Please Ignore Vera Dietz

Please Ignore Vera Dietz A.S. King 3.5 / 5	Published 2010 First Sentences "The pastor is saying something about how Charlie was a free spirit. He was and he wasn't."
Publisher's Description: Vera’s spent her whole life secretly in love with her best friend, Charlie Kahn. And over the years she’s kept a lot of his secrets. Even after he betrayed her. Even after he ruined everything. So when Charlie dies in dark circumstances, Vera knows a lot more than anyone—the kids at school, his family, even the police. But will she emerge to clear his name? Does she even want to? Edgy and gripping, Please Ignore Vera Dietz is an unforgettable novel: smart, funny, dramatic, and always surprising.
Dear Reader, This was my second experience with this author, and I am glad I gave her another shot. My first was I Crawl Through It, which I REALLY wanted to like, but just could NOT get into. This one, however, felt more real to me, which perhaps contributed to why I enjoyed it more. I could identify with Vera, a teenage girl who feels a bit adrift. Vera is coping with the recent loss of her best friend (and secret love) on top of she and her father having been abandoned by her mother a few years back. She kind of coasts through school (it doesn't play a big role in her life), and most of her story is centered around her job at the local pizza delivery joint, the town's notable Pagoda, and the hiking trails near her house. While she navigates these places, she also slowly unravels the mystery of her best friend's death, and learns how to come to terms with the loss. Vera was a unique and memorable character who definitely marched to the beat of her own drum, and I liked that about her, particularly in a YA protagonist. She was smart and witty and did her own thing, others be damned. (Which, admittedly, sometimes wasn't the best idea. But still.) I did particularly enjoy how Vera's and her father's relationship developed over the course of the book. Neither had dealt very much (at all?) with the leaving of Mrs. Dietz, and their small family was strained because of this. Charlie's death - a second loss - pushed them to acknowledge that they needed to figure out how to be a family in this new landscape. It felt very believable. This book was part of one of the Quarterly boxes that Book Riot sent out before I put my subscription on hold. I don't know if I would have sought it out otherwise, but I'd been meaning to get to it since it arrived in my mailbox. It was an enjoyable weekend read. Yours, Arianna

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Goodbye Stranger

Goodbye Stranger Rebecca Stead 3.5 / 5	Published August 4, 2015 First Sentence "When she was eight years old, Bridget Barsamian woke up in a hospital, where a doctor told her she shouldn't be alive."
Publisher's Description: Bridge is an accident survivor who's wondering why she's still alive. Emily has new curves and an almost-boyfriend who wants a certain kind of picture. Tabitha sees through everybody's games--or so she tells the world. The three girls are best friends with one rule: No fighting. Can it get them through seventh grade?  This year everything is different for Sherm Russo as he gets to know Bridge Barsamian. What does it mean to fall for a girl--as a friend?  On Valentine's Day, an unnamed high school girl struggles with a betrayal. How long can she hide in plain sight?
Dear Reader, This is another one of those books I wish had been around when I was young. I really enjoyed it, and it was pretty unique. The story was the linear tale of a trio of girls growing into adolescence, but interspersed occasionally with an odd storyline told from the second person perspective: there is a little bit of a mystery thrown in. The reader begins to understand how the two stories are related as the book continues on, but I have to admit I was surprised by the reveal at the end! The book is a great introduction for young girls into the scary world of the teenage years. The group of three girls couldn’t be more different, and these contrasts are emphasized as they grow up. One loves to wear cat ears 24/7 and is becoming interested in theater tech. Another has a Hindu background and is learning to embrace feminism. And the third is blossoming into a beautiful young woman and hanging out with older girls (and boys). The three have made a pact from the beginning that they would never fight, but those promises become strained as they try to find their way forwards, while everyone grows up. The book explores how people and friendships change, and how it is okay to realize that sometimes you grow apart from people, and it’s not the end of the world. The way the author handles it, making it sound like a normal part of life, might help young adults as they struggle through similar situations.  This is the first time I’d also encountered any book address sexting, and I thought it was so well done. Nothing scandalous, but enough of a scare that it might teach young readers about the potential dangers of the activity and the idea that nothing you send digitally is private. A great lesson to impress upon people at a young age! Overall, I thought the characters were all great & unique, and I even learned something about a Hindu holiday that I had never even heard of before (I love when I get to learn something completely new from a book, any book!). I will most likely be passing my copy on to my sisters for when my nieces are old enough to appreciate it; maybe I’m just an out of touch old person, but I think it has potentially strong staying power for a middle-grade audience.  Yours, Arianna P.S. I picked this up at BEA this year and was through it inside of a day - a very quick read!

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The Girls from Corona del Mar

The Girls from Corona del Mar Rufi Thorpe 3 / 5	Published 2014 First Sentence "'You're going to have to break one of my toes," I explained."
Publisher's Description: A fiercely beautiful debut blazing with emotion: a major first novel about friendships made in youth and how these bonds, challenged by loss, illness, parenthood, and distance, either break or sustain.  Mia and Lorrie Ann are lifelong friends: hard-hearted Mia and untouchably beautiful, kind Lorrie Ann. While Mia struggles with a mother who drinks, a pregnancy at fifteen, and younger brothers she loves but can't quite be good to, Lorrie Ann is luminous, surrounded by her close-knit family, immune to the mistakes that mar her best friend's life. Until a sudden loss catapults Lorrie Ann into tragedy: things fall apart, and then fall apart further-and there is nothing Mia can do to help. And as good, kind, brave Lorrie Ann stops being so good, Mia begins to question just who this woman is and what that question means about them both. A staggeringly arresting, honest novel of love, motherhood, loyalty, and the myth of the perfect friendship that moves us to ask ourselves just how well we know those we love, what we owe our children, and who we are without our friends.
Dear Reader, This book had so much promise, I thought. It being about a pair of best friends who grew up in the '90s. But, ultimately I just wasn't sure what I was supposed to take away from it. Perhaps it was that Mia needed to learn to define herself separately from this woman who was once her best friend but had become a stranger? But she seemed to rely too much on schadenfreude*, which seemed to make her a truly bad person when she considered Lorrie Ann her best friend. Especially when she claims to have always considered Lorrie Ann "the good one" and considers the issues of who deserves what in life. And I struggled with the crux of this book, which seemed to revolve around whether a woman has the right to kill her child - not just have an abortion, mind you, but to put a living child (in this case, one suffering day in & day out from CP) out of his misery. The arguments on both sides were difficult for me to read. Perhaps it would be different if I were a mother, but I do wonder: would I be swayed by love to keep a suffering child alive, or to mercifully "save" him? Oh gosh, this book made me never want to have to find out that answer! What a difficult situation. I can't even. The book makes me wonder at Mia, as she struggles valiantly to hold a friendship together which proves increasingly difficult to even remember was once solid. Perhaps it is for the same reason she studies ancient translations of cuneiform: she wants to see everything as a story, something that's already happened, and isn't as good at looking at the here & now. I don't want to get too far into the story because it's easy to give big plot points away, but the reader has a difficult time telling if they were EVER truly best friends. What little we see of their "inseparable" teenage years isn't all that rosy, I don't think. Hmm, I wonder if the struggles of the friendship is why the book is titled "The Girls from..." and not "The Best Friends from..." Overall, an interesting book, but I kept wondering where it all was going. What small points the author made seemed to be shoved in at the end there. However, these girls are personalities which I don't think I will soon forget. Yours, Arianna *Holy crap I just checked, and I spelled that right on the first go!

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