Geek Girl

 ★★★★★

Geek Girl by Cindy C. Bennett

I originally picked up this book (metaphorically speaking) because of the fun premise: a reversal of roles with the bad girl setting out to corrupt the good boy. I expected a fun read, but what Bennett delivers is so much more than that. It's an honest portrayal of a wounded girl finally making peace with herself and her past.

Jen is a product of the foster system. After a huge disappointment with a family she truly loved, she shuts herself off emotionally. As she bounces around from home to home—some good and others horrible—she becomes the typical rebel teen to protect her heart from future hurt.

The story is fairly predictable, but that's not what makes this book shine. It doesn't need plot twists to pull readers in. It's the startlingly honest portrayal of Jen, her wounds and struggles, that tugs at you. I even cried at one point, which hasn't happened with any book in recent years. It wasn't tragedy that struck me to the point of tears, either, but the emotional honesty that leads Jen to truly find herself.

That said, there is plenty of fun, especially if you're a closet nerd like me. You could think of it as a mild, teenage Big Bang Theory. I whole-heartedly recommend Geek Girl to teens—male and female—as well as adults. The struggle to find oneself is universal, regardless of background or age, and Jen's journey is beautifully told. 

Cool fact: Bennett originally self-published Geek Girl before it attracted the attention of a publisher. It proves, in part, that a well-told, self-published story can find success.

Note: The publisher, Cedar Fort, is a smaller independent press in Utah that in the past has focused on Mormon fiction and nonfiction. It looks like they're branching out into mainstream with books like Geek Girl, which doesn't reference religion at all. Plenty of their other books do revolve around Mormon culture, such as The Next Door Boys (review to come). It's not good or bad; just something to note when selecting future reads from this publisher.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a review copy.

Cry Wolf

★★★★

Cry Wolf by Angela Campbell

Sorry, no rippling teen werewolf abs or sparklepire foes in this tale. Just a good old-fashioned story of a reporter out to debunk an urban legend.

I love that a modern story involving a werewolf can be categorized as a contemporary realistic book. Realism FTW! I'm so ready for the paranormal phase to be over and get back to the good old-fashioned ghost, monster, and urban legend stories. I prefer to outrun scary creatures, not date them.

Before getting to the heart of the review, I do have one confession to make*: I have a large weakness for stories involving reporters and/or editors from small-town newspapers, or from big papers sent to small towns. It has to do with some of my college-hood dreams. I majored in journalism, later working as a reporter and then an editor at a large metropolitan newspaper. Honestly, I'm still a reporter at heart. Even now I get all squiggly inside thinking about how much fun it'd be to spend a few years working at a small-town newspaper.** 

So when I saw that Cry Wolf incorporated a) a big-city reporter coming to a small-town to investigate an b) urban myth in the form of a werewolf, with a c) romance likely to develop, I was a goner. Absolutely perfect.

That said, it was a nice story on the merits of the writing and characters as well. I'll admit I don't have many nitpicks, but probably more so because I got lost in the story. Which, honestly, should be the goal of every writer. 

It's a fun read, with a romance that feels rather realistic (including sexy bits, if you're at all concerned about that), and a kitten. How could it not be good when there's a rescued kitten? I don't think it's possible. 

Joking aside, I liked this book. Four stars to the author for an enjoyable ride. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys light, fun romances with a touch of mystery.

*I mention this now because there is a very good possibility that other books of this nature will cross the pages of this blog, and fairly soon. There are a couple of them winking at me from my TBR pile. Those little minxes.

**It'll have to be a small one since most of the big ones are going kaput. Or being handed over to untrained bloggers, but I won't get into that. *tries not to grumble*

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a review copy!

Saving Juliet

Have you ever seen the movie Lost in Austen, about the girl who falls though this crack in her bathroom wall into Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice only to swap places with main character, Elizabeth Bennet? No? Well, make sure you do. It's lengthy, but worth it.

If you have seen the movie, you know things in fictional P&P Land start tripping up the moment Amanda steps a toe in it, and everything goes wonky.

Suzanne Selfors's Saving Juliet gives Shakespeare's classic Romeo and Juliet the same sort of treatment, and with thoroughly fastasmagoric results.

