Another Day - David Levithan

When Rhiannon and Justin talk or even ask a question to each other they always end up fighting.  One Monday Justin suggests that they leave and asks her where she wants to go.  She says the ocean and suddenly they are leaving school and heading there.  Along the way Justin sings along with the radio, which he normally doesn't do, and asks about her family.  She knows something is different, but doesn't question since she's enjoying this change in Justin.  They spend the rest of the day at the beach building sand castles and talking like they haven't talked before.  The magical time ends when Rhiannon's mom calls asking where she is.  Justin drops her off and she wants more days like the one they had today. The next day Justin is back to his same old self, and Rebecca, Rhiannon's friend, is wondering where she was yesterday afternoon.  On Thursday after Justin blew her off, a girl named Amy comes up and tells her she's thinking about coming to school there.  Amy follows Rhiannon around for the rest of the day.  After school she walks Amy to her car she asks Rhiannon what is one thing nobody else knows about her.  She tells her about the time she stole Forever by Judy Blume from her sister and named her private area Helena.  They both laugh and hope they see each other next year.  On Saturday Justin and Rhiannon go to Steve's party.  While there she talks to Steve's cousin Nathan.  They talk about relationships and she starts to question why she is still with Justin.  He finds them talking and she says Nathan is gay, so there is nothing to worry about.  They go downstairs and dance before the cops break up the party.  Just before she leaves Nathan asks for her e-mail.  On Sunday she is surprised to see an e-mail from him and she replies.  She then goes back to spending her time surfing the net.  The next day their friends are asking about Steve's party.  Justin says there were too many skank girls in the kitchen, Stephanie yelled at him, and the cops came.  Rhiannon goes along with Justin's story, and doesn't say a word about her time with Nathan.  Rebecca, Steve, Stephanie, Ben and Rhiannon skip the last few periods because there is an assembly.  Rhiannon mentions to Steve about his cousin, and he says all his cousins are eight years old.  Steve does remember seeing Nathan though.  Rebecca points out that guys lie all the time, and Nathan liked her and wanted to get close to her.  She e-mails Nathan asking for an explanation.  Nathan replies he can explain, but it has to be done in person.  She agrees to meet him at a bookstore the next day.  Rhiannon gets there early and a girl sits down in front of her saying Nathan sent her.  A tells her that every day A wakes up in a different body.  A tells her who he/she's been for the last week.  Last Monday when her and Justin went to the beach it was A in Justin.  She doesn't believe A and thinks this is a joke.  A tries to convince her it is possible.  She agrees to meet A tomorrow, to see if he/she is telling the truth.  She stops by Justin's house and asks him about last Monday.  He remembers being at the ocean, but not much else.  The next day during school Rhiannon is e-mailing A about where to meet with him/her.  She hangs out with Justin before heading to meet A.  She is late meeting A and asks the boy A is in to see his phone.  She asks him questions about the people A has been in.  A then explains how he/she has seen things going from person to person.  When A was in Justin he/she fell in love with Rhiannon.  A is going to prove to her what love really means.  The next day Rhiannon e-mails A and he/she replies the girl who A is in today is trying to kill herself, and she needs to get over right away.  Rhiannon heads over and the girl has a notebook filled with ways to end her life.  They come up with a plan to have A in Kelsea's body tell her father she wants to kill herself.  If that doesn't work drive to a hospital.  When Rhiannon gets home she sees an article about Nathan claiming to be possessed by the devil six days ago.  She e-mails A asking how things went with Kelsea.  Kelsea's father is aware of what's going on and is seeking help for her.  She then takes a drive to where Nathan lives under the guise of selling Girl Scout cookies for her sister.   He has a blank look in his eyes, different from when A was inside of him.  After that trip she and Justin hang out and have pizza.  They talk about Justin's father heading to see his sick grandmother.  He calls and talks to her before his dad arrives.  Steve then calls about a party at Yonni Pfister's house.  They go to the party, and while Justin is getting drunk Rhiannon calls Kelsea's house to make sure everything is okay.  Her father says she is getting the help she needs.  On Sunday she hangs out with A who is a girl named Ashley and is gorgeous.  They head to a national park and have a picnic.  Afterwards they go walking and talk about what each of them wants.  A wants to be with Rhiannon, but they can't be together.  Rhiannon cares about A, but also cares about Justin.  She is trying to justify why she's with Justin, but A says she'll become lost because Justin is also lost.  Rhiannon calls Justin and tells him a friend of hers is in town.  She asks if he would like to have dinner with the two of them, and he says yes.  A and Rhiannon fill the next few hours by telling everything to each other.  They meet Justin for dinner and at one point she leaves to go to the bathroom when she comes back she doesn't want either A or Justin.  He leaves and Rhiannon takes Ashley back to her house.  Rhiannon calls Justin to apologize, but Justin tells her Ashley is not her friend and she is out of control.  At school the next day Justin tells everyone what a slut Ashley was the day before.  In art class Rebecca tries to talk sense into Rhiannon about Justin.  She tells Rebecca everything thing is fine with her and Justin.  The next day a swoopy hair kid catches her eye and it turns out to be A.  They talk and as much as they want to see each other Rhiannon says they should stick to e-mail for now.  As A walks away she can still feel the connection to him/her.  Are they destined to be together, or will Rhiannon choose to stay with Justin? 

I enjoyed this book just as much as I enjoyed Every Day.  I really liked how A broke through the barrier Rhiannon had put up to have her examine her relationship with Justin.  To her everything was fine with Justin.  A saw a person who was becoming lost, and helped her start breaking away to become her own person.  Sometimes we need another perspective from someone else, even if it's a person we barely know, to get us to look at things differently.

