The Last Beginning (and thoughts on The Next Together) by Lauren James

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 352

Publisher: Walker Books 

Released: 6th of October 2016 

Sixteen years ago, after a scandal that rocked the world, teenagers Katherine and Matthew vanished without a trace. Now Clove Sutcliffe is determined to find her long lost relatives. But where do you start looking for a couple who seem to have been reincarnated at every key moment in history? Who were Kate and Matt? Why were they born again and again? And who is the mysterious Ella, who keeps appearing at every turn in Clove's investigation? 

For Clove, there is a mystery to solve in the past and a love to find in the future.

What I Have to Say 

When I first read The Next Together, I thought it was amazing.  But talking about it with my friends after, I found many of them found it a little too romance orientated. For those who dislike romance, the sci fi factor is not strong enough to keep them interested in the book. The solution to this? The Last Beginning. 

The Last Beginning is, in  my opinion, the actual story. It's beautiful and perfect and has exactly the right balance of sci fi and romance. It has a great sense of mystery and Ella is the most perfect character ever. I feel that The Next Together would work much better as a prequel, something to read that adds to the story but doesn't stand as well on it's own. 

The beauty of these two books is that you can read them in either order and they still make perfect sense. In my opinion, this book would be best read first, especially if you don't like books centered too much on romance. 

Reading this one second, will just make you want to read the first one again anyway. 

 

What Not to Do If You Turn Invisible by Ross Welford

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 400

Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Books 

Released: 29th of December 2016 

Turning invisible at will: it’s one way of curing your acne. But far more drastic than 13 year-old Ethel Leatherhead intended when she tried a combination of untested medicines and a sunbed.

It’s fun at first, being invisible. And aided by her friend Boydy, she manages to keep her extraordinary ability secret. Or does she…?

When one day the invisibility fails to wear off, Ethel is thrown into a nightmare of lies and deception as she struggles to keep herself safe, to find the remedy that will make her seen again – and solve the mystery of her own birth…

What I Have to Say 

Another tale of humour and misadventures from Ross Welford, which has a very serious plotline hidden beneath the hi-jinks. I think I liked Time Travelling with a Hamster better, but this was still a really good story. Ethel is an idiot, let's be honest, but then given the chance to turn invisible, can any of us really say that we wouldn't have gone back to try it more times? 

With Time Travelling with a Hamster, what I liked most of it was the way Welford combined the humour of Time Travel and action with the intense plot of grief and mourning. With What Not To Do If You Turn Invisible, I felt that there wasn't enough of this combination. As a mystery rather than a story of grief, it naturally only had a scattering of clues at the start, which made the combination less effective. 

But in the end it was still the combination of the absurd story line of becoming invisible contrasted against the suspense of a young girl trying to work out the mystery of who she is that made it a lovely and exciting read. 

My thanks go to Netgalley and Harper Collins for providing me with this copy for review. 

Pushing Perfect by Michelle Falkoff

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 352

Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Books 

Released: 29th of December 2016 

Kara Winters is always striving for perfection. But when her anxiety takes over, the price of perfection spirals out of control… 

'Perfect' Kara Winters has always hated her nickname. Especially now that she no longer lives up to it. She used to have normal friends, she used to be normal. Now all she wants is to get into Harvard and leave high school behind. 

So when the pressure to ace her exams finally gets to her, Kara does one tiny bad thing, just to help out, to ease the stress. If it will help Kara get a perfect exam score and one step closer to a new life, it’s a price she’s willing to pay. 

But she never expects to get caught out. Or that Alex, Raj and her other not-so-perfect new friends might get embroiled in a horrible mess that could ruin all of their futures. Sometimes perfection isn't what it's cracked up to be.

What I Have to Say 

A very well told story of pressure, secrets, lies and drugs, Pushing Perfect was neatly woven tale of friendships drifting apart and mysterious blackmailers. It hooked me in with the strain of trying to perfect and get into a good school- the pressure of living up to everyone's impressions and expectations of you, but the blackmail compelled me to read on and on, desperate to find the resolution. 

I loved Alex as a character so much. Kara was a great main character, but Alex just added so much more life and fun to the story. She brought Kara out of her shell and made the book what it was. I loved the friendship and partnership between the two girls more than anything else in the book. 

It was a thrilling ride, but I do feel it was wrapped up a little too easily. A lot of the problems that arise during the book would never have happened had the characters not lied to each other so much. It's probably rather accurate to real life, but it all seemed rather an simple solution for everything. 

For anyone who's felt stress or pressure to be someone they're not, this is a book to find solace in and a good thriller of schemes and blackmail. 

My thanks go to Harper Collins and Netgalley for providing me with this copy for Review. 

Simon Says by Robert Armstrong

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 102

Publisher: Austin Macauley

Released: 30th of November 2016

Hello there, Cherished Reader, I am Rebecca Sweet, self-confessed drama queen and games-playing schemer! I found myself friendless in my new residence of Jamestown, and Diary Dearest became my confidante. Unfortunately, while I was distracted, someone managed to steal her and her bitter innards from the safety of my room. And so began a chilling tale of cat and mouse with the elusive, letter-writing Simon.

I became determined to find out my tormentor's identity, although it took me to the darkest and most dangerous of booby-trapped places, complete with fearsome creatures and even the undead. 