Seventeen year old Mimi, scion of the late, great theatre goddess Adelaide Wallingford and last hope for the historic Wallingford Theater hates acting, despite her pedigree and promise on the stage. As any teen faced with but one choice of futures, Mimi chafes against the strictures, plans, and outright momentum of her mother, who--from Mimi's viewpoint, only wants to live out her own failed dreams through her daughter. Complete with a stuck-up Surfer boy pop-star (for the ratings,dear) co-star in the form of one Troy Summer, avaricious understudies, and an heretofore unexperienced case of stage fright, Mimi does her best to play Juliet Capulet until she can escape for a few weeks in a planned vacation with her Doctors Without Borders-esque aunt.

Enter some very realistic and intuitive descriptions of Mimi's pre-cue panic attacks--which just keep getting worse, her inital crush on and being crushed by Troy Summer, and finally a magic charm which send Mimi and Troy both either back in time, or arguably, into an alternate universe wherein the feud between Montague and Capulet is alive and thriving.

Reading this book is a bit like seeing all the different charcters on days other than those Shakespeare chose to write about. Selfors gives great back-story about how the feud began, manages to humanize Juliet as a real thirteen-year-old girl, no matter the era, makes the reader totally buy Paris as a pervy old man, keeps Romeo from sounding like the most fickle guy alive, and eventually even makes heroes of many unheroic characters, and while the "script" often strays from Shakespeare's narrative (Romeo and Juliet never fall in love at all, at least possibly until after the book), and the language stays mostly contemporary, the book is all the better for these choices. Elizabethan English--as genius as Will's abilities were--would only have cluttered the alternate plot points and would have seemed almost gaudy in comparison to the very real and very ageless way Selfors handles the story.

This is definitely a book in which the cover does the story a disservice. While Mimi is very much a modern teenager, she isn't flippant or blase, which is what that pink bubble-gum bubble and kitten shades say to me. Mimi has heart, just like her (normally) fictional counterparts, and that should be shown, too.

I got a kick out of this book with it's nimble narrative and ultimate happy ending. I engaged with it, and if I hadn't gotten it from my library in the first place, I'd have been happy with my choice to BUY it.

Wildefire

Wildefire by Karsten Knight

Amethyst

Dude. No, Seriously. Dude. In case you wonder if I'm one of the "several people" mentioned below in Michelle's review who disliked the level of violence, rest easy. I'm cool enough with that. The GD-bomb being dropped on the first page I wasn't exactly happy about, or with the following profusion of profanity, but that wasn't what burned me on the first 135 pages of Knight's first novel.

In a nutshell, the whole thing up to that point seemed to scream at me, "Trying WAY too hard". Trying too hard to sound like an authentic teen, trying too hard to be "edgy", trying too hard to make the reader empathize with the main character. For the first 135 pages I just kept thinking, "No," and mentally shaking my head. Between the over-compensation and the wealth of passive voice (a personal peeve), I got knocked out of the story more often than I got pulled into it.

And then something changed. Suddenly the writing grew more confident, more comfortable with itself, and the story--which is very cool--began to shine through. Sure, there were still some features that felt contrived, but all in all, once Knight hit his stride, it was all downhill, baby. Easy. And intriguing. And curiouser and curiouser (even if I tagged the villian the second he/she showed . . . assuming the character is the real enemy (oooo!).

That's fantastic.

I will admit the copy I read was an ARC, an uncorrected proof, so my version may not have been the final say in how the book came out. Perhaps Knight tightens up those first several pages. Perhaps he fixes that confusing time-frame/flashback sequence at the end, and for goodness' sake, let's hope he learns to love a closing comma, because the phrasing suffers without it, but mostly, Wildefire has potential. You'd probably be pretty safe BUYING it, or BORROWING it, either way.

P.S. Gorgeous cover.

Michelle

★★★½

I found Karsten Knight's Wildefire a refreshing take on paranormal romance since it deals more with plot and characters than many of the I-loved-you-before-I-even-saw-you books out now.

There were some things I thought the author did well with his debut, and others that were poorly done or that I really didn't like. But the story is compelling, especially since it incorporated gods and mythology from across the globe.

The plot itself—reincarnated gods meeting each other at a private school in the California redwoods—might seem like a rather popular recent middle grade series *cough*Percy Jackson*cough* but this one is completely different in tone and target audience. There is little chance that these two would be mistaken for each other.

