Book Review: Panic by Lauren Oliver

If my town had a Panic, I would have done it.

Panic began as so many things do in Carp, a poor town of twelve thousand people in the middle of nowhere: because it was summer, and there was nothing else to do.

Heather never thought she would compete in panic, a legendary game played by graduating seniors, where the stakes are high and the payoff is even higher. She'd never thought of herself as fearless, the kind of person who would fight to stand out. But when she finds something, and someone, to fight for, she will discover that she is braver than she ever thought.

Dodge has never been afraid of panic. His secret will fuel him, and get him all the way through the game; he's sure of it. But what he doesn't know is that he's not the only one with a secret. Everyone has something to play for.

For Heather and Dodge, the game will bring new alliances, unexpected revelations, and the possibility of first love for each of them-and the knowledge that sometimes the very things we fear are those we need the most.

The plot has been well thought out. The game is obviously the centre and they do carry you through the novel wanting to know what happens next.  Nothing is really a surprise and the foreshadowing -hints really- was not very subtle at all.

The characters are all a very tragic fare, a desperate bunch with different reasons for playing Panic. They're so complex that their motives even change. Their motives are realistic and they all petty realistic that themselves. I felt rather discontented from them; more wanting them to get their comeuppance than feeling sympathetic towards them. I think with this novel it doesn't matter if you care about them. There is some romance, but it’s a tiny, tiny fizz.


This book is told in third person, but mainly from Heather and Dodge's point of view. I like how it goes through the days as well as having the chapters.
 
Overall, I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars for injured teenagers. I enjoyed reading it and it was an interesting idea. If you liked Oliver other stuff, then you should definitely check this book out.


I got this book off NetGalley for review. It's published tomorrow by Hodder & Stoughton. 

Book Review: Confessions of an Almost Girlfriend by Louise Rozett

This a sequel, why don't they ever make that clear on Netgalley?


If you’re not true to yourself, why should anyone else be?
In her second year of high school Rose Zarelli is determined to become Rose 2.0 - as in, innovative...superior...improved.
Improved how? Well, Rose is setting some ground rules. This year she absolutely most definitely will NOT:
1) do things just because other people want her to
2) randomly shoot her mouth off
3) worry about whether she’s someone’s girlfriend—or not.
And most important of all she determined to tell off Jamie Forta, the boy who might just have broken her heart, once and for all and move on.
After all she’s older and smarter now. She can totally pull this off.
How hard can it be? Right? Right?

This book was rather baw. It has all these issues in it Homophobia, bullying, child abuse, spouse abuse, drug addiction, grief and the mention of a creepy sexual experience. I did not care about any of these as I did not care for any of the characters. Which is quite the fault for contemporary romance, it's not like it's fantasy or something plot driven. You shouldn't really care about the characters. Frankly, there all could have dropped dead and it would have just been something that happened.

Also why is every punishment being banned from sports. Are American schools really that dumb? Very convenient that everyone that needs punishing takes a sport very serious.

It was just a very what was the point? I was hoping for something more than the romance. You did have some friendship action going on but it was rather stereotypical. I just no. I'm not actually sure now why I wanted to read this book, it weird I really can't remember.

It just seem all unlikely, the author was just shoving issues into the book. I get the whole "Trying to show that you don't really know what going on with other people and why they do the things they do" but it didn't feel real.

I didn't get the ending, why the hell did no one just tell the police the truth?

Basically no one learned or gained anything. I gave it the baw rating of 2/5 stars and recommend it to someone who has yet to go High School so that would mean preteens over here and likes that sort of thing.

Review: Undone by Cat Clarke

I was incredibly excited for this book since I found out about it, being quite the big fan of Cat Clarke. I loved both her other novels.  Before I start to gush, lets have the straight up summary that's on the back of the book.

Jem Halliday is in love with her gay best friend. Not exactly ideal, but she's learning to live with it.

Then the unspeakable happens. Kai is outed online ... and he kills himself.

Jem knows nothing she can say or do will bring him back. But she wants to know who was responsible. And she wants to take them down.

As I take quite the interest in covers, I just want to start by saying I love this cover, but while matching the plot, its had annoying issues. Its looks like a blonde, little girl (it meant be a teen, but at first glance it looks like a kid) in a dress. This matches no one in the book. No one. Its shame really, as Clarke had the good luck with the other two books with covers that make sense. Okay, it might slightly match someone, but why put them on the cover is beyond me. But the font is petty.

Now for the actual important part.

 "Undone" is beautifully heartbreaking. I had tears in my eyes though most the last hundred pages or so. Basically, Jem gets her a letter with three names on it which she presumes is a list of who outed Kai. She then take upon herself to get revenge in her last year of life. Because Jem had decided to kill herself a month after Kai, but it is stopped by twelve letters (one for each month of the year) written by Kai. So now new plan is to get revenge and then kill herself on the anniversary of Kai's death.

The letters from Kai were a highlight (though very camp) and good look into Kai and Jem's friendship. Though, somethings he asks Jem to do are bit stupid. The whole blonde hair annoyed me, as soon as she does it I was hoping she dyed back to black or at least her natural colour before the book finished.

I also really dislike the mum (though I'm petty sure you're meant to), she so happy to ignore her daughter's problems because she now blonde and wearing "standard" make-up. I think those things are petty clear warning signs.

Jem to get her revenge becomes part of "Team Popular" so that she can find out their weaknesses. I think the first two revenges were fitting, but I never really understood the last one. She really seemed more at rick as well with that one. I also I think they could have been better spread out, as during the first and second one I got bit impatient, same with the third one, trying to figure what she was up to. I guess the last one was petty obvious, once things were in motion, but I just didn't understand how that was bad. There were bigger humiliations that she could have done, and it was bit half arsed.

That's basically all I can say without spoiling it. I gave it 5/5 stars but I don't think it was as brilliant as Clarke last two books. I still highly recommend it.