It seemed someone in Jamestown did not want me to become the heroine, Nora, in the school play Vampire's Lady. However, Patient Reader, I am Becky Sweet, and I have tricks up my sleeve!

What I Have to Say 

This book was a complete and utter disappointment. The idea had a lot of potential and I will admit that when I picked it up I did feel it could go either way, but that didn't do anything to lessen the gut-wrenching disappointment I felt as I read it. If it wasn't a mere 102 pages, I would have put it down. 

I wish so much that there was something I could say to soften this review even slightly, but there was literally nothing I liked about it. The main character, Rebecca was an awful person who was clearly some kind of psychopath who's mind went straight to planning a murder as revenge, without a single moral quandary about doing so.   

I'm just so sad it didn't live up to my hopes of it. 

My thanks go to the publisher for providing me with this copy for review. 

A Quiet Kind of Thunder by Sara Barnard

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 320

Publisher: Macmillan Children's Books 

Released: 12th of January 2017 

Steffi doesn't talk, but she has so much to say.

Rhys can't hear, but he can listen.

Their love isn't a lightning strike, it's the rumbling roll of thunder.

Steffi has been a selective mute for most of her life - she's been silent for so long that she feels completely invisible. But Rhys, the new boy at school, sees her. He's deaf, and her knowledge of basic sign language means that she's assigned to look after him. To Rhys, it doesn't matter that Steffi doesn't talk, and as they find ways to communicate, Steffi finds that she does have a voice, and that she's falling in love with the one person who makes her feel brave enough to use it. 

What I Have to Say 

Another wonderful book from Sara Barnard. This one is important for different reasons than her last, but just as good and, as with Beautiful Broken Things, it featured a very strong friendship. With this book Barnard, shows us that not only can she write beautiful friendships, but she can also balance them perfectly with romance. 

The main reason I liked this book though was that it is a fantastic addition to the brilliant collection of books exploring anxiety. It shows a girl who learns how to calm her anxiety enough to talk again through her relationship with Rhys, a boy who couldn't hear her even if she did talk.

Most of the books about anxiety have messages at their heart, a part of recovery that the book explores. With Holly Bourne's Am I Normal Yet? and  Sophie Kinsella's Finding Audrey it's about accepting relapses and the ups and downs of recovery. Louise Gornell's Under Rose Tainted Skies tells us that love may seem like a cure, but really it's our strength that gets us through. And A Quiet Kind of Thunder emphasizes the need to celebrate achievements, even if they feel like failures. 

Everyone, whether they live with anxiety, know someone with anxiety or even are just looking for something good to read should get this book. It is beautiful and pure perfection. 

My thanks go to Macmillan for providing me with a copy of this book. 

A Week of Reviews

To make up for being such a bad blogger, both with my hiatus in November and the lapse in reviews over the holiday season. I'm going to do a whole week of blogging starting tomorrow (the 2nd of January) to catch up with the reviews I owe.

Check back every day for reviews of some books I missed in 2016, some that due to come out in 2017 and a couple of extras that I just have to share my thoughts on.

I hope you enjoy the extra activity.

Lost Stars or What Lou Reed Taught Me About Love by Lisa Selin Davis

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 272

Publisher: Hot Key Books 

Released: 6th of October 2016 

I'll be your mirror, reflect what you are, in case you don't know ...

In the aftermath of her older sister's death, sixteen-year-old Carrie is taken under the wings of her sister's friends, and finds herself forsaking the science nerds of her former life and slipping into a daze of cheap beer and recreational drugs. Carrie - a talented guitar player and obsessive tracker of the coming Vira comet - is partying hard and fooling around with boys she doesn't even like, even though she's desperate for a boyfriend.

Her mother, enveloped by grief at the loss of her eldest child, has retreated to a monastery in the Catskills that requires a vow of silence. With her family splintered apart, Carrie is overcome at times by uncontrollable rages and her father decides to send her to a boot camp for wayward teens. Compounding the shame, and to her horror, she is forced to wear work boots and a hard hat - boy poison.

Then she meets Dean, a fellow musician and refugee from his own dark past. Throughout the summer Carrie learns more about Dean, about her sister's death, about her own family's past, and about herself...as well as about the Bee Gees, disco and the difference between wood and sheet-rock screws. Through love, music and her precious comet - and no small help from Lou Reed - Carrie fumbles her way through the complex web of tragedies and misunderstandings, to the heart of who she is and who she wants to be.

What I Have to Say 

This is a very touching picture of a family torn apart by grief. It took me a while to get into, as it does a lot with depressed characters as it's hard to connect with a character who is in a numb state of mind. But, as always with such characters, as I began to understand her and why she was the way she was, I connected with her a lot more. 

The really interesting bits happened when the family started to face their problems.While Carrie was just doing drugs and getting in trouble with her dad, it bored me a little, but after she met Dean and started to open up and confront things more it got much more interesting. 

I think there were some very intense emotions in this book and it looks at grief from multiple angles. It looks at relationships between family members both the anger and pain on the surface and the much deeper emotions that aren't expressed so easily. 

I wasn't blown away by this book, but by the end of it, I felt it was definitely worth reading. 

My thanks go to Hot Key Books for providing me with this copy for review.