Mini Reviews

Enthusiasm by Polly Shulman
This is really a cute story! Julia and Ashleigh are such fun girls. I initially picked this one up because it referred to Ashleigh as an enthusiast of Jane Austen. But it captivated my attention beyond that and made me fall in love with it. Oh to be an enthusiast! Although come to think of it, I am an enthusiast.....about books at least. Ashleigh pushes Julia far out of her comfort zone, and some pretty cool things happen because of that. Cute boys to name one. :) It's a pretty quick read and I urge you to try it. Just a quirky and fun little story that will brighten your day.



Epic Fail by Clair LaZebnik
Read this one if you like Jane Austen sequels. It's pretty much a modern, teenage Pride and Prejudice. Derek and Elise rub each other wrong from the get-go, and like the original, Derek falls first and slowly brings Elise around to seeing him as a nice guy. Nothing new, but it is cute. Like I said, if you enjoy Jane Austen sequels and/or young adult books, you'll enjoy this one.



Awkward by Marnie Bates
Oh my goodness I laughed all the way through this! Poor Mackenzie, an overnight success on YouTube for all the wrong reasons. I absolutely cannot imagine something like that happening to me, I'd be miserable and never want to leave the house again. But not Mackenzie, she steps right up and looks all that embarrassment in the eye, and marches forward. Her journey is quite interesting to say the least. She makes plenty of mistakes, but keeps going and learns exactly what she does want and what and who she likes and wants in her life. She has lots to learn actually, but you have great fun walking alongside her as things escalate and escalate even more.(Seriously, the things that girl has to go through!)



Fools Rush In by Janice Thompson
Combine an Italian girl living in Texas, with an honest-to-goodness Texas cowboy, add in both crazy families, along with a dash of wedding planning and pizza making. Not to mention all the other myriad of things that go wrong and cause chaos and there you have it folks. A guaranteed hour or three of laughter and smiles. Bella's Italian family, and DJ's Texan family make quite the combo. It is an absolutely fabulous book! An amazing start to a trilogy. You must, must, must, must try it. (If I add another 'must' would you get my point? Or is five two many?)  :) One of my favorites, it's on my shelf and definitely not going away anytime soon. If you don't enjoy Uncle Lazarro and his antics along with everyone else, then I'm sorry, but you must be crazy. (You may not like it, but surely you'll laugh regardless! At least I hope so, because I did.)



There You'll Find Me by Jenny B. Jones
Finley has been through so much. It's never easy to lose to someone you love dearly. And her brother Will was pretty special. So she goes to Ireland, retracing a trip that Will had taken years earlier, and meets Beckett Rush, vampire movie actor. Sounds intriguing right? Trust me, it's a great read. Funny (I mean, you're dealing with actors who star in vampire movies) yet serious (because Finley has some real issues she needs to deal with), it does a good job at combining the two. Finley's adventure in Ireland changes her. She is able to grow up and through the caring people around her (not to mention the grouchy old lady she visits at the nursing home) she learns how to let go and let God. It's cute watching Finley and Beckett circle one another, not too sure about the other. But they do help each other deal with emotions that they've both been struggling with. It's just a sweet and fun story that I definitely recommend!


Alrighty folks, that's all she wrote. Just a few quick words to hopefully add to your already large pile of to-reads. Enjoy! :)

Toodle-loo kangaroos!

Teaser Tuesday {The Mountain Between Us}

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


My Teasers:

 "Then, as if he'd done it a thousand times, he pancaked the plane against the mountain. The tail touched first, then the left wing, which hit something and snapped off."

~ page 37, The Mountain Between Us by Charles Martin

Happy Tuesday! I started this one a couple weeks ago, and haven't gotten back to it. I'm hoping this will get me interested again. :)

Toodle-loo kangaroos!

Review: Sean Griswold's Head

Sean Griswold's Head

About the Book:

According to her guidance counselor, fifteen-year-old Payton Gritas needs a focus object-an item to concentrate her emotions on. It's supposed to be something inanimate, but Payton decides to use the thing she stares at during class: Sean Griswold's head. They've been linked since third grade (Griswold-Gritas-it's an alphabetical order thing), but she's never really known him.

The focus object is intended to help Payton deal with her father's newly diagnosed multiple sclerosis. And it's working. With the help of her boy-crazy best friend Jac, Payton starts stalking-er, focusing on-Sean Griswold . . . all of him! He's cute, he shares her Seinfeld obsession (nobody else gets it!) and he may have a secret or two of his own. 

My Thoughts:

I read this one last year and decided it was time for a reread. Payton has always got along well with her parents and done decently in school. But when she discovers that her dad has been diagnosed with MS and nobody told her for six whole months, she's unable to process her chaotic emotions. On one hand she wants to be there for her father, whom she's always been close to, but on the other hand she's incredibly upset that everyone else in her family knew about it for that long and nobody told her. I can relate to Payton's feelings, my mother has Parkinson's Disease. When a parent is diagnosed with a crippling disease like that, it's hard for a child or a teenager to know how to handle it. I mean, I'm an adult now and still learning how to do that. And to find out that everyone else knew about it for six whole months before I did? Well, I may not think Payton's response is right, but it is understandable. This is where Sean Griswold comes in. He provides a welcome distraction from all the frustration at home. Sean and Payton are just so adorable! And Payton's Focus Journal thoughts on Sean and his head are funny. But he does help her to start figuring out what she thinks and how she'll handle her dad having MS. He also introduces her to a new sport-biking. Which is exactly what Payton needs, a way to work out her emotions physically. She had previously played basketball, but since she had shared that with her dad, she feels guilty and upset and won't play anymore. Her best friend Jac, and Sean's friend Grady, also provide support (in Jac's case) and teach Payton to look beyond the superficial in a person (in Grady's case).

