Review: Kissing Tennessee by Kathi Appelt

Kissing Tenessee: and Other Stories from the Stardust Dance
by Kathi Appelt
Published: April 1, 2004
Publisher: HMH Books for Young Readers
Available: Amazon

Synopsis:
Mason and Carrie Marie can't get up the courage to ask each other to dance. Russ's girlfriend has died, and now he's just trying to live without her. Peggy Lee has grown up with Tennessee--how can she ever think of him as more than a friend?

In these moving tales and others, Kathi Appelt captures the sometimes amusing, sometimes touching missteps of some unforgettable students, who come together one last time for the most memorable night of their young lives.

Review:
I picked this up because really who can resist a bunch of stories centered on a dance? Okay, so lots of people. I however am not one of them. I was lucky enough that my junior high had dances every month in addition to the lunch time sock-hops the last Friday of every month (No, I didn't grow up in the 50's!).

I loved the idea of this book, and some of the story blurbs were exactly what I was looking for. That said, it just didn't deliver. I wanted drama, romance, fun, and a few tears. What I got was vague emotions from the characters, little to no character development, and a tiny little book with a large number of stories. I really feel that Appelt should have just focused on a few of the short stories and built them up enough to get the reader to actually care about what is happening. I can understand not wanting to turn everything into a novel, but even short stories need to have some character depth.

This would be a book I'd recommend for a tween with a short attention span.

Review: Ever by Jessa Russo

Ever (Ever, #1)
by Jessa Russo
Published: October 1, 2012

Publisher: Curiosity Quills Press
Available: Amazon

Synopsis:

Seventeen-year-old Ever’s love life has been on hold for the past two years. She’s secretly in love with her best friend Frankie, and he’s completely oblivious.

Of course, it doesn't help that he’s dead, and waking up to his ghost every day has made moving on nearly impossible.

Frustrated and desperate for something real, Ever finds herself falling for her hot new neighbor Toby. His relaxed confidence is irresistible, and not just Ever knows it. But falling for Toby comes with a price that throws Ever’s life into a whirlwind of chaos and drama. More than hearts are on the line, and more than Ever will suffer.

Some girls lose their hearts to love.

Some girls lose their minds.

Ever Van Ruysdael could lose her soul.

Review:
There were so many things I wanted to like about this book. The ghost of a childhood crush, a girl who was a devoted to his memory, a hot new neighbor. Combined they should have made an awesome read. Instead this story fell flat.

So, Frankie is dead and he's been haunting Ever for the past two years. Which was pretty much fine by her because she was fifteen (or was it fourteen) and madly in love with him when he died, although he never once thought of her that way. Having Frankie haunt her and her family is just peachy because this way she knows that she never has to move on and actually experience any healthy relationships. Then Toby moves in next door and he's hot enough that Ever realizes she's not dead like Frankie and maybe she should move on with her life.

I spent the entire novel rooting for Ever and Toby. Yes, Frankie appears first, and there's the whole unrequited love issue Ever has going on with him, but seriously? He's a 17 year old ghost with a pompadour and a cigarette behind his ear, who is actually pretty mean to Ever. There was a lot of Ever flip flopping between her love of Toby and Frankie. And really, it's pretty pathetic how quickly she does it. One minute she's making out with Toby the next she's realizing Frankie is her life (despite the fact he has none) and then it's back to Toby.

A few other characters appear and it's kind of hard to figure out what their motives really are. By the end I was confused and disappointed, and maybe even a little angry. Ever was set up to be a girl who had realized that she was wasting her life day dreaming over someone she could never have, who was determined to move on with her life, and then she just folds.

While the writing wasn't bad, this is not a series I am the least bit interested in continuing. I have a feeling that the next book will simply weaken Ever to the point of no return.

Review: The Earthquake Machine by Mary Pauline Lowry

The Earthquake Machine 

by Mary Pauline Lowry

Published: September 2011

Available: Amazon

Synopsis:

The Earthquake Machine tells the story of 14 year-old Rhonda. On the outside, everything looks perfect in Rhonda's world but at home Rhonda has to deal with a manipulative father who keeps her mentally ill mother hooked on pharmaceuticals. The only reliable person in Rhonda's life is her family's Mexican yardman, Jesús. But when the INS deports Jesús back to his home state of Oaxaca, Rhonda is left alone with her increasingly painful family situation.

Determined to find her friend Jesús, Rhonda seizes an opportunity to run away during a camping trip with friends. She swims to the Mexican side of the Rio Grande and makes her way to the border town of Boquillas, Mexico. There a peyote-addled bartender convinces her she won't be safe traveling alone into the country's interior. So with the bartender's help, Rhonda cuts her hair and assumes the identity of a Mexican boy named Angel. She then sets off on a burro across the desert to look for Jesús.