The opening sequence is somewhat violent, and though it didn't bother me too much, I've heard from several others who really didn't like it. I saw it as setting up the characters for the rest of the story. The first few chapters are basically back story, there to establish what got Ash to the boarding school, so the subsequent actions seem fitting with the beginning. 

I wouldn't say to necessarily let the first chapter dissuade you from reading the rest of the book, but there is (perhaps worse) violence later on, so it's definitely something to consider.

My biggest peeve, however, was that Ash often sounded masculine throughout the book. I'd originally thought she was a jock tomboy from her actions and dialogue, but later she's described as girly and cute, and those two didn't mesh for me. 

While I enjoyed most of the book, I really struggled with the climax of the story. It felt a bit overblown, like so much was happening that the characters got lost in the action.

I'm hoping the sequel is better because I love the revelation near the end that one character is actually my favorite god in all of human mythology. There are so many ways to have fun with that character.

Paranormalcy

You know what I'm a big fan of? Cotton candy. It's fluffy, sweet, can have multiple flavors and colors, and I DO NOT SHARE IT.

Kiersten White's debut novel is exactly the same, except for that last bit, because I'll be only too pleased to share Paranormalcy with my friends. Granted, I probably wouldn't share it with my children, but that's more because they're all boys who have about much interest in funny, airy, girlie stories as they would in opera.

That's okay, though. More delicious Evie for us, right?  So, the quick and dirty?  Fun and funny focal point Evie has spent the majority of her sixteen years dispensing humane (oh, the irony) justice and control to paranormals, and with a light touch. Her world isn't the usual, but it works for her, and for the most part she's happy, and she feels like she belongs and is loved. Then of course, Something Bad happens to make Evie question her lifestyle, beliefs, safety, and even her race, but without losing her sparkling sense of humor.

There's a boy. Of course, there's a boy. What's the story of a in-indentity-crisis teenaged Barely-Been-Kissed without a boy? A cool boy, both figuratively and literally, as Lend appears to Evie to be made of water (though he isn't . . . ah, not exactly).  Lend needs to be saved, and because Evie intends to help out with that, Evie needs a little saving, herself, possibly from herself.

If Evie doesn't find enough strength in her old life, will she be able to keep her world enough intact to create a new one?

I THOROUGHLY enjoyed Paranormalcy, and am totally looking for to its sequel, Supernaturally.

Crescendo

I read Becca Fitzpatrick's first novel, Hush, Hush soon after its release somewhat due to curiosity about the premise, somewhat due to a few teens I know having gushed over it. My general impression was, "Meh," with a shrug of my shoulders. On the one hand, there were some really good elements; a supremely-hot-but-not-entirely-trustworthy boy, creepy bad guys, and a girl who doesn't have much of a clue about what's going on. I can forgive that, but unfortunately, it was all a little too patterned, in a way I've seen all before, so the book--aside from from scorching descriptions of possible boy-toy, Patch--didn't stand out for me.

I can't say the same about Hush, Hush's sequel, Crescendo. It totally stood out for me . . . just not for the kind of reasons one would want. Firstly, main character Nora has not come out of the first book much more informed, but she's honed her ability to whine to a fine point. Whenever boyfriend Patch--with whom she's supposedly soul-mated--fails to deliver what she wants, Nora complains about what a horrible relationship they have, how much she should be pitied, and how Patch isn't sacrificing enough to make their lives more idyllic (despite him having given up his life's dream of getting out of his tortured existence in the previous book, for the sake of his love for her, and becoming her assigned protector, besides).

In the meantime, other lives around Nora are falling apart, but she's too self-centered to noticed, or give those circumstances any attention, except when it benefits her agenda du jour.

Simply put, I just can't like this girl. I'm supposed to. I'm supposed to empathize with her, but it's too difficult when she's got a smokin' boyfriend who adores her, and all she can do is think about what she still wants.

Borrow, if you must, but really? Bypass.

Darkest Mercy

What do you do if you've read a book by an author you genuinely find admirable and a lovely person, but you find the book is only so-so? What do you say if you then are bound to post a review said mediocre offering?  I guess--if you're me--you put it off a couple days and then you post the following:

Melissa Marr is an enjoyable writer who (as I've said in a previous review) has a history of hits and misses with me. I hate to say it, but Darkest Mercy is a miss. It isn't good when I repeatedly think to myself, "Yes, mmm-hmm, yeah, already know this. Can we get on with it, already?", only to eventually ask, "Wait, what? That was the big bang? Did I miss it when I blinked a second ago? No?".

