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Smash It!
Warnings: Sex, Discussions of Sex My Thoughts Drama nerds rejoice for the year of fuck it! Smash It! is all about a shy girl that decides to take a page out of Shonda Rimes “year of yes” to start overcoming her shyness. Liv feels that she has always been on the sidelines next to her two rockstar friends, Eli and Dré. She is hopelessly in love with Eli and fears taking the leap, feeling that she’s the uncool girl that nobody notices. But owning oneself is not as easy as it sounds, and everything becomes more complicated when other people and feelings are involved. I loved the main characters and…
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Thirteen Reasons Why
Warnings: Suicide, Bullying, Rape, Sexual Assault My Thoughts This is a difficult story to unpack and process. The book tackles suicide and a number of other incredibly heavy themes that are not easy to approach and talk about even though they are topics that do need to be talked about, and badly. The story is paced like a suspense novel and it made the book incredibly readable, but I can’t decide if this is a good or bad thing. On one end it’s good, it allows Hannah to talk about the different life events that impacted her and sent her spiraling into depression while simultaneously showing the effect that her…
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Always and Forever, Lara Jean
My Review: Graduating high school is truly an event to be celebrated, but it’s bittersweet too with the changes that it brings. It is the end of an era for young people as they say goodbye to youth and start transitioning into adulthood. We grow up, and we grow apart—there are many that end up going their separate ways as seniors head to different colleges or to work. Senior year is a time to reminisce because of the finality, it’s the time that many remember for the rest of their lives. This book made me feel all kinds of nostalgia about my own senior year, even though I was more…
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P.S. I Still Love You
My Review: What a delightful and frustrating book, this series has become such a guilty pleasure for me to read. To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before was such a delight because it introduces an understandable dilemma, and the reader follows Lara Jean as she clumsily falls in love with her first boyfriend. Drama ensues when another letter recipient shows up, and Lara Jean’s new squeeze Peter is still very close to his very jealous ex-girlfriend.Lara Jean, I think you half-fall in love with every person you meet. It’s part of your charm. You’re in love with love. In this book we see Lara Jean come into her own more…
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To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
My Review: I had been eyeing this series for a while despite the fact that I rarely read YA contemporary romance. I picked up the boxed set on a whim because I had always been interested in the story blurb and the fact that the main character is biracial like me. I’m so glad that I finally picked this up because if it wasn’t for my husband starting to tuck us in for bed at five a.m., I would have devoured this entire book in one sitting. I was hooked. What would you know about love, Lara Jean? The story follows a rising junior named Lara Jean, who writes letters…
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A Girl on the Shore
Also by this author: Dead Dead Demon’s Dededede Destruction, Nijigahara Holograph, Solanin My Thoughts A Girl on the Shore is a manga that I didn’t know that I needed. It’s a story about two youths, struggling with an oppressive ennui that leads them to become friends with benefits. This isn’t a love story by any means, as many that have ever entered in a true “no strings” friendship can probably attest to. It is about loneliness, selfishness, and the complexity of relationships. “We just do it and do it, but I keep feeling like it’s not enough. Why do you think?” I was surprised with how much I related to…