Ms. Leavitt balances really well between the seriousness of a disease and the cuteness of new love. Payton is still growing up and she's learning early that life hands out some bad hands sometimes. She just has to remember that there are silver linings in whatever we go through. Talking about our feelings, whether to a parent, a friend, or a counselor is important. Serious diseases like MS are awful and they affect the patient's family just as much as the patient themselves. But it is possible to get through it, and even find some awesome new friends (or even a boyfriend!) along the way. It's not the end of the world, but the beginning of a new chapter in your lives. This really is a delightful little story. Sweet and serious, it's a wonderful little gem that makes for a nice few hours of reading time. Definitely recommend!

A fun passage:

So, with the aid of Jac, I go into full 007 mode with the Great Plant Idea. We find Miss Marietta's home address online, which is only a quarter of a mile away from me. Jac insists on writing the card, which works for me since my dreams lately have been haunted by its endless blankness. My job is to pick up the plant, which I do with the help of a begrudging Trent. Jac meets me at the front of our teacher's housing community at 1500 hours.
"Do you have the card?" I peek out from behind one of the plant's massive spikes.
"You didn't ask that right. Code, remember?"
I roll my eyes. "Has the white dove landed?"
"Roger. Are you ready to deliver the green goblin?" Green goblin = well, duh, right? Our code talk is more obvious that Pig Latin.
After a secret handshake and three strolls around the block to "stake out the place"-in case, you know, Russian spies try to thwart the delivery-we ease the plant onto the doorstep. Jac places a gloved finger over her lips while she rings the doorbell. Then we sprint to the hedge lining the right side of her yard.

Toodle-loo kangaroos!

Review: Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

Attachments: A Novel

About the Book:

Beth and Jennifer know their company monitors their office e-mail. But the women still spend all day sending each other messages, gossiping about their coworkers at the newspaper and baring their personal lives like an open book. Jennifer tells Beth everything she can't seem to tell her husband about her anxieties over starting a family. And Beth tells Jennifer everything, period.

When Lincoln applied to be an Internet security officer, he hardly imagined he'd be sifting through other people's inboxes like some sort of electronic Peeping Tom. Lincoln is supposed to turn people in for misusing company e-mail, but he can't quite bring himself to crack down on Beth and Jennifer. He can't help but be entertained-and captivated- by their stories.

But by the time Lincoln realizes he's falling for Beth, it's way too late for him to ever introduce himself. What would he say to her? "Hi, I'm the guy who reads your e-mail, and also, I love you." After a series of close encounters and missed connections, Lincoln decides it's time to muster the courage to follow his heart . . . even if he can't see exactly where it's leading him.

My  Thoughts:

Okay, so I've been seeing this one around the blogosphere and read such good things about it. Why did I wait so long to read it again? I have no idea, but I'm glad I finally gave in! (And I love that cover.) This is such a fun little story. I laughed most of the way through it. (Really) Set in 1999, it brought back all the memories of Y2K that I had forgotten, i.e. the worries people had and the crazy things they did. Hard to believe that's been over 13 years ago now. I will say that the beginning is a little slow. It didn't really pick up until about halfway through, but then all the set up of the beginning really kept me hooked. You know pretty well what the ending is going to be, still the adventures until you get there are what make this story so wonderful. Beth and Jennifer are such great friends and you can tell that even though you only read their emails. They truly care for one another. There certainly wasn't much about themselves that they didn't tell one another either. And Lincoln. Poor Lincoln. So lost and confused; trying to figure out his life and really, himself. A big portion of the story is Lincoln figuring out who he is and what he wants out of life. I can relate to being older and still unsure where your life is headed. It's tough, and Lincoln has the added burden of having been hurt in the past and finding it hard to move beyond this. 

I loved all the times Lincoln kept missing actually seeing Beth. Beth sees him way before he sees her and their constant missed connections are cute. Lincoln is cute! (Literally and figuratively.) He gets so adorably flustered and jealous. And he is just a genuinely nice and sweet guy. He starts feeling so so guilty about reading people's emails, especially Beth's and Jennifer's. And he has no clue how to fix this dilemma that he got himself in. I was getting pretty worried towards the end that the resolution would be rushed and perhaps not as I was hoping, but Ms. Rowell knew what she was doing. It was a sweetly romantic book that was wonderful to read. The one thing I did not like is that it does have some bad language. Not excessively so, and the most of it is towards the beginning so it didn't really detract from the story, but I do think it would have been just fine without it. Also it is about 28 year olds, and they don't all lead clean, moral lives (nothing in detail, but it is alluded to). So if that bothers you, you may want to bypass this one. But if you can overlook that, then you're in for a real treat! I highly recommend this one.

A couple of favorite passages:

<Jennifer to Beth>> Oh, I love period dramas, especially period dramas starring Colin Firth. I'm like Bridget Jones if she were actually fat.
<<Beth to Jennifer>> Oh...Colin Firth. He should only do period dramas. And period dramas should only star Colin Firth. (One star upgrade for Colin Firth. Two stars for Colin Firth in a waistcoat.)
<<Jennifer to Beth>> Keep typing his name, even his name is handsome.

<<Jennifer to Beth>> Anyway, he changed my tire for me. It took him eight minutes, tops. I just stood there holding his dinner (McDonald's) and watched. And cried. I must have looked wildly pathetic because he said, "I have some French fries in there if you want them." I thought that was such a weird thing to offer, but frankly, I'm exactly the sort of person to be comforted by French fries, so I ate them.

Toodle-loo kangaroos! Happy reading!