At best, Darkest Mercy is an okay book with an awesome cover, some pretty people expressing overwrought angst (yes, there is such a thing), and though it has little to offer by way of an actual story line, alienated-but-romantic teens will slurp it up like an energy drink.

I'm not a fan of energy drinks (hello, yucky flavor and acidic aftertaste!), so this one gets a Borrow from me, which would be a Bypass if it weren't for teen hordes everywhere, of which I am a fan.

Anna and the French Kiss

★★★★★

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

The only word I can think of that captures the feel of Stephanie Perkins' Anna and the French Kiss is delightful. This isn't serious fare, but it's not meant to be. It hits the intended mark perfectly: a light, fun, romantic tale of a teenage girl falling in love. Teen chick lit at its finest.

At about a third of the way through the book, I had to put it aside for a week because the temptation to jump on a plane back to France was too much for my weak francophile heart. (Why did Delta have to send me an email that day announcing a European fare sale?!) 

The problem was with Perkins' descriptions of Parisian life; the sights, sounds, smells, and flavors of that glorious city. She captured the ambiance and feel of the city so well, I craved to be back at an outdoor cafe, watching Paris flow by as I nibbled on some quiche Lorraine and perhaps a raspberry macaron or tart au chocolate. The fact that I've only been back from France four months is not lost on me. If Paris weren't so expensive, I might never have come back. I'm exaggerating. Sort of.

Tragically, I didn't find my own Étienne, despite spending two months in France. Hmm. Maybe I should take another look at those airfares. I could do with a hot American/British/French boyfriend right about now.

Forever

Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver trilogy is one of the few series I've loved, but do not own, and I think it's because it intimidates me. The fluid insertion of poetic imagery (I loved Sam's description of  something being as "thin as a lie") speaks of such easy talent that a reader can't help but be wooed.  Whether you're attracted to Grace, Sam, Cole, or Isabel, it doesn't matter, because each character has his or her own magnetism--both the kind that draws in, and the kind that repels.

In Forever, Stiefvater ties up all the severed ends cut apart in the second installment, Linger, and rocks out some very nice, natural-feeling bows.

A personal (well, more personal, since I suppose reviews are already seriously personal) note? Even the dedication and acknowledgement rang with gorgeousness and made me cry a little. How is that in any way fair?

I'm on the fence about whether or not it's a Buy or Borrow, but only for myself. For the rest of you, it's not so much a gamble to advise you go ahead and support your local indie bookstore* with some cash on behalf of this book.

*Oh, look, I've even included a handy IndieBound link in the book title.

Haint Misbehavin'

Haint Misbehavin' by Maureen Hardegree

✭✭✭

I'm a big fan of ghost stories (that don't freak me out too much), and Haint Misbehavin' is a fun one for the middle grade audience. Set in Georgia, there's enough flavor of the South to lend an air of plausibility that the ghost of a young girl from the 1800s would haunt Heather, a modern preteen girl.

While I enjoyed the ghost story, I felt enough rage about the unfair treatment Heather got from her parents and the nasty vendetta of her sister that I couldn't rate it higher.

It's a personal pet peeve, but I abhor books or movies that show unfair relationships toward one child with blatant favoritism of another. (minor spoiler) While the family relationships resolve and are all hunky-dory by the end, (/minor spoiler) there is enough of a bias against Heather that I couldn't relax while reading most of the book. I wanted to jump into the story so I could throttle her older sister. I can't imagine anyone being that cruel to a sibling and their parents turning a blind eye, unless it was a Cinderella situation with the rest of the family being evil. But that's not how this family is portrayed. Were it not for the sibling injustice, they'd be an average American family.

Otherwise, it's an enjoyable story and I look forward to the next book, especially since the sibling rivalry won't be much of an issue in later books. I honestly hope my assessment doesn't prevent people from reading Haint Misbehavin', since it does have a fun ghost story, but as Ames would say, this is a borrow and not a buy.

The next book in the series, Hainted Love, just released in March. By the way, the cover of the second book is much better and will appeal a lot more to preteen girls.

Advance copy provided by the publisher and NetGalley.

Tethered

There are few books that have done to me what Amy MacKinnon's Tethered has done, which is to take me through a solid, somber tale, leading in a very certain direction and with an expected pleasurable conclusion and then blow it all to hell in the last five pages.

