of Madness- by Susannah Cahalan was an outstanding memoir of disease. Susannah has her life put together, living on her own in Manhattan, working at the New York Post. Then, she has a bedbug scare. She begins to obbsess over this bedbug scare. You could call this the beginning. There were never any bedbugs. Susannah begins to have extreme mood swings, and high anxiety, until one night with her boyfriend Stephen, she has a seizure. She is diagnosed with bipolar disorder, then schizophrenia, then alcoholism, and multiple other things. None of these diagnosises seem to make sense. She is admitted to the epilepsy floor of NYU, and is a very difficult patient. Many doctors join and depart from her case, but the most effective will be Dr. Najjar and Dr. Dalmau. Almost a million dollars are spent on blood work, PET scans, CT scans, MRIs, and more tests, to figure out what is going on with Susannah. It turns out all they needed to do was have her draw a clock. The doctors discover that the right side of her brain is inflamed. Through a brain biopsy and multiple spinal taps, it's confirmed that Susannah is dealing with anti- NMDA receptor autoimmune encephalitis. She is the 217th person to be diagnosed. She will survive this, but will she ever be the Susannah everyone knows and loves? This was an outstanding book, based off of an article written by Susannah entitled "My Month of Madness". Susannah is an inspiration for young women around the globe fighting anti- NMDA receptor autoimmune encephalitis.