Book Review: For Holly by Tanya Byrne

All the girls in comas nowadays.

Lola Durand hates her stepmother. It's a cliché but it's true.

Lola Durand can't get through to her father. He never wants to talk about the things that matter: why they had to move to Paris, why he had to marry evil Agatha, and how they can get through the heartache of her mother's death together.

If he won't listen, she'll show him. She'll show him the truth about his new wife and then her life can go back to normal, just the way she likes it.

Lola Durand knows a secret about her stepmother. She's going to share it.

This is the second novel by Tanya Byrne that I have read (and reviewed). I probably enjoy this book less, but I really like Follow Me Down.

This book is in a diary/confession form from point of view Lola going over the events that lead outcome of the book. Most of the main plot has already happened by the time Lola starts writing. This book has a lot of tropes, but uses them to explore the emotion of the characters.

Lola is a sympathetic character going through a hard time since the death of her mother and her father's half abandonment. She has done dumb stuff, but I feel for her as she is a motherless 17 year old whose not handling her grief well with a bad support system. The adults aren't really better, as they aggravate the situation.

It explores grief and being from a mixed race character, Lola having a white French father and black Barbadian mother (I got this book from library, I might be slightly wrong), without the parent she takes after and feeling disconnected from her father without Mother's presence.

Overall, I give this book 4/5 stars for stolen lippy. This was a decent YA distraction, with complex character and though is filled with medical tropes (this is third book I've read with a coma in the past few months and it's a random first in books), they are used well as away get to the emotion.

Book Review: Unrest by Michelle Harrison

You think a teenage boy would be happy about a girl in his room. 

Seventeen-year-old Elliott hasn't slept properly for months. Not since the accident that nearly killed him. Sometimes he half-wakes, paralysed, while shadowy figures move around him. Other times he is the one moving around, while his body lies asleep on the bed. His doctors say sleep paralysis and out of body experiences are harmless - but to Elliott they're terrifying.

Convinced that his brush with death has attracted the spirit world, Elliott secures a job at a reputedly haunted museum, determined to discover the truth. There, he meets the enigmatic Ophelia. But, as she and Elliott grow closer, Elliott draws new attention from the dead. One night, during an out of body experience, Elliott returns to bed to find his body gone. Something is occupying it, something dead that wants to live again . . . and it wants Ophelia, too . . . 

This is the story of a boy who died and rises again so now the Dead hounded his dreams. Or more like they make him astral project, giving him unrestiful nights.

Elliott makes an likeable, appealing protagonist.The supporting characters are okay, there is a sprinkle of stereotypes as minor antagonists. The romance is somewhat decent. The mythos of the ghosts was done well. It took from a lot of things to have realistic rules that worked for the plot.

I liked the plot mixed with the setting. While it is set at museum, its actually a collection of old buildings making more a fake tour from different time periods. Elliot chooses to work there as they have started during ghost tours at night as the buildings are meant to be haunted. There's also mystery that comes from working at the museum. I enjoyed the journey of this and the solution was fulfilling.

It also deals with grief, Elliot having lost his mum before his accident and his dad failing to cope after she gones.

I listened to the audio book version narrated by Paul Chequer. He did a good job of bringing Elliot to live, this book being in first person.

Overall, I give this book 4/5 stars for drawing henna. This was a decent YA with supernatural stuff.

Book Review: Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon

Bad parenting in YA is as common as Love Triangles.

Madeline Whittier is allergic to the outside world. So allergic, in fact, that she has never left the house in all of her seventeen years. But when Olly moves in next door, and wants to talk to Maddie, tiny holes start to appear in the protective bubble her mother has built around her. Olly writes his IM address on a piece of paper, shows it at her window, and suddenly, a door opens. But does Maddie dare to step outside her comfort zone?

Everything, Everything is about the thrill and heartbreak that happens when we break out of our shell to do crazy, sometimes death-defying things for love. 

Lets start by stating the above summery has a small error and things don't quite go down in that way in the book. You're be shocked and horrified (okay, it's that there's no piece of paper. Also she has left the house, but she doesn't remember that). This plot isn't very unique and the plot is almost the exact same as a film, but reverse genders and a different tone. I won't say which one for spoilers but you can probably work out if you wanted to. I also feel like I have either read/heard about another book with characters with the same disorder.

The format of this book is my favourite part of this book.We have typical pose from the point of view of the Madeline with illustrations scatter throughout the book and emails, texts and post-it notes.

The characters themselves ain't great in personality department. I kinda equal the two main characters as two traits, Madeline is books and Olly is maths. Oh, I forgot that Olly is actually Green Arrow. I don't feel like explaining that reference. Their actual interactions are good, but these characters don't stand for themselves for me and feel flat. The relationship between Madeline and her mother doesn't sit right with me, especially towards the end of the book. I would have like more resolution with them.

Overall, I give this book 3/5 stars for humuhumunukunukuāpuaʻa. This novel is not at all original and filled with clichés but it's done pretty well. It's a good light read, though I do feel it's trying to be more than that with the issues it has characters facing. Though, that could be interpreted as Yoon trying to make them more realistic. The ending is just too "perfect" for me to think of it as anything more.

I got this book off NetGalley for Review and it is being publish by Corgi Childrens on 27th August 2015.