Anyone But You by Kim Askew & Amy Helmes

Anyone But You by Kim Askew by Amy Helmes
Series: Twisted Lit, #3
Source: Authors for Review
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: January 1, 2014

These violent delights have violent ends...

Gigi Caputo is fed up. A vicious act of vandalism has dealt another blow to her family's proud pizza heritage, and the Montes--owners of a rival Italian restaurant--are clearly to blame. The hostility goes far beyond bragging rights for best pizza in Chicago. The Montes have been bent on destroying Cap's for four generations. Even if it means putting herself in harm's way, Gigi's determined to get to the bottom of the feud. Instead, in a secret encounter with Roman Monte, the very boy whose relatives have brought her family such grief, she finds both danger and love at first sight. If the daughter and son of these two warring families fall for each other, can it be anything but a recipe for disaster?

Slowly, Gigi and Roman learn that their story is fatefully linked to the summer of 1933, when two twelve-year-olds, Benny and Nick, hop the turnstile at the Chicago World's Fair. The most stunning wonder of the fair is Stella, who innocently causes a lasting rift between the two boyhood. Wending its way through past and present day, this modern take on Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is bittersweet, funny, and intensely exciting. It's classic romance--a tale of hate and the only force that can ever defeat it: love.

Romeo & Juliet is one of my least favorite Shakespeare plays. I just can't get over the stupidity of the entire story, and I really don't find it romantic. Insta-love, then everyone dies. That's a real winner there. Which is why I was pleasantly surprised to find that I actually enjoyed Anyone But You. I was expecting the humor and the sense of romantic comedy that comes with these girls together, but this was the first book of theirs that I really liked.

At first, I was a little bit confused, and kind of unsure - as y'all know, I don't follow POV switches very well - unless they're very well written. And while the POVs in Anyone But You weren't badly written, not at all, the first switch was very confusing. Not only did it switch POVs, it all switched eras. Like, all the way back to the thirties - and that was a tiny bit disconcerting at first.

I didn't connect with the main character, Gigi, and I didn't really buy the romance between Roman and Gigi - but I'm willing to forgive the instalove. Because, as I mentioned before, the original play was built on insta-love. I would have liked to have seen more development, but I'm fine with what was presented.

I actually liked the scenes from the past, told through Nick's eyes, better than the present day. Nick was a more complex character, and it was nice to see all of the things that tore Benny & Nick apart. The development in that part of the story was absolutely phenomenal! I predicted what the problem would be, but since I'd already read the play... it was okay.

The most interesting part of Anyone But You was picking out names and faces and personalities from the original play - and comparing them. That was a lot of fun. All in all, Anyone But You really wasn't a bad read. I actually really liked it, and it was a wonderful re-imagining of Romeo & Juliet.

The Namesake by Steven Parlato + Excerpt

Title: The Namesake
Author: Steven Parlato
Series: N/A
Source: Publisher for review
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: January 18, 2013
GoodReads||The Book Depository

Gifted artist? Standout student?

All his teachers are sure certain that Evan Galloway can be the graduate who brings glory to small, ordinary St. Sebastian's School.

As for Evan, however, he can't be bothered anymore.

Since the shock of his young father's suicide last spring, Evan no longer cares about the future. In fact, he believes that he spent the first fifteen years of his life living a lie. Despite his mother's encouragement and the steadfast companionship of his best friend, Alexis, Evan is mired in rage and bitterness. Good memories seem ludicrous when the present holds no hope.

Then Evan's grandmother hands him the key--literally, a key--to a locked trunk that his father hid when he was the same age as Evan is now. Digging into the trunk and the small-town secrets it uncovers, Evan can begin to face who his father really was, and why even the love of his son could not save him.

In a voice that resonates with the authenticity of grief, Steven Parlato tells a different kind of coming-of-age story, about a boy thrust into adulthood too soon, through the corridor of shame, disbelief, and finally...compassion.

Oh God. This book is something else-- and honestly, it was fantastic, but it deals with some very, very dark and taboo subjects. It honestly gets more and more graphic as you read, until you're at the point where you honestly don't want to hear anymore, but you still have to know what happens. You have to know why he did it. Why Evan's dad committed suicide. And the results WILL surprise you.

I think that my only real issue with this book WAS that it was unbelievably graphic. It was pretty insane, and I can honestly tell you that there are some things that I never really wanted to know...ick. But as icky as some of those subjects were, they are what made the story so unforgettable.