Thus begins a wild adventure that explores the borders between the United States and Mexico, adolescence and adulthood, male and female, English and Spanish, and adult coming-of-age and Young Adult novels.

Review:
The book will appeal to some readers, however it just wasn't for me. At all. And the synopsis doesn't really represent what this book is focused on. I was expecting a girl's adventure novel, full of challenges both physically and emotionally.  That is not what The Earthquake Machine gives its reader, and I'm finding it really hard to figure out what I want to say about it. 

There are positives to the book. Lowry obviously has a wonderful descriptive writing style. She brings to life the setting and really gives the reader an amazing view of Mexico. 

That said, I felt really uncomfortable reading a lot of the book, and I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable if I knew my teenage niece was reading this book. I'm no prude, and I have no problem with sex, drugs, crude language, and violence in YA novels. They are real parts of many teens' lives. But there is such a focus on detailing the sexual aspects in this book, and combined with the crude language it just felt out of place. I'm not really interested reading a detailed account of a young girl figuring out how to masturbate (on p.5), or finding an 'earthquake machine' that will help her along.

There were so many events that I just didn't buy, because they seemed so unbelievable, especially when they are all combined together. And even those that were believable took a turn into the bizarre, including her obsessive love/hate for a much older man (aka pedophile). I just didn't buy it or most of the other things that happened. 

This almost felt like a tirade against all the men in Rhonda's life, and that the whole book was her journey to finding a sexual identity. All of which is fine if I could have only believed that these things could have happened. There were a lot of aspects of a coming-of-age story, but I just don't think it is a YA novel. For a journey of self discovery, The Earthquake machine just left me with a sour taste in my mouth and the feeling that 10 years down the road Rhonda is going to be a bitter, man-bashing, single woman who blames everything wrong with her life on the men around her.

Review: Where I Belong by Gwendolyn Heasley

Where I Belong by Gwendolyn Heasley
 Published: February 2011

Publisher: HarperTeen

Available: Amazon

Synopsis:

Meet Corrinne. She's living every girl's dream in New York City - shopping sprees at Barney's, open access to the best clubs and parties, and her own horse at the country club. Her perfect life is perfectly on track. At least it was...

When Corrinne's father is laid off, her world suddenly falls apart. Instead of heading to boarding school, she's stripped of her credit cards and shipped off to the boonies of Texas to live with her grandparents. On her own in a big public school and forced to take a job shoveling manure, Corrinne is determined to get back the life she's supposed to be living. She doesn't care who she stomps on in the process. But when Corrinne makes an unlikely friend and discovers a total hottie at work, she begins to wonder if her life B.R. - before the recession- was as perfect as it seemed.

Review: **This review will contain spoilers

Wow. This was no where as good as I'd hoped. I'd seen this as part of a giveaway on the Spring Fling Blog Hop and the description grabbed me as much as the cover. I love Texas romances (so much I even moved to Texas and married a Texan!), and I love sweet romances. This looked and sounded like it would be perfect for me. Instead, I was disappointed and frustrated (and not in a good way).

The book starts off with a preface written by the main character Corrinne, telling us that if we don't  like her at first, to keep reading. Well she was right, at least partly. I didn't like her at the start, but contrary to the suggestion that I would grow to like her I never did. She is selfish, self absorbed, prejudiced, snobby, and an all round b***h. Right up until maybe the last two chapters when she then suddenly realizes what a horrible person she is and makes a last ditch effort to accept the friendship of Kitsy and romantic interest of Bubby. Yes, accept. Because I'm supposed to somehow believe that she actually deserves these things?

The romance angle is way over stated. There is practically no romance to this book. Bubby - yes, apparently that is his name, because every Texas town has a Bubby, right? Gagh! Having lived 10 years in Texas I never meet a Bubby. (I'm ignoring that fact that my sister-in-law calls my husband Bubba, because he absolutely hates it.) Bubby is barely in the story. Corrinne uses him as a stand in date, she ditches him, calls him names, constantly insults him and judges him, and yet he still likes her?! Even Corrinne doesn't understand that and asks him why, to which he responds that she's full of surprises. Uh no, she's not. From the opening page which establishes her as a Blair Waldorf/Paris Hilton wannabe, everything she says and does is exactly as I predicted.

The only thing that kept me mildly interested was Kitsy. I wanted to see if she would finally stand up to Corrinne and her judgmental attitude, but alas, Kitsy is a stereotypical Southern girl with all the right manners and just accepts Corrinne's judgment as her due while fawning over how wonderful Corrinne is.

