Young Adult – Page 48 – Jill's Book Blog

Review: Riverdale Student Handbook

Title: Riverdale Student Handbook
Author: Jenne Simon
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Scholastic
Source: Purchased
Format: Paperback
Release Date: August 28, 2018
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

The Riverdale High student handbook looks like an ordinary introduction to the high school. There’s class photos and a campus map and student guidelines from Principal Weatherbee. But what you really need to know about Riverdale, can’t be found in an official handbook.
Luckily, Archie, Betty, Veronica, Jughead and other classmates have gotten hold of the guide. They’ve slipped in classified student records, private notes, and secret photos and scribbled their own notes with tips on surviving Riverdale High.

Review:

I just finished catching up with the latest season of Riverdale! This book was released last year, so it’s a little dated now. I still loved reading about this crazy school!

This student handbook contains information about academics and extracurricular activities. It also has editorial notes from the students, mostly Veronica and Cheryl, though some others comment at times. It was funny to read their opinions and edits of the handbooks, especially when they inserted their own documents, like autopsy reports and arrest documents.

This was a really fun book! It’s a must read for fans of Riverdale.

Review: The Wise and the Wicked

Title: The Wise and the Wicked
Author: Rebecca Podos
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: May 28, 2019
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Ruby Chernyavsky has been told the stories since she was a child: The women in her family, once possessed of great magical abilities to remake lives and stave off death itself, were forced to flee their Russian home for America in order to escape the fearful men who sought to destroy them. Such has it always been, Ruby’s been told, for powerful women. Today, these stories seem no more real to Ruby than folktales, except for the smallest bit of power left in their blood: when each of them comes of age, she will have a vision of who she will be when she dies—a destiny as inescapable as it is inevitable. Ruby is no exception, and neither is her mother, although she ran from her fate years ago, abandoning Ruby and her sisters. It’s a fool’s errand, because they all know the truth: there is no escaping one’s Time.
Until Ruby’s great-aunt Polina passes away, and, for the first time, a Chernyavsky’s death does not match her vision. Suddenly, things Ruby never thought she’d be allowed to hope for—life, love, time—seem possible. But as she and her cousin Cece begin to dig into the family’s history to find out whether they, too, can change their fates, they learn that nothing comes without a cost. Especially not hope.

Review:

This story reminded me of The Raven Cycle. Ruby’s family is a little like Blue’s family in that series. They both have some mystical powers. The women in Ruby’s family see their death when they get to a certain age. It’s called their Time. They had to flee their original home in Russia generations before because their family was being hunted by a man. This old battle was reopened in this story.

I liked this story but I found some parts confusing and unclear. There are some queer characters, which was great representation. One character was transgender. I thought that the character magically changed gender in some way, so it was only later that I realized they were living as a transgender person.

I also found the multiple generations of the family confusing. There hadn’t been that much time since the family moved from Russia, but they made it sound like it was many generations ago rather than two. A family tree could have helped me keep everything straight.

This is a good story.

Thank you HarperCollins Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: My Ideal Boyfriend is a Croissant

Title: My Ideal Boyfriend is a Croissant
Author: Laura Dockrill
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: July 16, 2019
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

This honest, laugh-out-loud novel brimming with body positivity, bite-sized nuggets of feminism, and commentary on eating will have readers rooting for sixteen-year-old BB as she navigates her world while maintaining her plucky zest for life even in the most trying of times.
It’s a food diary. I have to tell the truth. That’s the point.
Sixteen-year-old Bluebelle, also known as BB or Big Bones, lives her life unapologetically. She loves life! She loves food!
When BB has a worse-than-usual asthma attack, her mom insists she go to the doctor. There, she is told that she is overweight (no surprise) and prediabetic (big surprise) and must lose weight, move more, and keep a food diary. To get out of this immediate health crisis, she agrees to make an effort.
Then a tragedy occurs in the family, and things get seriously complicated. Suddenly, losing weight and moving more are the least of her worries. As for the food diary, though, BB doesn’t just document what she’s eating, she documents what she’s feeling–and she has a lot to say!

Review:

This story was both hilarious and heartbreaking.

Bluebelle is told that she is obese and needs to lose weight after a serious asthma attack. A nurse gives her a food diary to keep track of her diet. The diary ends up turning into a journal where she talks about everything in her life. It takes a serious accident for her to rethink her life choices.

There was so much delicious food described in this book! This is definitely not a book to read when you’re hungry. There was a paragraph that described toast, which made me crave it. I’ve never read toast described in such detail before!

The only thing that bothered me about this book was the cover. The character is supposed to be so obese that she is unhealthy, or at least that is the way she is described. However, the girl on the cover looks like she’s a healthy body weight. I wish her size was represented with a more appropriate model on the cover.

I really enjoyed this story!

Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Heartwood Box

Title: Heartwood Box
Author: Ann Aguirre
Genre: Young Adult, Thriller
Publisher: Tor Teen
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Format: Ebook
Release Date: July 9, 2019
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

A dark, romantic YA suspense novel with an SF edge and plenty of drama, layering the secrets we keep and how appearances can deceive, from the New York Times bestselling author.
In this tiny, terrifying town, the lost are never found. When Araceli Flores Harper is sent to live with her great-aunt Ottilie in her ramshackle Victorian home, the plan is simple. She’ll buckle down and get ready for college. Life won’t be exciting, but she’ll cope, right?
Wrong. From the start, things are very, very wrong. Her great-aunt still leaves food for the husband who went missing twenty years ago, and local businesses are plastered with MISSING posters. There are unexplained lights in the woods and a mysterious lab just beyond the city limits that the locals don’t talk about. Ever. When she starts receiving mysterious letters that seem to be coming from the past, she suspects someone of pranking her or trying to drive her out of her mind. To solve these riddles and bring the lost home again, Araceli must delve into a truly diabolical conspiracy, but some secrets fight to stay buried…

Review:

This book was a combination of genres. It was mostly a young adult thriller, but there were aspects of paranormal fiction, science fiction, and even historical fiction. Though this seems like a large mix of genres, it worked in this story.

The story was quite creepy at the beginning. I couldn’t figure out what was going to happen. It was heartbreaking to see Araceli develop a relationship with a boy from a different time, while knowing that they couldn’t be together. It was strange, the way this story resolved into science fiction. I thought it would just be a paranormal or supernatural story, but it had science behind it.

I really enjoyed this story!

Thank you Tor Teen for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Royals (Royals #1)

Title: Royals (Royals #1)
Author: Rachel Hawkins
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books
Source: Purchased
Format: Hardcover
Release Date: May 1, 2018
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Meet Daisy Winters. She’s an offbeat sixteen-year-old Floridian with mermaid-red hair; a part time job at a bootleg Walmart, and a perfect older sister who’s nearly engaged to the Crown Prince of Scotland. Daisy has no desire to live in the spotlight, but relentless tabloid attention forces her to join Ellie at the relative seclusion of the castle across the pond.
While the dashing young Miles has been appointed to teach Daisy the ropes of being regal, the prince’s roguish younger brother kicks up scandal wherever he goes, and tries his best to take Daisy along for the ride. The crown–and the intriguing Miles–might be trying to make Daisy into a lady . . . but Daisy may just rewrite the royal rulebook to suit herself.

Review:

I’m so glad I finally read this book! It was everything I thought it would be and more!

I loved the plot. Daisy is suddenly thrown into the spotlight when her sister becomes engaged to the Prince of Scotland. She had to deal with this new fame, which led to many scandalous photos in the British press and damage control by the royal family’s press secretary.

The story had some examples of the press stories throughout the book. There were more of these at the beginning, and I loved them. They were a funny little break in the main story that showed how the royal family was described to the rest of the world. These stories tapered off towards the end, and the stories were just described by Daisy. I wish there had been more of these press stories, because they were very entertaining.

I loved this book! I can’t wait to read the next one in the series!

Review: Wilder Girls

Title: Wilder Girls
Author: Rory Power
Genre: Young Adult, Horror
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: July 9, 2019
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

It’s been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was put under quarantine. Since the Tox hit and pulled Hetty’s life out from under her.
It started slow. First the teachers died one by one. Then it began to infect the students, turning their bodies strange and foreign. Now, cut off from the rest of the world and left to fend for themselves on their island home, the girls don’t dare wander outside the school’s fence, where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the cure they were promised as the Tox seeps into everything.
But when Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors that lie beyond the fence. And when she does, Hetty learns that there’s more to their story, to their life at Raxter, than she could have ever thought true.

Review:

This story was a rollercoaster ride!

I felt the camaraderie between the girls right away. They were close because they had all been affected by the same disease, called the Tox. It affected everyone differently. Some girls grew gills, another grew a second spine, and other people grew tree branches out of their bodies. Each symptom kept getting creepier than the last, because they were unpredictable.

I liked the way that this story had two different perspectives. Hetty had the Tox, but she was fairly reliable throughout the story. The narratives switches to another girl for a few chapters, and she is very sick with the Tox. This gives an inside look into how it affects the girls when it takes over their bodies.

I really enjoyed this story. It had creepy horror elements that kept me hooked. I would love to see a sequel happen one day!

Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Stranger Things: The Other Side

Title: Stranger Things: The Other Side
Author: Jody Houser, Stefano Martino, Keith Champagne
Genre: Young Adult, Graphic Novel
Publisher: Dark Horse Books
Source: Library
Format: Ebook
Release Date: May 7, 2019
Rating: ★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

The hit Netflix series from the Duffer Brothers is now a spine-tingling comic that recounts Will Beyers’ harrowing survival in the treacherous Upside Down!
When Will Byers finds himself in the Upside Down, an impossible dark parody of his own world, he’s understandably frightened. But that’s nothing compared with the fear that takes hold when he realizes what’s in that world with him!
Follow Will’s struggle through the season one events of the hit Netflix show Stranger Things! Written by Jody Houser (Mother Panic, Faith) and illustrated by Stefano Martino (Doctor Who, Catwoman)

Review:

I love the show Stranger Things, so I’m excited about the new books about the show that are coming out.