T.B.
9/25/15

Dark Dude by Oscar Hijuelos

Sometimes you need to step away from yourself to figure out who you are and what matters. Dark Dude explores that journey for one teen.

Rico is a young Latino boy growing up in 1960s Harlem. The problem is that he looks like a white boy, which leaves him torn in his identity since he's not white, but the Latinos don't count him as one of them either. When his struggles in school lead his parents to threaten military school, Rico makes a drastic decision to run away with his best friend who nearly died in a horrible accident while on drug. Looking for a fresh start, they head to Wisconsin to stay with an old buddy of Rico's. While Rico and his friend start to find their places in the world, Rico discovers that you can't escape all of your problems.

Although this novel takes place in the '60s, it is a timeless story about identity and family. Aside from mentions of hippies and full-service gas stations, it's easy to imagine this story happening now. The target audience definitely feels male, but the message is for anyone. It speaks of the people of the world and how even the most picturesque place will have its problems. It talks of overcoming your demons and finding your place. And it talks about family and the undeniable draw they have on your life.

This book has the potential to speak to a number of impressionable teens as they fight to figure out where they fit in their cultures, family and the world in general. It looks like a long book and that might deter some readers, but it is easy to get through and worth the time.
MMK

Twisted Fate by Norah Olson

Sometimes I think that authors are trying too hard to be original and cutting-edge that they end up failing in the final product. This one of those books that "uniqueness" made the novel confusing and a general struggle to get through.

The book starts off with the revelation that something happens to Syd's sister, something she wished she'd been able to prevent and it all had to do with their next door neighbor Graham. Syd's fascinated by him because he's odd and she knows there's something off about him, whereas her sister Ally is falling in love with him. Graham, though, is odd. He's moved next door to these sisters because of something that happened in his last town, something that has caused him to lose his best friend and have a juvenile record. To deal with this, he has an interest in recording people - making a record of the world and selling these films online. When Syd learns the truth about these videos and the consequences of them, she knows she has to do something to protect her sister.

This novel is told through different narrators, a number of them foreshadowing that something awful happens to Ally. With the different narrators, my first observation was the contradiction of stories. It made me think about the saying how every story has three sides - his side, her side and the truth. I thought this book was just about finding the truth, but there was something else going on. The contradicting chapters, however, bordered on confusing. To be honest, I peeked at the end of the book and knowing the truth helped a little. It made the signs more obvious, but yet it also made other things more confusing - especially the final scene. With the revelation at the absolute end of the book, the sequence of events in the final scene make little sense. So if anyone could explain it to me, I'd greatly appreciate it. Aside from the twist and the creative storytelling, another thing that bothered me was the prevalence of drugs in this novel. Graham gladly talks about altering prescriptions and combining drugs. Syd is always smoking weed. While I understand this happens, in my eyes, there's no need to glorify it. It'd be one thing to say he did it or to say she was high, but the novel goes into details about what drugs to mix and what he's doing. I didn't feel as if it was necessary, but maybe I'm too much of an innocent to accept these things.

In the end, this novel was a struggle to get through for me. Since I found the storytelling confusing (sometimes it read like a novel, sometimes it felt like telling the events in a documentary), it was hard to get into this book. The story as a whole is interesting and intriguing, but I think it could have been told differently and would be more successful.
MMK

This Song Will Save Your Life by Leila Sales

Getting through high school is difficult for a number of people - and I'm not talking academically. As much as school is about class, it's about fitting in, and when you don't, the struggles can seem insurmountable. This novel isn't as much about finding your place in high school, but about find out who you are.

Ever since the fourth grade, Elise has known that she was unpopular. At the start of sophomore year, she's determined to be popular and did everything she could think of to succeed. When she fails, she believes that suicide is the only option, but even that doesn't work out like she planned. Now she's just as unpopular and lost until she runs into a pair of girls who invite her to an underground dance club where Elise can get lost in the music. While there, Elise discovers a passion for DJing, some real friends, and a boyfriend. All of this, though, is still a secret, and her real life is exploding with the discovery of a fake diary in her name that points out how unpopular she is in school. Just when she thinks that things are finally going her way at the club, everything falls apart and she risks losing everything that had finally made sense to her.  Had she really discovered who she really was, or was this just another act to try and fit in?

Elise has a great voice throughout this book. From the very beginning, she's someone you can relate to as this girl desperate to be liked. I was a little bothered by how casually she treated suicide given how serious of a situation it is, but I guess it fit with her personality and the fact that she really didn't want to die. You really felt for this character and her struggle to be liked that you cheer when she gets accepted and crushed when it seems like she's been rejected again. You want her to find her niche and she does. This book is heavy with music references. The problem I had is that some of them are obscure - at least in the eyes of someone not into the music scene. If it was all popular songs, it could easily date the book, but I only knew a handful of the songs and that left me feeling like I was missing out on something. Does that detract from the telling of the story, not really. 

This book has a great message about finding out what makes you "you" and embracing it. You can't let other people tell you what's cool or not or be afraid of who you are. Elise finds this awesome talent which also makes her psuedo-popular. It almost makes me wish her talent and experience was a little bit more realistic for the average person to relate to and see how "easy" it can be to find yourself because I think the message of the book is so important. Not everyone is going to become DJ Elise, but everyone has the chance to love who they are. Definitely a book to read.
MMK