*Here are the big spoilers,so you are warned*
The ending was a huge disappointment. Heasley seemed to be trying to wrap it up in a way that would be just perfect. Corrinne's father's company magically comes out of the recession and create a wonderful new job for him back in New York, Corrinne gets to go to the exclusive boarding school she's whined about the entire book, she realizes she's been snobby, and she decides to accept and return Bubby's interest in her (even though she's now moving away!). What the hell?! The more I think about it the angrier I get.

There wasn't anything that made me hate this book, and even though I didn't like the main character or the stereotypes displayed, it was well written and I think there will be people who could enjoy the story. Maybe I would have been one of those people if I hadn't gone in believing it was a romance or that by the end I would like Corrinne. 

Review: Revealing Eden (Save the Pearls #1) by Victoria Foyt

Revealing Eden (Save the Pearls #1) 
by Victoria Foyt

Published: October 2011

Publisher: Sand Dollar Press Inc

Available: Amazon

Blurb:

Eden Newman must mate before her 18th birthday in six months or she'll be left outside to die in a burning world. But who will pick up her mate-option when she's cursed with white skin and a tragically low mate-rate of 15%? In a post-apocalyptic, totalitarian, underground world where class and beauty are defined by resistance to an overheated environment, Eden's coloring brands her as a member of the lowest class, a weak and ugly Pearl. If only she can mate with a dark-skinned Coal from the ruling class, she'll be safe. Just maybe one Coal sees the Real Eden and will be her salvation her co-worker Jamal has begun secretly dating her. But when Eden unwittingly compromises her father's secret biological experiment, she finds herself in the eye of a storm and thrown into the last area of rainforest, a strange and dangerous land. Eden must fight to save her father, who may be humanity's last hope, while standing up to a powerful beast-man she believes is her enemy, despite her overwhelming attraction. Eden must change to survive but only if she can redefine her ideas of beauty and of love, along with a little help from her "adopted aunt" Emily Dickinson.

Review:

What? What?! How can I even start? There are so many things about this book that are just completely - Argh! I can't even think of how to describe it.

Revealing Eden starts off with a fairly interesting premise. Radiation is permeating the ozone and has managed to kill of the majority of fair skinned people. Survivors live under ground in a society based on a racial class system with white people at the bottom and black people at the top. Definitely a twist on racial issues I could find new and interesting. Then the author names the whites as 'Pearls'. Yes, Pearls. You know those rare and precious stones? What a horrible name for them. How atrocious. I'm white and I don't think being called a pearl would offend me. And trust me I've been called racist names before. What's even worse is that the first racist comment of the book actually comes from Eden, our Pearl protagonist.

I could have still gone along with the story if it had some kind of focus. What starts as a dystopian, takes an abrupt turn into Fantasy, as one of the characters undergoes a procedure to turn himself into a jaguar hybrid. The story moves out of the combs of their racial society and into the rainforest, where it then becomes a mesh of South/Central American mythology and environmentalist preaching.

On top of this is the total lack of a likeable, coherent main character. Eden is whiny, selfish, racist, self hating and all round bit*h. She is constantly flip flopping between pitying herself, hating herself and hating everyone else. She's a completely unlikable character. I didn't buy into anything she felt that was not negative. Her father is completely oblivious to her and couldn't care a bit about her in any capacity other than how she can help him in his scientific discoveries, yet there is a moment when Eden believes she is about to die that she decides he does care for her and she's been a fool to not see it. What? Like when she nearly drown and he told her it was an inconvenience, or when he chose his research over her life, while she had a gun pressed to her head? But wait! When she comes back alive, he does seem to care, so much he might even shed a tear! There was another moment when she decided she was wrong about her treatment of Bramford, the lead male of the story, simply because she put on a pretty dress, then moments later decides to try escaping him, because she hates him.

Bramford is at least interesting, and I wish the book had actually been told from his perspective. He makes some radical life changing decisions and has a past that makes his choices even more powerful. He's honestly the most human character and it's pretty obvious from the first scene with him that he's meant to be Eden's love interest despite her prejudice and constant hate filled words.

The love story angle is even more What?! One moment Eden can't stand Bramford, then he turns into a half human, half jaguar and she spends the rest of the book lusting after him, breathing heavy, squeezing her thighs, groaning and moaning. I thought it was about to turn into a porn or something. If she wasn't panting then she was blaming him for everything wrong with her life. Then just as suddenly she loves him. But wait! He loves someone else. So, how does Eden treat this person she claims to love? She tricks him into sharing painful details of the woman he loved and then uses them to hurt him. Deliberately. Of course, she kindly lets the reader know every few pages that he is a beast, a selfish beast, so she must be justified, right? Of course, because she's a horrible dirty Pearl, while he's a precious Coal.

