The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen
reviewed by Valerie
Amazing. Astounding. Extraordinary. Actually, all of these words understate how good this book is. The Truth About Forever reflects the life and difficulties of high school girl Macy Queen. This book revolves around the saying "life isn't perfect". And although it isn't perfect in so many ways (as Macy proves) it can still be pretty wonderful. Sarah Dessen, the book's author, describes an extremely real situation that so many people, of many different ages, can relate to. Macy's only parent, her mom, has blocked out the world emotionally and spends all her time working to keep herself distracted which can be a huge problem when you need someone to talk to. Macy is struggling, between studying for her SAT's, her summer job at the library, and finding some fun during the summer. When she meets a caterer offering a job, chaos erupts.
Dessen's vivid descriptions add to the suspense in the story. There is just enough drama to get you excited but not too much that you find it heavy.Throughout the story, you will find yourself laughing and crying as you navigate your way through Macy's life and you'll love the book just like I did. So when you're having some down time, just pick this up and I promise you won't want to put it down again.
The Whisper by Emma Clayton
reviewed by Jasmine
The Whisper is an excellent sequel to the book The Roar. In The Whisper Mika and Ellie put their plans into motion. In this world, the earth was split by a gigantic wall into the North and the South. The North is a cold and barren cement wasteland where its people have never heard of trees, plants, or live animals. The South is a beautiful paradise which only a handful of people know about, and even fewer live there. The people who do live there live in gigantic mansions with butlers and maids. In the North the implanted army of children starts to stir in response to Mika and Ellie's plans.
The Whisper is a fantastic sci-fi book which also has quite a bit of fantasy sprinkled in. The only flaw was that the author did not spend enough time explaining each event. Otherwise it was fantastic.
Twilight by Stephanie Meyer
reviewed by Nell
The Twilight Saga is, as I'm sure you know, quite popular these days. Recently I decided to check it out, if only too see why. I was well and truly disgusted. The writing is ridiculous, nearly every plot point was introduced in a painfully roundabout manner, and there were so many obvious grammatical errors I wanted to phone up the editor and complain. In addition to this, the characters are flat and unoriginal. Bella Swan, the female protagonist, is useless. She claims to be depressed, but this is immediately resolved once she meets a hot guy. This is remarkably ableist. In addition, she is an incredibly sexist character. Bella is unrealistically shallow, relying solely on her physical appearance and rich boyfriend to get by. She is simply waiting for Prince Charming, utterly incapable of doing anything for herself. This is an age-old female stereotype and one of the most revolting. Edward, her love interest, also has no personality. He is that male character we so often find in early 1900s romances: strong, brave, and patronizing. Incredibly, he is also the essence of a cut and paste male character. Edward is also a mass of angst, mystery, and stalker-like tendencies. Meyer has managed to combine the two worst male stereotypes. Congratulations. The only saving grace it would have would be the love story, but Meyers fails us even there. It has that quality most Disney films possess: the idea of glancing at someone once and then falling madly in love. A painfully unrealistic idea. Bella literally forgoes college to have sex with Edward 24/7. Twilight is, in all honesty, a waste of time.
The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen
reviewed by Jasmine
The False Prince is about an orphan named Sage who finds himself in a situation which no one could have foreseen. Conner, a nobleman who wishes for power, hand picks four orphans, along with Sage, who have similar qualities to the lost prince. He then takes them to his home, but when they get there, there are only three orphans left. Once they get to his home Conner tells them of his plan, which requires the three to compete for a spot to stay alive. They are competing for which one resembles the lost prince the most, including personality, physical looks, and skill. Sage goes along with Conner's plan and hopes that no one will find out his secret.
This book was awesome. The story line was perfect and so was the character development. The only problem I had with it was the order of the events. If the author would have added a little less foreshadowing it would have been perfect.