Evan was a good character-- I'll give him that. But I do have some gripes that are similar to another blogger's. Evan is supposed to be CRAZY SMART. Genius level, even. But it seems like he's just a regular kind of guy. He doesn't act like the guy from An Abundance of Katherines (who's always making up a mathematical equation for everything), nor is he really all that groundbreaking. We see very little mention of his "geniusishness". He just seems like a normal kind of guy.

Another thing that kinda made this book a tad weird was that it was all Catholic. (Not that I'm against catholicism, but it seemed used a lot for a guy who was quite a cusser, if you catch my drift). It just seemed like he wasn't really Catholic-- all we see is that he goes to a Catholic school. I wish that his actual religion had been used as a key part of the character development, because that would have been super cool.

All in all, I enjoyed The Namesake, but it disturbed me so much that I had to knock a star off of the rating. It was so graphic that I often found myself not wanting to read more, but dying to find out what had happened. Is this a bad thing, or a good thing? You decide.

Am I getting desensitized or something? It's like nothing else could surprise me, affect me even. I've developed an emotional callous. ~ Pg. 273, ARC

Excerpt:

Mister Pettafordi's office is examining room bright.

It makes me queasy, like I'm here for X-rays -- which, in a way, I am. My art teacher slash guidance counselor slash "Think of me as your friend" wants to help. That's how I landed in the vinyl visitor chair on the wrong side of his desk. I should be in silent study, passing notes to Alexis. Instead, I'm here, embarrassed for Michelangelo's David. He's beside the file cabinet, a red umbrella hanging from his crooked elbow, looking a little vulnerable, naked under the lights.

I need to write this stupid essay. Mr. P's fixated on getting me a full scholarship; he says I'm his "best student ever." But then, that's what my teachers always say.

Mister P: "Evan, you need to pursue your art."

Me: "Uh-huh."

Mister P: "Evan, you've got what it takes."

Me: "Hmm."

Mister P: "Evan, follow your dream!"

Thing is, I think it's his dream more than mine now.

But I'm trying to get a jump on this heap of applications. Pettafordi said I need to "dazzle them" with my essay. I asked what I should write about.

He said, "Evan, write what you know."

As helpful as that was, I've chosen the opposite. See, I'm not sure I want to study art, or even go to college anymore. So I'll write what I don't know. I could do twenty pages on spark plugs or the reproductive cycle of the Andean potato weevil. Except, those I could research. No. I'll tackle the true unknown.

I never knew my father.

I don't mean that in a trash TV kind of way. Like, Up Next, DNA Tests: Real Dads Revealed! It's not like that. Mom wasn't a sperm bank patron. I wasn't raised by wolverines. I've lived most of my fourteen years in a room two doors down from the man, falling asleep to his snores. I could map you his morning stubble, a whorl on his chin like Madagascar. Nope. Nothing dramatic about the Galloways. We were typical. Mom made Campbell's soup casseroles. Dad fell asleep in the leather chair on movie night. We were about as normal as it gets. At least, that's what everyone thought.

Before last April.

Now when I think about stuff, it's all about how it used to be. We used to have Monopoly marathons. Build model planes. Gorge ourselves at China Buffet. We used to . . . whatever.

A great philosopher once said, "Used-to-bes don't count anymore."

Okay, it was this singer, Neil Diamond. My friend Alexis is a huge fan. But I disagree with Old Neil because, really, used-to-bes are the only things that do count anymore.Especially when today sucks so bad.

It's funny how perfectly life splits into before and after. Before, it was just life, crappy or un'. After, everything's different.

But I was going to tell you about my father.

My Father by Evan Galloway
My father is tall.
My father is fun.
My father reads stories
and Plays with me.
My father is the best, FATHER NUMBER ONE!

I wrote that in first grade. You could say my opinion of him has evolved. For one thing, I realized he was never all that tall. I admit the poem loses something sans macaroni frame, but I think it shows real literary promise. I mean, after reading that, I'm sure you can see how I ended up in Honors English, right?

Yeah, I'm smart. All through school I've been in the brain group: TAG, the Talented And Gifted Program. It's actually sort of cool, loads of field trips, elaborate, "self-guided learning opportunities." Sure, the regular kids call us "Tag Fags," but that's never really bothered me. Not much. It's jealousy, plain and simple. And come on -- tag fag? -- such an obvious rhyme. Leave it to a remedial reader.