I'm really sad to say that I spent about five days reading this, when I could have been doing anything else. I'd only recommend this for fantasy readers not offended by the idea of human/animal relations.

Review: Growing Pains: Kendra's Diaries by K.P. Smith

Growing Pains: Kendra's Diaries 

by K.P. Smith

Published: May 2011

Publisher: Do It Publishing

Available: Amazon

Blurb:

Growing Pains; Kendra's Dairies is the first book in the series chronicling the journey of Kendra Foster from adolescence to adulthood.

I aspire to encourage, entertain, and inspire young adults. Life has its ups and downs, its bumps, and its bruises. But with perseverance, determination, and faith you can be all you were born to be.

Never Give Up!

Review:

There were certain elements of this book that I really loved and others that drove me nuts! So, let me start off with the things I loved :)

Kendra. She is flawed, she is real, she is African-American and she is facing real problems that many other young girls face. Kendra's one of those characters that isn't overly perfect and can be related to easily. I love that she is an African-American living in New Orleans, because it is representative of the population there and, although she could easily have been written as white, it is a nice change in a market flooded with white protagonists. (As a teacher this is a very frustrating fact). I especially love that she is a normal 13-year-old girl that isn't obsessed with one boy, and constantly going on about how he is her life.

The other characters in the book are also believable and again the situations were believable and relateable for a younger teen audience. Kendra goes through a number of experiences that most girls will. Preparing to enter high school, first crush, fighting with her best friend, first kiss, jealousy, arguing parents. Her life is very normal. And that leads to my first issue.

Normal can be, well, boring. There was no sense of urgency in this novel. Things happened and Kendra learned to move on. We didn't necessarily see or feel her confusion or despair when her dad walked out on them, and the love interest is only mildly developed. As much as I am for non-obsessive teen love, preteen and younger teens tend toward the obsessive, especially with first love. I think more narration about her feels would have given more importance to the issues she was facing.

Setting was another area I thought the author should have given more consideration to. New Orleans is a city full of life and culture. Sadly there wasn't really any details that made New Orleans different from any other city in the US. But more important was the time frame. It took me until I was almost half way through the book to realize this story was taking place during the 1980's. Later on there were references to 80's specific people or items that made it clear, but then it felt more like a trip down memory lane for the author. Will today's teens really want to read two pages of comparisons between the the love lives of Kendra and her friend being compared to those on Dallas?

The dialogue was the final area I felt that needed strengthening. Listen to any teen, even way back in the 80's and they spoke casually, using contractions and slang. Everything the characters said sounded very formal. And from my experiences living in the South for over ten years, people down there are anything but formal in their speech. I just wanted to shake these characters and tell them to speak normally. This is Smith's debut novel, and I think that as the series continues Smith will find a more natural voice for her characters. 
 

Review: Tempest by Julie Cross

Tempest  

by Julie Cross

Published: January 2012

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

Available: Amazon  

Blurb:

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun. That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities. But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him. Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

Review:
 I really wish I could say that the blurb or the cover attracted me to this book, but neither of them did. I entered a free drawing through Goodreads and it seemed mildly interesting. It also had a lot of interest so I assumed good things. Well, after finishing it, I cannot understand why. According to the ARC version I received there is a HUGE amount of marketing going into this book, and it already has a movie deal signed. But I'm at a total loss as to why?! This book was a complete mess. From the cover to the last page.

First the cover is a complete rip off. Okay so it's in color, but there is absolutely no way the publishing company didn't see an eerie resemblance to Becca Fitzpatrick's Hush, Hush cover. What is wrong with cover artists today? The cover doesn't even depict a scene from the book!! There's one moment it seems close to but still, where is the originality?

On to the plot. Time travel? I'll go with it. I'm not a huge fan (apart from Back to the Future movies), but it's not being over done in today's market. The problem is that this came off as a mesh of Time Cop, The Butterfly Effect and Jumper. And not only that, but what seems to be original is a complete mess. There is absolutely no logic to the time jumps happening. The hero Jackson jumps into the past, then into the future, then creates an alternate past and still manages to jump into a future similar to the one he was first in, but not like the one he was going to be in after going into the past and creating an alternate. Confused? Yeah, well so was I. And what's worse is there is absolutely no point to anything he does after the big jump he initially takes. Everything could have been solved if he'd simply stayed there, because no matter what he does in the past, it won't change the future, except when it creates an alternate future (which apparently makes sense in this book).

