An Un-awesome Snow Day

After reading the excerpt about Michael Northrop's "Trapped", I could not WAIT to get my hands on it.

To me, it sounded so exciting and seemed like someone jumped inside my head and took out one of my biggest fantasies...to be trapped inside your school overnight.

The story goes like this...three best friends and a few of their fellow "peers" aka mortal teenage enemies get locked in their high school for a few days and nights during the biggest blizzard of the century.

The heat turns off, the electricity goes haywire, and they live on cafeteria food for the duration of their stay.

Basically, it's the Breakfast Club, in the snow, over night.

I was extremely disappointed when I read the first few pages. I thought that it would get better as time went on but it seemingly got worse. I didn't enjoy the writing and the scenarios seemed unrealistic.

How did the teens' parents not send out a search party looking for them? Even if there was a HUGE snowstorm, my parents would freak out if I didn't come home for multiple days.

It seemed very overdramatic, and not in a good way; the teens locked in the school were a bunch of babies and it was just very over done.

I was expecting so much better from this book; the summary made it seem like a fun, light hearted story about an eclectic group of kids stuck in school overnight but I was definitely wrong.

It was an overdramatic, poorly written book about teenagers from different sides of the track, learning to build a civilization to survive inside a school.

Maybe it was just my high expectations for the book that made me hate it so much but I couldn't wait to finish reading it.

This just goes to show you...never judge a book by it's cover, or it's summary.

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My Future Books:

1. The Fault in Our Stars is the newest novel from renowned YA author, John Green. This book has had SO much hype since it was first announced. It's publication date was January 10th, 2012 and since then it has enjoyed being on the NYT Best Seller's List. The book is about a cancer patient who finds love and comfort in a cancer survivor support group. John Green is a fabulous writer and this book is sure to be his next big hit.

2. Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight: This book was one of the first published of the new year on January 2nd, 2012. Just from reading the summary, it sounds like an intriguing, YA book. A young girl is on her way to London for her father's wedding to a woman she has never met and while she's in the airport, she meets a gorgeous British boy who sweeps her off her feet. Is it love at first sight or just a happy lustful first glance? We'll have to read to find out!

A Great Paper Read

John Green is one of those authors that make you second think every bad thing you've heard about Young Adult novels.


He is not the typical romance, family issues, friend backstabbing YA author; he speaks to the soul and speaks to teens in a philosophical way.


This is only the second book I've read by John Green and my standards were high; this definitely did not disappoint.


Paper Towns is about a boy, Quentin Jacobsen and his infatuation with his next door neighbor and former best friend Margo. 


When I first started reading it, I thought that it was going to be the typical "old friends find love" story but it wasn't that.


Margo is a free spirit who has the attention of the entire school; it's a few months before prom and graduation for the seniors, including Margo, Q, and their separate group of friends.


Margo is always one for games and pranks so she beckons Q out of his window in the middle of the night for a wild night of shenanigans. Q is back in his bed before the alarm goes off for school but when he arrives at his high school, Margo is no where to be found.


The rest of the book (which I won't give away) is spent with Q and his group of friends, along with a few of Margo's plotting and traveling to find the free bird before graduation starts.


My explanation can not do this book justice. It truly is a beautiful coming of age story dealing with the pressures of high school, family, and being perfect.


Margo Roth Spiegelman is the type of girl everyone wishes they could be; she's beautiful, smart, and popular...everyone loves her. But she also has the personality people wish they could have, she is so care free, does whatever she pleases and never looks back. There is no better way to describe Margo other than saying she is a true free spirit without a care in the world.


While reading it, you will get the hint of J.D Salinger's "Catcher in the Rye" but it is so much more than that. 


Paper Towns is not too serious, it's witty and clever and very funny at times. It truly is one of the best books I've read in a while, you will not be disappointed.

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A new feature on the blog will be My Future Books, a list of two or three books that are just being released that I want to read. This week's books are:

1. Pretty Little Secrets : A slight spin off/missing piece of the Pretty Little Liars series. It takes place between two of the books on a winter break that no one has ever addressed. You could see form my 1st post with the review of Ruthless, PLL #10, I really love this series so this is a definite must read.

2. Two Truths and a Lie : This is also another Sara Shepard book. Her other series "The Lying Game" is equally as suspenseful and freaky as PLL. This is the third book in the series and centers around the life of Emma, who has taken her long lost twin Sutton's place and trying to find her killer all while keeping up the appearance of someone she has never met. Two Truths and a Lie was just released on February 7th, so get caught up on the series! It's a wonderful read.

