Review: Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma

Dear Blog,

I finished Forbidden yesterday and, well, it's kind of hard writing a review of it without just typing Ohmywordohmyword for the whole entry.  I need to explain everything in a logical, book-reviewer sort of way.

Summary (from Goodreads): Sixteen-year-old Maya and seventeen-year-old Lochan have never had the chance to be 'normal' teenagers. Having pulled together for years to take care of their younger siblings while their wayward, drunken mother leaves them to fend alone, they have become much more than brother and sister. And now, they have fallen in love. But this is a love that can never be allowed, a love that will have devastating consequences ...How can something so wrong feel so right?

Review: This is, understandably, a very edgy and controversial subject matter.  I first heard about it after reading a synopsis on somebody's Waiting on Wednesday post.  I forget whose it was blog it was, actually, so to whoever it was: you are the most awesome blogger ever for introducing me to one of the most mind-blowing books I have ever read. Anyway.  Even though I finished it last night, it's been on my mind ever since, and I'm really not sure where I ought to start. There's so much I want to say- so much to say- about Forbidden, my mind is in a whirlwind of thoughts.  Where to begin?  These 418 pages pack so much into them, but I raced through it in a day and a half.  Yes, it was difficult to read, but at the same time I tore through it to find out what would happen.

Well, the story alternates points of view between Lochan and Maya, which I think works really well for the story; you get to hear what both of them are thinking, how they really feel about one another.  Although, I guess, Lochan and Maya's voices sounded kind of adult considering that they were meant to be teenagers, and their voices didn't sound incredibly distinctive from one another.  This is something that happens quite often in a dual-narrative novel, but I can overlook this, I think, because the subject matter and the way it's handled is so excellent.

I can't remember the last time I felt so torn when reading a book.  One part of me desperately wanted for Lochan and Maya to be together for the rest of their lives, and I desperately hoped that they could, even though I knew that there wouldn't or couldn't be a happy ending.  I couldn't help but think: Why can't they be together?  Because, well, it's a free country isn't it? But the other half of me was squirming and thinking, eeeeeeeew!  I guess that the human brain has just got used to thinking that a relationship between a brother and sister is wrong.  In which case, it's a very disturbing book and gets your brain thinking about right and wrong.

The relationship between Lochan and Maya isn't even there at the beginning of the book. Their love develops very, very slowly, but you can see it getting bigger and bigger until it finally emerges, at which point you almost want to start cheering. It's tender, sexy, realistic, romantic and just so right, and in such moments you throw aside all thoughts about it being sick, twisted, gross, etc. But when they realise it's wrong, it dawns on the reader, too. 


It's not just their forbidden relationship that Lochie and Maya have to worry about. With their mother neglecting them more and more until she almost totally abandons them, three younger siblings to take care of, A levels and university looming, everything seems to be falling apart.  I couldn't make up my mind whether or not I liked Kit, their 13-year-old brother.  I know he was a pain to Lochan and Maya, but, well, I think what I felt for him was more pity than anything else. Willa, their 5-year-old little sister, was particularly sweet.  It was just so tragic that Lochan and Maya had to deal with all of it.


Strangely, I think that although there is a dual narrative, the book seems to be focused slightly more on Lochan out of the two, although Maya is probably my favourite character in the book because...she changes.  All good characters ought to develop and change and learn as they go along.  Not that I didn't like Lochan- he was clever, sweet and three-dimensional despite his social anxiety. 


And the ending?  Oh my word. It's devastating, heartbreaking, tragic, depressing, and...hopeful? Ish?  Right at the ending, the slight glimmer of wonder and joy made me want to curl up in a little ball and burst into tears, but I think I was too emotionally drained to even do that.  Forbidden is that powerful- after reading it you just feel like a big, empty void, uncapable of any emotions because they've been sucked out of you.  The last chapter before the epilogue...holy macaroni.  That's all I can  say. In my desperation for there to be some sudden twist in the plot to make everything turn out for the better, I didn't really realises the consequences of Lochan's actions.  But no more can I say, lest I start babbling and give everything away. 


*applauds*
Kudos for Tabitha Suzuma for dealing with such a tricky subject.  Who could have done it better? The answer is, probably nobody.


In five words (because Forbidden deserves more than three) : a disturbing, devastating emotional rollercoaster. 


Reccomended for: teens (probably older teenagers, as some parts of it are a bit, erm...graphic) and adults who don't mind the edgy and difficult subject matter.
Rating: 5, of course!

Review: Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Dear Blog,

I finished Before I Fall  (Only the 2nd book on my 2010 Debut Author Challenge list that I've read) last night so as ever I have a review.
You may or may not have noticed that my blog background has dissapeared.  This is something to do with the website, but I hope by the weekend my blog will be restored to its normalness. 


Summary (from Goodreads): What if you had only one day to live? What would you do? Who would you kiss? And how far would you go to save your own life?
Samantha Kingston has it all—looks, popularity, the perfect boyfriend. Friday, February 12th should be just another day in her charmed life. Instead, it’s her last. The catch: Samantha still wakes up the next morning. In fact, she re-lives the last day of her life seven times, until she realizes that by making even the slightest changes, she may hold more power than she had ever imagined.