This graphic novel is about Will’s time spent in the Upside Down. It wasn’t a very exciting story, especially if you’ve already watched the show. There were some flashbacks to him playing dungeons and dragons with his friends, but most of the story wasn’t new.

The illustrations could have been more detailed. The characters faces looked flat, without realistic details. I could tell who the characters were just based on their clothes from the show, but they didn’t really look like the real actors.

I was a little disappointed in this graphic novel. I hope the novels about Stranger Things are better.

Review: The Best Lies

Title: The Best Lies
Author: Sarah Lyu
Genre: Young Adult, Thriller
Publisher: Simon and Schuster Canada
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Format: Ebook
Release Date: July 2, 2019
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Remy Tsai used to know how her story would turn out. But now, she doesn’t even know what tomorrow will look like.
She was happy once. Remy had her boyfriend Jack, and Elise, her best friend—her soulmate—who understood her better than anyone else in the world.
But now Jack is dead, shot through the chest—
And it was Elise who pulled the trigger.
Was it self-defense? Or something deeper, darker than anything Remy could have imagined? As the police investigate, Remy does the same, sifting through her own memories, looking for a scrap of truth that could save the friendship that means everything to her.
Told in alternating timelines, Thelma and Louise meets Gone Girl in this twisted psychological thriller about the dark side of obsessive friendship.

Review:

This was a gripping YA thriller!

There are two alternating narratives in this story. One is in the present, which is right after Jack has died. The other tells the story of Remy and Elise’s friendship. Remy seemed like an unreliable narrator, because she had to lie in her testimony. However, there were reasons for her lies.

Even though I knew how the story ends, with Jack’s death, I was still hooked on the story. There were some other twists before the end that I wasn’t expecting. Elise was a complex character, who went through a lot over the course of the story. She was classified as the “villain,” but I ended up feeling a little sorry for her.

I loved this story!

Thank you Simon and Schuster Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Ordinary Girls

Title: Ordinary Girls
Author: Blair Thornburgh
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: June 4, 2019
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Perfect for fans of Jenny Han and Sarah Mlynowski, this heartfelt and humorous contemporary take on Sense and Sensibility follows two sisters—complete opposites—who discover the secrets they’ve been keeping make them more alike than they’d realized.
For two sisters as different as Plum and Ginny, getting on each other’s nerves is par for the course. But when the family’s finances hit a snag, sending chaos through the house in a way only characters from a Jane Austen novel could understand, the two drift apart like they never have before. Plum, a self-described social outcast, strikes up a secret friendship with the class jock, while Ginny’s usual high-strung nature escalates to pure hysterics.
But this has always been the sisters’ dynamic. So why does everything feel different this year? Maybe because Ginny is going to leave for college soon. Maybe because Plum finally has something that she doesn’t have to share with her self-involved older sister. Or maybe because the girls are forced to examine who they really are instead of who their late father said they were. And who each girl discovers—beneath the years of missing their dad—could either bring them closer together…or drive them further apart.

Review:

This was a great story about sisters.

I flew through this book. I loved the way that Patience narrated it. She was very mature. It sounded like a Victorian novel, though the subject matter wouldn’t have been in a novel in the nineteenth century.

I enjoyed the family dynamic of the story. Their mother was an artist who often had too much on her plate. The house was also an important part of the story, because it was falling apart, which kept interrupting their lives when they had to fix it. The relationship between the sisters was also important. Though they are very close, they kept big secrets from each other, which only come out after they are threatened with a tragedy.

I really enjoyed this story!

Thank you HarperCollins Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: The Lost Sisters (The Folk of the Air #1.5)

Title: The Lost Sisters (The Folk of the Air #1.5)
Author: Holly Black
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Publisher: NOVL
Source: Purchased
Format: Ebook
Release Date: October 2, 2018
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Sometimes the difference between a love story and a horror story is where the ending comes . . .
While Jude fought for power in the Court of Elfhame against the cruel Prince Cardan, her sister Taryn began to fall in love with the trickster, Locke.
Half-apology and half-explanation, it turns out that Taryn has some secrets of her own to reveal.
The Lost Sisters is a companion e-novella to the New York Times bestselling novel The Cruel Prince by master writer Holly Black.

Review:

This story comes between The Cruel Prince and The Wicked King. It is a great refresher of The Cruel Prince because it gives an overview of what happened in that book from a new perspective.

This story is told by Taryn speaking directly to Jude. It is written in the uncommon second person, because it addresses “you.” I read this story after reading The Wicked King, instead of between the two novels. However, I think I enjoyed it more reading it this way, because Taryn plays a unique role in The Wicked King. This story gave me a different perspective of her character because she was able to tell her side of the story.

I enjoyed this short story. It is great for fans of this series!

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The Raven Boys (The Raven Cycle #1) by Maggie Stiefvater

Love and Other Curses by Michael Thomas Ford

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Ordinary Girls by Blair Thornburgh

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The Dark Beneath the Ice by Amelinda Bérubé

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