Now I'm at Saint Sebastian's Catholic High School, third year, following Dad's footsteps. Yeah, he went here. But I one-upped the old man; I'll graduate at sixteen. They jumped me a couple grades. So I'm the second Evan Galloway to attend SSCHS. My family calls me "Junior," but technically, I'm not. Dad and I don't have the same middle name. Or, didn't. I do that sometimes, refer to him like he's still here. Like he didn't kill himself last spring. Like Gran didn't find him hanging from a beam in her attic Easter morning, while Mom and I were at Mass.

Exposure by Kim Askew and Amy Helmes + Giveaway!

Title: Exposure
Author: Kim Askew and Amy Helmes
Series: Twisted Lit, #2
Source: Publisher for review
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: January 18, 2013
GoodReads||The Book Depository

Double, double, toil and trouble. Sometimes, the quest for high school royalty can be deadly! In this emotionally-charged twist on Shakespeare’s Macbeth, a self-conscious shutterbug named Skye Kingston navigates a treacherous school year in Alaska fraught with unspoken secrets and tragic twists of fate.

Along the way she encounters three strangely prophetic BFFs; one social-climbing, sociopathic cheerleader; and a heart-stopping hottie named Craig McKenzie: the man who would be Prom King. Can Skye save the boy she loves — and herself — before they get caught in the crosshairs?

This book was just a bit too anticlimactic for my taste. I mean, it kept me entertained and all for the short time that I was reading it, but...yeah. I just didn't care all that much for the story. Something so very dramatic happens, and it's something that you never forget for the duration of the story...but it really isn't capitalized on.

Skye's decisions toward Craig were kind of spineless, and it was the end of the book before I started to like Skye at all. Before then, she simply wasn't brave enough. She was the character that was in the corner wussing out, and that's just not my favorite kind of character. And when something very dramatic (we're talking BAD juju here) happened, she just took it. It was very strange, to say the least.

Ugh. I'm not really sure that there's anything good that I actually CAN say about this one...harmless fluff, and it was fairly enjoyable and all...but not very memorable. I just don't have very much to say about it.

Giveaway:

Just because I didn't love it to death, doesn't mean that you won't! And the publisher has given me an awesome opportunity for you! Check out the GIVEAWAY! US only. a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tempestuous (Twisted Lit #1) by Kim Askew and Amy Helmes

Title: Tempestuous
Author: Kim Askew and Amy Helmes
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: December 18, 2012

Recently banished, unfairly, by the school’s popular crowd, former “it girl,” Miranda Prospero, finds herself in a brave new world: holding dominion amongst a rag-tag crew of geeks and misfits where she works at the Hot-Dog Kabob in the food court of her local mall.

When the worst winter storm of the season causes mall workers and last-minute shoppers to be snowed-in for the night, Miranda seizes the opportunity to get revenge against the catty clique behind her social exile. With help from her delightfully dweeby coworker, Ariel, and a sullen loner named Caleb who works at the mall’s nearby gaming and magic shop, Miranda uses charm and trickery to set things to right during this spirited take on Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

Tempestuous  had all of the key elements of a good romantic comedy--meaning that it was really cute and all, but it would never happen in real life. The ending was a bit too perfect, and the characters were a bit too cliche. But in spite of that, I still enjoyed it.

It was a good read, because it took my mind away from all the books I've been reading lately--all dealing with rough issues and hard lives. But this cut me a break from all that--sort of. There were a few tense moments in this book--most notably, being snowed in for the night. Which would suck. And all of the delightful instances that again, would never, ever, ever happen. Ever.

As I said before, the characters were a bit cliche. Especially Ariel, because it's like, the law of young adult literature for the protagonist to have a quirky best friend that's completely innocent and naive. I did think that Miranda was an pretty good character, despite being cliched, and that Caleb pretty much avoided cliche completely, but they could've had a bit more character development.

This is one of those books that are good fluff, but you don't actually remember much about it after reading. All in all, this book is exactly what it claims to be. A fresh take on Shakespeare's The Tempest. And if you've ever read the Bard's work, you'll know that he liked being dramatic. And that character quality was not one of his best qualities.

*This book was provided by the publisher for review.

The Girl in the Wall by Daphne Benedis-Grab

 

Title: The Girl in the Wall
Author: Daphne Benedis-Grab
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: December 18, 2012

Ariel's birthday weekend looks to be the event of the season, with a private concert by rock star Hudson Winters on the grounds of her family's east coast estate, and all of Ariel's elite prep school friends in attendance. The only person who's dreading the party is Sera, Ariel's former best friend, whose father is forcing her to go. Sera has been the school pariah since she betrayed Ariel, and she now avoids Ariel and their former friends. Thrown together, Ariel and Sera can agree on one thing: this could be one very long night.