Review: I disagree with the Jay Asher quote on the front cover: "You'll have no choice but to tear through this book".  To my mind, this is the sort of book you have to read slowly; savouring every single word and really dragging it out so that it never ends.  Why rush through this book and then finish it, just like that? Yes, I read Before I Fall reeeally sloooowly, like when you only have a few bites of chocolate cake and want to make them last as long as possible.  Mind you, when I say "really slowly," I mean four days, and my mother is still reading the same book that she was reading in May. 


It seems that in lots of reviews of Before I Fall, people seem to dislike Sam.  Sometimes, quite a lot.  But I thought it was kind of nice to have a book from the point of view of one of the I've-got-it-all, popular crowd type-people instead of one of the outsiders who can only watch on while the in-crowd go to parties and date jocks and all that.  And, well, although every cliché  is based behind some truth, Sam wasn't like that.  And as for her being mean, although I found Sam really likeable, because, well, if somebody goes on the awesome emotional journey of sorts that Sam experiences by way of living through the last day of their life 7 times, it's hard not to completely love them.  It was her friend, Lindsay, who I wasn't really keen on, as the plot went further and further along and we found out more about her secrets, then I couldn't help but start disliking her more and more.  And yet I felt sort of sorry for her at the same time.  Such is the emotional torment that is Before I Fall, and  by the end I still hadn't made up my mind on how much I really liked her.


And Juliet.  Even though the reader didn't find out more and more about her until about half-way through the book, she is an excellent, excellent character;  complex, disturbed, quiet, terrible, fascinating and slightly creepy.  A companion novel or sequel of some sort that goes further into her complicated character would be somewhat awesome, although it would be kind of hard to fit that around Before I Fall; it couldn't just tell the same story from the point of view of another person.  Anyway, Juliet was to my mind the most interesting person in the book.


I supposed at first that it must be hard to write about the same day seven times over.  But this book makes you realise how many possibilities there are for events in each day.  Who knows, everything could be completely different.
It makes you think a lot about this sort of thing; how one person's actions can completely alter everything.  It also makes you wander what you would do if you had to live the same day over and over, and what you would do to change things.  In which sense, it's a very philosophical book. 


So, well, plot?  Does this book have a plot?  A girl dies in a car crash and lives through it seven times.  It's sort of hard to describe the book in that sense, but Sam learns so much along the way, then it feels like a journey of sorts. Even if it's just to The Country's Best Yogurt, school and a party.  It was an emotional journey, I suppose.


One thing: This is one of those books where they released it in the UK, changed the cover slightly (got rid of the Jay Asher quote and changed the font) and didn't bother changing certain words to the British spelling. As you may or may not know, I feel like screaming whenever there's a spelling mistake that the editor missed, and though having it published with some slight differences to the spelling here and there because it was first published across the pond, is no excuse.  Perhaps this is just me being a grammar freak, maybe not, but it bothers me.


And, well, to conclude with a new conclusion system:


In three words: thought-provoking, funny, and heartbreaking.
Reccomended for: teenagers and adults everywhere.
Rating: 5.

Review: Hold Still

Dear Blog,

I finished Hold Still yesterday so, well, as ever I have a review, but alas a short one because my Russian homework summons.

Summary (from Goodreads): An arresting story about starting over after a friend’s suicide, from a breakthrough new voice in YA fiction.

Devastating, hopeful, hopeless, playful . . . in words and illustrations, Ingrid left behind a painful farewell in her journal for Caitlin. Now Caitlin is left alone, by loss and by choice, struggling to find renewed hope in the wake of her best friend’s suicide. With the help of family and newfound friends, Caitlin will encounter first love, broaden her horizons, and start to realize that true friendship didn’t die with Ingrid. And the journal which once seemed only to chronicle Ingrid’s descent into depression, becomes the tool by which Caitlin once again reaches out to all those who loved Ingrid—and Caitlin herself.

Review: I've read a lot of depressing books lately, but when I saw Hold Still at the library the other day I has to borrow it before anybody else could, because after discovering it on Goodreads I've wanted to read it.  So, well, despite having read many tragic pieces of literature of late, I read it.
 
Hold Still isn't just a glum suicide book.  Far from it!  It's as much about life as it is death, and has  the bittersweet hope that everything will be alright, sort of, at the end.  It's a heart-wrenching emotional journey for both Caitlin and the reader.

The writing is amazing stuff.  It's wonderfully raw and poetic, and especially towards the beginning it has an empty, hollow feel like the soul has been torn out of the book (much as, I guess, somebody might feel in the aftermath of a suicide).  But instead of just filling the book with empty pages (*cough cough* New Moon), there is writing.  And it is meaningful.  It's easy to write about death and get carried away in the emo-ness, but everyday life carries on and that's what Hold Still is all about. 

