On the agenda for today:
- Review March's Blogger Book Club read - The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
- Announce April's Blogger Book Club read.
- Choose the April BBC link-up date.
- Beg everyone who read The Fault In Our Stars to link-up today.
First up.. My review of March's book.
by John Green
GoodReads Summary -
Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.
The Good
--Oh my lanta!! I LOVED this book. I've already re-read the last few chapters (and cried a second time) and I have no doubt in my mind that I will read the book again and again!
--I cried. At first I thought I wasn't going to. I definitely had the "oh my goodness, that's so sad!" feeling going on, but I thought I was going to make it all the way to the end without actually crying. Then I didn't. I'm not sure I was crying for the reasons I should've been crying (Gus) I was crying because of because of everyone else and their reactions to things.
--Cancer is a hard topic to cover in a work of fiction because cancer isn't a fictitious thing to a lot of people. It is also hard for me to have an opinion on this, because I've never experienced cancer in the way the characters did. However, I really like the way John Green handled the topic. I won't go into it much more than that.
--I loved Isaac.
--I was pleasantly surprised by how much I loved the ending. I was so nervous getting towards the end, because I had loved the book so far and I was so worried that the ending was going to disappoint, but the ending seemed so, so fitting.
--It terms of writing style, character, plot development, etc.. I have absolutely got to give it to John Green, because this was a well written book. Grammatically and stylistically I was very pleased and I can be hard to please in this area.
--John Green lives in Indiana and this book was set in Indianapolis which is a hop, skip, and a jump from where I live, so I loved all things about the setting. Obviously.
The Bad
--This isn't necessarily bad, but the way the main characters spoke and the language they used was unrealistic. I enjoyed it, but the whole time I was thinking that these were supposed to be 3 teenagers who have barely been to school and spent so much of their life in hospitals and yet they speak much, much more eloquently than their parents. It made the characters unique and interesting, but it was also unrealistic in an otherwise very realistic book.
--I'm going against everyone right now, I'm sure, but I did not love the Amsterdam section of the book. Spoiler, kinda.. There's this whole section about Anne Frank and I think that could've easily been plucked from the book and not changed a thing for me.
--I am still totally undecided how I feel about Peter Van Houten.
Final Thoughts
I recommend this book. I'm curious to see how well Hollywood does with this move adaption. I laughed out loud at more than one part, I snapped pictures of quotes on my phone to save for later, and I ended up crying into the pages at the end. A good, good read.
WHAT DID YOU THINK?
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April.Yesterday I asked for assistance in choosing a book for April. I posted 3 choices of books that had been recommended to me and 1 book that has been on my "To-Read" list for years! In comments, emails, on Twitter, and through texts the 3 choices of books that had been recommended to me were all eliminated rather quickly. I was not getting very many good reviews for any of them. Turns out, I got zero comments on the book I've had on my list for years. So, guess which book I chose for April.
by Nancy Pickard
One beautiful summer afternoon, from her bedroom window on the second floor, Jody Linder is unnerved to see her three uncles parking their pickups in front of her parents’ house—or what she calls her parents’ house, even though Jay and Laurie Jo Linder have been gone almost all of Jody’s life. “What is this fearsome thing I see?” the young high school English teacher whispers, mimicking Shakespeare. Polished boots, pressed jeans, fresh white shirts, Stetsons—her uncles’ suspiciously clean visiting clothes are a disturbing sign.
The three bring shocking news: The man convicted of murdering Jody’s father is being released from prison and returning to the small town of Rose, Kansas. It has been twenty-six years since that stormy night when, as baby Jody lay asleep in her crib, her father was shot and killed and her mother disappeared, presumed dead. Neither the protective embrace of Jody’s uncles nor the safe haven of her grandparents’ ranch could erase the pain caused by Billy Crosby on that catastrophic night.
Now Billy Crosby has been granted a new trial, thanks in large part to the efforts of his son, Collin, a lawyer who has spent most of his life trying to prove his father’s innocence. As Jody lives only a few doors down from the Crosbys, she knows that sooner or later she’ll come face-to-face with the man who she believes destroyed her family.
What she doesn’t expect are the heated exchanges with Collin. Having grown up practically side by side in this very small town, Jody and Collin have had a long history of carefully avoiding each other’s eyes. Now Jody discovers that underneath their antagonism is a shared sense of loss that no one else could possibly understand. As she revisits old wounds, startling revelations compel her to uncover the dangerous truth about her family’s tragic past.
Engrossing, lyrical, and suspenseful, The Scent of Rain and Lightning captures the essence of small-town America—its heartfelt intimacy and its darkest secrets—where through struggle and hardship people still dare to hope for a better future. For Jody Linder, maybe even love.
We will be linking up our Blogger Book Club reviews for this book on Wednesday, April 30th.
However, as usual, the linkup remains open for 2 weeks after that date.