Oh, the characters, or character I should say. Jackson is a boy. No, he really is. I say that because I think the author forgot this fact at moments (many moments). Like when he goes into the past and thinks about how all the college kids he sees would be surprised that Jon and Kate broke up. Really? Teenage boys know and care who Jon and Kate are? And they assume a mass of other college kids will too? Please. Teenage guys care about very few things. Sex, sports, technology, girls, working out. Any of these I could believe, but a middle aged married couple with eight kids? Anytime there was an opportunity for Cross to address even the faintest physical contact it's glossed over, and it didn't feel like she was trying to shield her young readers, but that she didn't know how to describe it from a boy's perspective. What a cop out. If you're writing from a boy's perspective, and having it centered around a romance (which this book supposedly is), then get me in the mind of this boy, and be honest about it. (This is exactly why I have yet to attempt writing from a male's point of view.)

Jackson is also a flake. And not one I would want as my boyfriend. Here he is with this amazing ability to time travel and instead of telling his girlfriend, he stands her up multiple times, pays off her roommate with his credit card (oh, boy did I mention that he's uber rich?), and then when she's shot and laying dying in his arms he time jumps back too far. So there's the big problem he faces. Not that his girlfriend, Holly, is dying in his future, but that he's stuck in the past. At first he tries to get back to her, but within a couple of chapters, he's trying to see his dead sister, uncover his father's secret government job, and date the younger version of his dying girlfriend, because really, why try and get back to help her when he can have a younger one?

Review of Zombie Blondes by Brian James

Review of Zombie Blondes by Brian James
Published: June 2008
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends

ISBN: 9780312372989
Available: Amazon

GoodReads Blurb:

From the moment Hannah Sanders arrived in town, she felt there was something wrong.
     A lot of houses were for sale, and the town seemed infected by an unearthly quiet. And then, on Hannah’s first day of classes, she ran into a group of cheerleaders—the most popular girls in school.
     The odd thing was that they were nearly identical in appearance: blonde, beautiful, and deathly pale.
     But Hannah wants desperately to fit in—regardless of what her friend Lukas is telling her: if she doesn’t watch her back, she’s going to be blonde and popular and dead—just like all the other zombies in this town. . . .

***

Come on! What is up with YA authors wimping out on the true strength of Zombies? What has happened to the good old zombies needing to feed? The constant craving they have to devour human flesh? The fact that zombies are supposed to be the risen dead?!! 


The cover should have been my first warning that this book was not going to go the logical and traditional route of zombies. Don't get me wrong, I think the cover is brilliantly done and definitely drew me in, but what you see on the cover is the exact way the zombies look. No rotting flesh, no dirt and blood covered skin. Just pretty, blond girls.


So, I get that the author is trying to say something about society's need to follow the leader, especially in high school, but it just seemed over done. What non-popular kid in high school hasn't thought of or joked about the popular kids being zombies, or clones of each other? There was potential with the story, but James couldn't pull it off. Maybe it has to do with the fact that he has no idea how teenage girls think.


Hannah starts fairly likable. She's obviously had a rough time constantly moving around the country with her father, and she's like most teens, wanting to fit in, to be popular. That is where I see the similarities ending. Hannah is obsessed, which could have been humorous, if the novel had been going in that direction, and if Hannah hadn't been such a self-absorbed, selfish, and downright rude character. Despite being constantly snubbed by the popular blond girls (zombies) she keeps going back for more, complaining about not having friends, then being a complete b***h to the few students who do try to befriend her. She was stupid and frankly I wish she had died at the end (sorry for the spoiler, but I'm just to angry to not put it in!).

I'm going to skip all of the abusive friendship and romantic relationship stuff because I would simply rant about it forever. 


The plot is left with huge dangling threads. There's an almost constant reminder (every single chapter mentions it at least once) that her father was once a police officer, but is now on the run, and yet at the end nothing. We never find out what he did. There's no closure to this story, just a big cop out by James, maybe he was hoping for a series. I sincerely hope not.

The actual writing style has it's downfalls as well. James has a habit of dropping the subjects of his sentences. This can work occasionally. Occasionally. Here are some examples I randomly pulled:


(p40) We take a few steps over the grass together before Diana tells me she's got to go the other way. Says good-bye but doesn't walk away.


(p58) He adjusts the tape that wraps around the remote to hold in the batteries. Taps it gently against the palm of his hand...

(p.82) I snatch my backpack up off the ground. Start to stomp up the driveway toward our dilapidated brown house with...


There's just so many I wonder if an editor even read through it. What scares me the most is that one of my 3rd grade students just read one of his children's books and I'd hate for her to think he utilized the same style and she though it was an example of good writing.


As sad as I am to say this. Skip it.