They have no idea just how right they are.
Only moments after the concert begins and the lights go down, thugs open fire on parents and schoolmates alike, in a plot against Ariel's father that quickly spins out of control. As the entire party is taken hostage, the girls are forced apart. Ariel escapes into the hidden tunnels in the family mansion, where she and Sera played as children. Only Sera, who forges an unlikely alliance with Hudson Winters, knows where her friend could be. As the industrial terrorist plot unravels and the death toll climbs, Ariel and Sera must recall the sisterhood that once sustained them as they try to save themselves and each other on the longest night of their lives.

It pains me to say this after reading this non-stop action book, but I don't get the ending. It was a bit too abrupt, and I just wish that more things would've panned out. I thought that Ariel gave up a little too much for me to identify all that well with her--I loved the book until the end. Some people died, and it was all so...undramatic.

I just wish that the person who died hadn't--I mean, I know that it's for a higher purpose and all, but why? I thought that the story was headed along just fine! *cries self to sleep* I wanted him to live--I wanted Ariel to be happy and alright. (Not a spoiler.)

I feel like this book was a bit more plot than character development. I mean, plot is good and all, but I'm a sucker for good characters. It doesn't matter if the book goes nowhere. I won't care as long as I like the characters, seriously. Characters make the book.

Speaking of which, I enjoyed Sera and Ariel's alternating points of view. Sera's voice was my favorite though, because she seemed a lot nicer than Ariel. Don't get me wrong, she straightens up her act in the end, and becomes a better person, but throughout most of the book I couldn't stand her. She was so self-righteous and full of herself--ugh.

Back to Sera. She seemed like such a total sweetheart, but she was brave too. She wasn't afraid to stand up for what was right, and I loved that about her.

All in all, The Girl in the Wall was a fast paced, unforgettable read, but it relied heavily on plot instead of characters. But it was a good plot, so there is that.

*This book was provided by the publisher for review.

Louder Than Words by Laurie Plissner

Title: Louder than Words
Author: Laurie Plissner
Publisher: Merit Press
Publication Date: December 18, 2012

The debut novel of an American original, Laurie Plissner's is both medical thriller and lyric love story in the tradition of magical realism.

Since the snowy night when her family's car slammed into a tree, killing her parents and little sister, Sasha has been unable to speak except through a computer with a robotic voice. Nothing is wrong with her body; that's healed. But, after four years, Sasha's memory, and her spirit, are still broken. Then one day, she's silently cussing out the heavy book she dropped at the library when a gorgeous, dark-haired boy, the kind of boy who considers Sasha a freak or at least invisible, "answers" Sasha's hidden thoughts -- out loud.

Yes, Ben can read minds; it's no big deal. He's part of a family with a host of unusual, almost-but-not-quite-supernatural talents. Through Ben's love, Sasha makes greater progress than she has with a host of therapists and a prominent psychiatrist. With him to defend her, bullies keep the world from ever understanding Sasha, he pulls away. Determined to win him and prove her courage by facing her past, Sasha confronts her past -- only to learn that her family's death was no accident and that a similar fate may wait for her, in the unlikeliest of disguises.

Louder than Words was really freaking great--and so not what I expected when I started this book. For one, I kind of expected it to be a really sweet romance--it wasn't. Not that it wasn't kind of sorta cute--it totally was, but it gives off a more mature vibe than that. This is not a fluffy read at all. I wouldn't recommend this one for anyone under fifteen--sexual content is pretty high in this one.

But in the story's defense, we did need to hear about it, because it makes a lot of things make sense.

The plot was fairly well done, but there were a couple of things that I saw coming--which at the risk of being spoilerish, I can't reveal them to you. But I would if I could! Speaking of which--how do you even write a novel like this? It seems like it would be pretty hard--and I don't think that it's been done before, so I've got nothing to compare this book too.

I thought that Sasha was a pretty good character, but it seemed like she could have been better--more development, more character, more something. I don't know what it was that she was missing, but she was without. Just a enough to bring the rating down, because the characters weren't fleshy enough--but they weren't so bad. It was a bit weird, to tell you the truth.

Ben kind of seemed like a shadow for some reason--maybe it was because of the time frame this book was done in? I liked the book, but I wish I could've got more development on all the characters and the plotline--maybe it's because the book is so short? If it had been longer, I probably would've felt more loving towards it. On another note, I couldn't put this book down--it was so good when I was reading it. This never happens to me, but 3.5 stars for this one!

*This book was provided by the publisher for review.