The Best of Me: The Perfect Valentines Day Read

If you're like me, you love a good romance novel. And even though I hate Valentines Day, I still love curling up with a Nicholas Sparks novel because lets face it, Sparks is one of the best romantic writers of our generation.

His track record includes "A Walk to Remember", "The Notebook", "Dear John", and "The Last Song". All of those novels consist of beautiful love stories that everyone wishes they could be a part of.

Sparks new novel, "The Best of Me" can be added to that list of amazing romance stories. It was published on October 11th, 2011 and debuted to a loving audience.

I’ve only read a handful of Sparks novels and loved them but there was something about them that threw me off. I never really liked the fact that he always made the love between the two people so immediate.

That’s why I was hesitant to start reading “The Best of Me”, because I didn’t want to be disappointed and have my faith in Sparks be ruined.

I was SO wrong and regretted waiting so long to read the book. 

The plot was unique but not at the same time. It focused around Dawson and Amanda, high school sweethearts who were crazy in love during their teen years but separated before college because of their family differences.

Dawson is a Cole, a violent, alcoholic, white trash family while Amanda is from a rich, high class family. The two families definitely do not get along, Romeo and Juliet style and Amanda’s parents do not approve of their daughters love and affection for a creature like a Cole.

They don’t let the differences get in the way of their relationship at first but eventually, it becomes too much and they go their separate ways.

Decades later, Amanda and Dawson reunite in their hometown of Oriental, deep in the South. Amanda went on with her life, creating a family and a a lovely marriage but deep down, she has never forgotten the way Dawson Cole made her feel.

Dawson never forgot her either, living his life in simplicity and loneliness. They immediately fall back into old habits which creates drama for everyone involved. 

There are a few subplots in the book that could add to the main plot of Dawson and Amanda, and are very essential but to be honest, I skipped a lot of those chapters because I was so invested in their relationship.

In my opinion, this was one of Sparks better novels. I loved the way he created the love story before the book even started; it was so different from the rest of his books where you see the love bloom between the two.

The fact that there was no amount of time or distance that could keep Amanda and Dawson away from each other was beautiful.

It’s a story of love, tragedy, sorrow, and pain but still, so perfect and beautiful. I sped through reading it, I just couldn’t put it down because I needed to know what happened.

I won’t reveal the ending, I’ll let you figure it out for yourself but it was beautiful, I was content with it, and it definitely made me cry. 

If you love the idea of forbidden love and memories from long ago coming back to haunt you, this book is definitely for you.

Ruthless

The Pretty Little Liars series was supposed to end with “Wanted’ in June 2010 but the author, Sara Shepherd had a different idea and continued to write for the mystery series.

Sara Shepherd published the first Pretty Little Liars novel in 2006 and since then she has published ten books in the series.

If you are unaware of the plot line of the PLL books, it’s centered around four teenage girls who live in Rosewood, Penn, a fictional town. Their best friend Alison was murdered and Ali was the central point of their friendship.

After Ali is killed the girls drift apart but are brought together again by their text message stalker ‘A’. The girls are clueless as to who A is but she knows secrets that only Alison would know. The mysterious A taunts the girls for months before they find out who she is.

When all is said and done, the girls feel safe but a new A comes to town that they have to deal with. Eventually they figure it out once again but not before A tries to kill all of them in a house fire.

That brings us to the the tenth book in the series, “Ruthless”.

This was definitely not my favorite Pretty Little Liars book, it seemed kind of pointless. Nothing was really solved and it seemed like just a filler book for the next novel that according to Barnesandnoble.com, will be called “Stunning” and released in June 2012.

In all previous nine PLL books, there was a huge WOW moment and a cliffhanger that left me panting for more of the Rosewood darlings but this didn’t live up to the hype that should come into a PLL book. 

The one almost “wow” moment the book had turned out to be a funk and was just a misunderstanding. 

Even though “Ruthless” was anything but, it was still fabulously written. Shepherd knows her characters and sticks to their true personalities which is refreshing, especially for such a young adult mystery novel.

Yes, this book was the least suspenseful in the series and yes, it definitely did not live up to the Pretty Little Liars persona, I would recommend it and give it 3 out of 5 stars. 

It was an easy read, especially if you’ve read the previous books. If you’re a series lover and can’t wait for “Stunning”, then read “Ruthless”, you won’t regret it but you might not be totally satisfied. 

A TV series by the same name, Pretty Little Liars, and basically the same plot debuted on ABC Family in June 2010. It's aired on Monday nights at 8pm on the Disney company's family channel.


To get more info on the TV series, click here and for everything about your favorite Rosewood girls, visit the official PLL site.