What I thought was going on? Not even. Going back and checking details against what really was happening? Makes TOTAL sense. All of it. A retro "ah-HAH!" moment, or rather, a barage of them, because it was great, and it all fit together like a thousand-piece jig-saw.

And I can't even tell you anything specific about the brilliance, because as River Song would say, "Spoilers!" I suppose I'll need to keep it simple, then.

The narrative--from the perspective of Clara, a withdrawn, somewhat broken undertaker--has a quiet, steady pace, calming even with the often disturbing subject matter. It isn't that Clara regards these things with any sense of flippancy, rather the opposite; her ability to process grief is so underdeveloped it's as if tragedy slides right off of her, until a certain little girl gets under Clara's skin and Clara becomes concerned with the child's home life.

Before it's all over, just about every (living) person in Clara's life is somehow connected to the young girl's circumstances: The compassionate couple who run the funeral home where Clara works, and who consider Clara their child; the older detective assigned to the little girl's case; the younger officer eager to help solve it; and not a few of the former residents of the bodies Clara works on.

Maybe I should have paid closer attention when I put a hold on Tethered with my library, because the novel is labelled "suspense", which might have given me some better idea of what was coming, but then again, maybe not. All I can say about it was that it was awesome.

So, do I recommend you buy Tethered or do I suggest you just borrow it? Well, that depends. How much do you love suspense novels? Are you the kind of reader who appreciates the craftsmanship in a good mystery enough to read it again, even after the mystery is solved, or not? If so, BUY, if not, BORROW. Either way I expect you'll enjoy yourself.

Kiss of Snow

Kiss of Snow by Nalini Singh will do well with the adult paranormal romance series crowd. I had the disadvantage of coming late to the party, so to speak, as I'm not familiar with any Ms. Singh's earlier Changeling/Psy novels and found myself tripping over terminology I'm sure fans of the series would read over without a hitch, but that's my fault, not that of the writing.

Basically, this novel is a solid, interesting-though-format-driven series installment similar in feel to series by Christine Feehan, Sherilyn Kenyon, and Gena Showalter.

Adding personal inspiration and viewpoint to common character templates, Singh creates an alternate universe populated by three main races; changlings (weres of different breeds), Psy (try to twist your brain around a completely biological mesh of ESP-gifted humans and cyborg, with interconnecting consciousnesses), and humans. With these different races comes a bushel of conflict, most of the focus of which covers the friction in interracial romantic relationships. It goes much deeper than skin or culture, ensuring the reader's eagerness to read on, learning more--not only about the resolutions, but even the problems faced by these couples.

While I can't honestly say Kiss of Snow blew me away, I'd definitely recommend it to readers of the genre, or  include the series to a starter list for an adult reader wanting to explore APRs.  This one's right on the line between Borrow and Buy; I probably would borrow it (which, in fact, I did), rather than buy, but I know many readers who would enjoy rereading the book, therefore making it a good purchase for them.

I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You

Now, for the sake of full disclosure (I disclose stuff all the time; be prepared), Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars are my two all-time favorite grown-up TV shows (I like a lot of kids' shows, too. *shrugs*), and to realize moments after finishing I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You by Ally Carter that the whole book is one possible answer to the question, "What would happen if you enrolled a gonvernment-funded Veronica Mars in Chilton, the private school in Stars Hollow, fictional home of Lorelai and Rory Gilmore?", well, whoa.

Yes, yes, that was a really long, awkward, badly-written sentence. Don't care. I wasn't actually awake when I composed it.

Point is, I thoroughly enjoyed the first of Carter's Gallagher Girls novels. I dug the well-balanced aspects of narrator Cammie's real life with that of her cover life. On the one hand, the kind of life we normal peeps live is about as alien to Cammie "The Chameleon" Morgan, only daughter of a super-spy and the headmistress of Cammie's own seriously serious spy school for genius girls, as being a girl genius super-spy-in-training would be to us. Which is to say, mucho Vulcan.

Another great balance? Flippancy vs. solemnity. Some pages are devoted to silly, girly angst of the "I speak fourteen languages and not a single one of them translates to BOY!" and homework vareties, while other pages deal with heartache over lost loved ones, fear of incompetence (as all three, spy, friend, and girlfriend), and finding redeeming qualities in a new enemy. The great thing? Carter blends these themes seamlessly. The fluff is marshmallowy, deep stuff is satisfyingly subcutaneous.

