Category: Book Reports

I’ll Give You The Sun by Jandy Nelson – Family Feels

In a nutshell: Twin teenagers Noah and Jude used to be inseparable, but a series of events drive them apart. Each sibling only has half the story, though, and they need to find their way back to each other to put things back together.
We Judge Covers: This cover tells you very little about the book, but it's super fun. Definitely something I'd at least pick up in the book store, knowing nothing else about it. A+ work, marketing folks.
Main Character: There are two, though I think Jude got a little more time than Noah. The story jumps a little in the timeline - Noah begins the story when they're 13 and Jude begins when they're 16.

The Weight of Blood by Laura McHugh – Small town justice.

In a nutshell: Two women disappear in Henbane, a generation apart and both connected to Lucy Dane. Her mother, Lila, disappeared when she was just a baby, most presuming that she'd killed herself. Her neighbor and sometimes friend, Cheri, was found cut into pieces, her remains stuffed in a tree. In a split timeline, we both visit the story of Lila's arrival in Henbane in the past, and Lucy's prodding into the secrets of her small town in the present.
We Judge Covers: Not too much to look at. I'm not sure this book would grab my attention in a bookstore, but I suppose the murky, foggy feel fits with the overall atmosphere of the story.

Alienated by Melissa Landers – Shallow.

In a nutshell: Aliens have made contact and now Cara Sweeny (no extra e, so a lot less cool than everyone's favorite Snark Lady) is chosen to host one of the first ever alien exchange students, Aelyx. (You can tell he's an alien because he has an x in his name.) Cara's doing it for the scholarship she'll get out of it, and she even has an idea to blog about the experience. Things turn sour when people in her town get swept up in an anti-alien paranoia. Plus, she also starts to fall in lurve with Alien Aelyx (shocker) and he's keeping a major (ish) secret.

The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson – Struggle bus.

In a nutshell: Haylee and her father Andy have lived their lives running from the memories that plague him after his time spent in the army. That is until Andy decides he wants to settle down in his old hometown so Haylee can graduate from a real school. Haylee struggles with school, struggles with managing her alcoholic and suffering from PTSD father, she struggles with her feelings for cute boy Finn, struggles with her memories of the past and she probably struggles with all her struggles too.
It's a struggle bus.

The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black – Just in case you aren’t fanged out.

In a nutshell: This is a YA book about vampires. I just wanted to say that right away. In Holly Black's newest, everyone knows vampires exist. In fact, places called Coldtowns exist, walled cities where the fanged creatures can mingle, party, feed off of and (mostly) co-exist with humans. There are those who got stuck in Coldtowns when the walls went up and there are those who chose to go there willingly. The catch is that once you enter a Coldtown, you can never get out.
At the beginning of the book, Tana wakes up after a party to find a house full of corpses. She survived, her ex-boyfriend survived and so did a darkly handsome and entirely strange vampire who looks like he needs Tana's help.

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell – An Internet love affair.

In a nutshell: Things are changing for Cath and very quickly. She's spent her whole life holding the hand of her twin sister Wren, but now they are starting college, and Wren doesn't even want to be her roommate. Wren has also abandoned their long time joint hobby of writing Simon Snow fanfiction. Cath is completely out of her element, but still, she's got to learn to navigate her new life, which includes a brutally honest roommate and her always cheery boyfriend, a Fiction Writing class where fanfiction is not welcome, a twin sister who keeps drifting away and the father they left behind, who she can't quit worrying about.
Plus, she's determined to finish her latest fanfiction story before the final book in the series is released.