And the illustrations?  The artwork is just as wonderful as the writing.  Hold Still is to photography and art what If I Stay is to music.  Plus, the photography/art  aspect to this book seems much more visual and exciting than Drawing With Light, another book about photography and visual things that I've read of late.  Reading Hold Still feels like looking through a photo album. It would make an excellent film.  So kudos to Mia Nolting for making the artwork mean as much as the words (after having looked at her website and seen some more samples, I am completely in love with her work). 

The supporting characters are good, too.  Of all the exciting cast of characters, I think Dylan was my favourite. Ingrid played a massive role in the book too, of course and I feel like I ought to say something about her.  But we only read about her anger and fear and intense emotions through her jounal and Caitlin's memories, but at the same time despite all her importance, she still seemed a little vague. But perhaps that was just because she was dead. 

Summary: Heartbreaking but hopeful, and sad but sweet. As any good tearjerker ought to be, I suppose.  Rating: 4.

PS  50 Followers!  Yay!  Thank you, blogosphere! 

Review: Looking for Alaska

Dear Blog,

I have returned from Yorkshire, and I bring with me a review of Looking for Alaska by John Green. Seeing as I have blogged little the last two weeks, I have many many books to write a review of.  Sorry.

Anyway.  This will have to be a short review because I stayed up very, very late last night surfing Inkpop.com, aka a teen writing website I am now thoroughly addicted to.  Anyhoo, I'm tired and sleep summons. 

Summary (from Goodreads): Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words - and tired of his safe life at home. He leaves for boarding school to seek what the dying poet Francois Rabelais called the "Great Perhaps." Much awaits Miles at Culver Creek, including Alaska Young. Clever, funny, screwed-up, and dead sexy, Alaska will pull Miles into her labyrinth and catapult him into the Great Perhaps.

Review: In my time I have heard many many good things about John Green.  In my time as a book blogger I've heard even more good things. So I bought a copy of Paper Towns off Amazon and borrowed Looking for Alaska from the library.  And now I have finally got round to reading his books, how glad I am that I have. 
  This is one of those books that both boys and girls can read, but alas like many similar books the UK cover seems to look like it would appeal more to boys, which is a shame. Note to boys reading my blog: get the US cover instead, perhaps.  I prefer the UK cover.  It's pretty.


The book is split into two parts: "before" and "after".  I won't say what event divides the two, but I had known what it was beforehand because somebody posted it on a review on Goodreads and didn't mark it as a Spoiler post.  Grrr.  Anyway, even though I sort of knew what was coming, the writing was so raw and tragic it didn't stop me feel like crying in an empty, devastated sort of way when The Event happened.  I didn't, but only because my little sister was sat next to me playing  on her Nintendo DS and would have mocked me ceaselessly, even though she weeps buckets at sentences like, "my  brother died when I was two."  before it moves onto another subject.  Anyway, though she herself is a wet blanket, I wouldn't have heard the end of it I had cried.  So, well, I didn't.
That said.  We know something sinister is going on when Alaska says things like, "you all smoke for fun.  I smoke to die." and "I may die young, but at least I'll die smart". And, in truth, I wonder if The Event would have come as such a shock to me even if I hadn't accidentally discovered it on the internet.

Looking for Alaska is one of those books where the characters are absolutely everything. You could keep the story and the writing but have different characters, and I bet it wouldn't be half good at it is with the cast of characters. They're quirky and cool, but with enough flaws and rough edges to keep them interesting. I think this is why sex-drugs-rock&roll Alaska is so compelling and mysterious: not just to Miles, a.k.a Pudge, but to the reader as well. Her mood swings are confusing and strange, her personality equally intriguing: energetic one moment and slightly scary the next. I was sort of surprised at first-having read heaps of reviews, I was sort  startled when the first thing she says as she appears in the book is recount to the Colonel how a boy she was with honked her boob.  I was like, "oh. Um.  Okay then."

I've read some bad reviews from adults who are all, "this book is BAD. They drink.  They smoke.  they drink drive. They have sex.  Bad, bad BAD. Bleeeeeurgh." All I can say is, I don't care.   It's not like they're the only teens in the world to do this things, so, well, get over it please.

 Miles was a likeable protagonist.  As I've said before, I read few books with male protagonists because I feel slightly alienated from them.  But Miles seems real, like he was an animate object instead of words in a book.  I loved that his main talent was memorising last words-how original is that?! 
While their were moments of such fleeting weirdness and teenagedom, it's a very deep and philosophical book. It's full of the sort of  sayings you might want to add to your favourite quotes if you have a Goodreads account (as every bookworm ought to).  Actually, having read the book I proceeded to add about a squillion quotes from the book onto my page.

Random extra paragraph: While in Yorkshire over the weekend, my father and sister were in a labyrinth and I, having completed it, was stood outside talking to the man who had designed it, having a slightly intellectual debate about the philosophies behind mazes (yes this is going somewhere).  I mentioned the last words that are at the centre of Looking for Alaska:  "How will I ever get out of this labyrinth?"  The designer of the maze asked about it and then we had a long conversation about mazes and what they really mean.

Summary: emotionally draining whether you saw The Event coming or not, and an absolute must read for every teenager and adult.  Rating: 4.5.