Starstruck – Cyn Balog

Book Summary

Gwendolyn “Dough” X doesn’t think she has much going for her—she carries a few extra pounds, her family struggles with their small bakery in a town full of millionaires, and the other kids at her New Jersey high school don’t seem to know that she exists. Thank the stars for her longtime boyfriend, Philip P. Wishman—or “Wish.” He moved away to California three years ago, when they were 13, but then professed his love for her via e-mail, and he’s been her long-distance BF ever since.
At the beginning of her junior year, though, Wish e-mails that he’s moving back to Jersey. Great, right? Well, except that Dough has gained about 70 pounds since the last time Wish saw her, while Wish—according to his Facebook photos—has morphed into a blonde god. Convinced that she’ll be headed for Dumpsville the minute Wish lays eyes on her, Dough delays their meeting as long as she possibly can.
But when she sees Wish at school, something amazing happens. He looks at Dough like she’s just as gorgeous as he is. But Wish is acting a little weird, obsessed with the sun and freaked out by rain. And the creepy new guy working at the bakery, Christian, is convinced that there’s more to Wish’s good looks than just healthy eating and lots of sun. He tells Dough that a mark on Wish’s neck marks him as a member of the Luminati—an ancient cult of astrologers who can manipulate the stars to improve their lives. Is Wish and Dough’s love meant to be—or are they star-crossed?

Book Review

When I first read the description to this book I thought that I would love it. It sounded humorous and unlike anything I had ever read before. Unfortunately, this book just fell flat for me.

The beginning of this book was actually quite good. It was funny and horribly awkward, and I felt like a lot of people could easily relate to the protagonist. This was one of those books where no matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t stop cringing and squealing at the awkward parts. I think it goes without saying that the author really hit home on those parts.

However; this book started going downhill for me towards the middle. The author decided to ruin this realistic, funny story with a whole bunch of “star worshiper” crap. How would you even think to come up with a plot like that? It makes no sense and I found myself just getting lost and ready to put the book down.

I gave Starstruck 2/5 stars. It started out as a cute funny story about a girl who I’m sure plenty of people could relate to, and then turned into a dumb supernatural tale that made you want to throw the book across the room.

Favorite Quotes

• “Twenty minutes later, I walk out of Melinda’s hotel with a plate of finger sandwiches, a bag of prostitute clothes, and a weird wedge on my head that makes me look like you could tip me upside down and fill it with cream of mushroom.

  I need another donut.”

• “Hans and Christian just stare at me, faces grim. All I can think of is how awesome it would be if my name were Andersen.”

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Delirium – Lauren Oliver

 

Book Summary

Lena Haloway is content in her safe, government-managed society. She feels (mostly) relaxed about the future in which her husband and career will be decided, and looks forward to turning 18, when she’ll be cured of deliria, a.k.a. love. She tries not to think about her mother’s suicide (her last words to Lena were a forbidden “I love you”) or the supposed “Invalid” community made up of the uncured just beyond her Portland, Maine, border. There’s no real point—she believes her government knows how to best protect its people, and should do so at any cost. But 95 days before her cure, Lena meets Alex, a confident and mysterious young man who makes her heart flutter and her skin turn red-hot. As their romance blossoms, Lena begins to doubt the intentions of those in power, and fears that her world will turn gray should she submit to the procedure. 

 

Book Review

I didn’t think I was going to really like this book. The description sounded like a lot of other books and it’s never really a plot that I’m a fan of. This book took me forever to read. Seven days. That’s a long time for me. But in my defense it was because this book was so boring. For once, my initial reaction was correct. I didn’t think I would like this book, and I didn’t.

Delirium was actually a really good book. It was written beautifully and the characters were outstanding. So what was my problem with it? Well, for one, the plot (as we discussed earlier), and secondly, there wasn’t enough dialogue. Now, I know what you’re thinking – I’m just being too picky right now. But I think that that’s the reason why I didn’t like this book. There wasn’t enough talking. People would have a short conversation, and in the middle of it the main girl would break in with her thoughts and would describe something that I didn’t really care about and the conversation didn’t start again until three pages later.

What I did like about Delirium was that it kept me guessing. It had turns and twists that I wasn’t expecting. Overall, I’d say this was a pretty good book, just not my type of book.

I gave Delirium 2.5/5 stars. It was a good book, it was just to slow for me. I guess the question I’m asking myself now is, “Will I read the second one?” I think that answer to that is yes. Why? Because Delirium ended with a huge cliff hanger, and I want to know what happens. Hopefully the second one won’t let me down.

 

Favorite Quotes

• “I love you. Remember. They cannot take it” 
• “I’d rather die my way than live yours.” 
• “Love: a single word, a wispy thing, a word no bigger or longer than an edge. That’s what it is: an edge; a razor. It draws up through the center of your life, cutting everything in two. Before and after. The rest of the world falls away on either side.” 
• “Hate isn’t the most dangerous thing, he’d said. Indifference is.” 
• “The deadliest of all deadly things: It kills you both when you have it and
  when you don’t.” 

 

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Fracture – Megan Miranda (Book Review)

 

Book summary

Eleven minutes passed before Delaney Maxwell was pulled from the icy waters of a Maine lake by her best friend Decker Phillips. By then her heart had stopped beating. Her brain had stopped working. She was dead. And yet she somehow defied medical precedent to come back seemingly fine. Everyone wants Delaney to be all right, but she knows she’s far from normal. Pulled by strange sensations she can’t control or explain, Delaney finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her altered brain now predicting death, or causing it?

Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who recently emerged from a coma with similar abilities. At first she’s reassured to find someone who understands the strangeness of her new existence, but Delaney soon discovers that Troy’s motives aren’t quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature-or something much more frightening?

 

Book review

     I got this book – along with many others – to read during spring break. It was one of those books that I never thought I would ever get around to reading. It’s a small book, only 262 pages, and I finished it one day. I lied on my bed all day long and mummified while I read this book. 

     The first chapter of this book was incredible. It had me very hopeful that the rest of the book was going to be amazing. But after Delaney wakes up I feel like the book just stay at one pace. Nothing really exciting happens. Of course you would think that being drawn to the dead is indescribably exciting; but unfortunately, the author just doesn’t do much with it.

     There were, however, something things that I did like about this book. The first was that in the very beginning part of the book Delaney says something about her not being very thin. And again, later on in the book, how her parents had to get her clothing the next size up for Christmas. I like this because almost every book I read, the female protagonist is thin and beautiful. Megan Miranda did something unthinkable – making her character a normal person. Not every girl out there is skinny and bronze, so reading this book was refreshing in that sense.

     The second thing I liked about this book was that even though the main ‘condition’ that both Troy and Delaney have is not realistic at all, the author incorporates real conditions that people actually have in real life into this book. 

     Overall, I gave this book 3 out of 5 stars. The book’s plot was good and it held my attention good enough. It had a little action, some mystery, but mostly romance *wink* *wink*. Having said that; I felt like there was something more that could have been added to make this book better. In the long run, this book was just good, not great. 

 

Favorite quotes

• “If you had one day left to live, what would you do?”
• “A cut. That’s what I felt. Words can cut, slice, like a razor.”
• “I wasn’t athletic and had no desire to work out, so I watched what I ate. Correction: I ate what I wanted and felt guilty about it later.” 
• “The first time I died, I didn’t see God. No light at the end of the tunnel. No haloed angels. No dead grandparents. To be fair, I probably wasn’t a solid shoo-in for Heaven. But, honestly, I kind of assumed I’d make the cut.” 
• “When I went from feeling nothing to everything and couldn’t stop screaming because it turned out the everything was blinding pain.”

 

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