Also, a Brownie Point for mentioning Gilmore Girls, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Dirty Dancing. Though, to be perfectly fair, I thought two mentions of Buffy =ed cool; three . . . enh, kind of pushing it.

So, the short version, if you're into anything like the shows mentioned above, or like a read that treads the worlds of fluffy AND textured, BUY this one.

The Search

The Search by Nora Roberts

I wish I could rate this book higher than 3 stars, but as other reviewers have mentioned, Nora Roberts spends way too much time detailing how to train dogs and the step-by-step process of using search-and-rescue dogs. If you cut 90% of that description out, the book would surely drop 100 pages and be much better for it. It's a nice read, and I really like the characterization of Simon. He is a straight-talking, no-nonsense guy who says exactly what he thinks, with most of it unflattering to the heroine. For some reason, it strikes me as honest and authentic, and I adore it.

Unfortunately, Fiona comes off very controlling and boring with the insane tendency to treat the whole world—family and friends included—as dogs to be trained. Normally I wouldn't mind, but the overanalyzing thoughts bog down the narrative and make the character flat, though not quite unlikable.

Otherwise, an enjoyable story. So to be fair, it's more of a 3 1/2-star book, though it still misses out on its full potential.

The Sweetness of Salt

The Sweetness of Salt by Cecilia Galante


The Sweetness of Salt is such a beautiful and real story, one without the teenage melodrama common in current YA fiction. Galante captures the essence of the family's struggle, giving it depth and importance without making it into a cliche. I loved the simplicity of this story, and especially how real these characters were. I would love to meet them sometime, stopping by the bakery for a cake and a chat. Simply lovely.

Wicked Lovely Series Book Four: Radiant Shadows

Radiant Shadows , the fourth installment in Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely series, has some very cool new facets (Steeds!), however it is what it is, which is a vehicle for any finishing touches, additional characters, and other set-up for the fifth book, which completes the series.

I'll admit I'm less invested in any WL storyline not primarily involving my personal favorite characters (Ash, Keenan, Donia, Seth, and Niall), and I'm sure that plays heavily with my 'meh' reaction to the book. I felt it was an unneccessary side-trip away from the "real" story, the brewing wars between the various fey courts. If the series weren't set up for each of its key players to have their own volumes, I'd have said Ani's story could have just about filled in two chapters of another book. However, I did see the need for Ani's love interest, Devlin, to have a book to himself, as he is the tie that binds the two strongest of the conflicting fey courts.

I enjoyed the handling of Ani's struggle to become her own person, even when she didn't fit anywhere, and even more Devlin's internal battles regarding his creators and his feelings for someone not precisely of his home realm. The book had the same dark, sparkling aftertaste of all Marr's novels, which I've always liked, and the new characters it adds to the mix for the upcoming book certainly create a whole new set of variables to the final outcome, so I look forward to that.

This is book is sitting right on the border between Buy and Borrow. If you already own the other series books, add this to your collection, but if the others have already come into and gone out of your life, follow suit and Borrow Radiant Shadows from a library or book buddy.

Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret

It's sad, really, that I never read Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume when I was young. Unfortunately, the stigma of it being a "banned book" equated the story with being bad. As I've gotten older and (hopefully) a bit wiser, I realize that I missed out on a beautiful story that may well have addressed some of the very concerns I had at that age.

The charming, innocent voice of Margaret makes her instantly relatable. A lot of "news" like new friends, new school, and new house greet Margaret as she embarks on one of the most frustrating and misunderstood times a girl passes through. Boys, menstruation, friends, and religion all play into the microcosm of her world. I don't know of a girl who hasn't wondered about those things as a curious eleven-year-old. It is natural, and Blume handles the delicate topics with finesse and gentleness.

I love Margaret's relationship with God, a being she didn't completely understand as far as organized religion, but who she trusted as a friend. Her hope that things would work out, even if it seemed like she would die of embarrassment at the time, struck me as the innocent faith of a child mixed with the maturing realizations of a young woman.

Reading this book, I realized I'm still curious and uncertain about different aspects of life. Though I'm long past the time of training bras and first periods, there is still a wonder and excitement about what life will bring. I hope I never lose that, but if I do, I'll have Margaret and her story to show me the way.

As a final thought, I'd like to share this: