Pearl aka Bean, has never felt close to her mother Lexie, who had Bean when she was a teenager. Grandpa Gus has always been the one to take her fishing, teach her how to cook and tell her stories about her grandmother, who died before Bean was born. All her mother does is work, argue with Gus, and go to the bar with her best bud Claire, which doesn’t leave much time in her life to be a mom. So Bean depends on her soulmate Henry and his mom Sally for comfort when the fights between Lexie and Gus get to be too much. When Gus dies suddenly, Bean is completely bereft. Strangely, she seems to be the only one. She knows Lexie and Gus didn’t get along, but Lexie seems almost happy that Gus has passed away, drinking and giggling with Claire in the days after the funeral. What is going on? Bean becomes determined to find out the reasons behind Lexie and Gus’s troubled relationship, and her mother’s strange euphoria now that Gus is gone. But when the truth comes out, it’s even more shocking and painful than the most melodramatic storyline on the daytime soaps that Bean and Henry watch with Sally. Though it hurts to fully understand the reality of her family’s past, it also helps Bean finally become the Pearl she was always meant to be. Jo Knowles has deftly taken what could have been a soap opera scenario and instead written a poignant story about the definition of family, the importance of honesty and the power of change. Lovely and spare, it is the perfect antidote to all that dystopian fiction you’ve been reading…
Riot Grrrl!
Pearl by Jo Knowles
09.05
Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
08.05
Poor Anna. It’s senior year and instead of getting to hang out with her best friend Bridgette and nurse her crush on Toph, the indie band boy with killer sideburns, she is instead being forced to go to school abroad. In Paris. I KNOW. I didn’t feel sorry for her either. Until I discovered the sum total of what Anna knows about France: “The Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomph, although I have no idea what the function of either actually is. Napoleon, Marie Antoinette and a lot of kings named Louis…The art museum is called the Louvre and it’s shaped like a pyramid and the Mona Lisa lives there…the food is supposed to be good, and people drink a lot of wine and smoke a lot of cigarettes.” That’s not very much to go on. Also, Anna speaks French not at all, and is a little (okay, a LOT) germaphobic. How in the world is she supposed to enjoy the City of Light when she doesn’t know the language and is too skeeved to take the Metro? Lucky for Anna, help comes in the form of a group of quirky housemates who quickly adopt her, including the devastatingly handsome and super nice Etienne St. Clair, who is part American, part British, part French and all awesome. It would be easy for Anna to get lost in his big brown eyes, except for one little thing—St. Clair has a girlfriend, and they’ve been dating for ages. Plus, every other girl in school finds him just as righteous as Anna does, so there’s no way she stands a chance…or does she? Because in short order, St. Clair seems to find Anna just as intriguing as she finds him. But what about his girl friend? And what about Anna’s still-very-much-alive crush on Toph? In the most romantic city in the world, Anna will have to navigate some seriously rough relationship waters before finally figuring out who she wants to be with—and who wants to be with her. This sparkling overseas romance by Stephanie Perkins is a sheer delight from start to finish, brimming over with witty banter, poignant subplots and spot on characterization. Anna’s love of old movies and St. Clair’s admiration of Pablo Neruda are just a few of the great little details that make them o-so-real. A perfect way to ease the heat of the dog days of summer reading.
The Name of the Star: Shades of London, bk. 1 by Maureen Johnson
07.25
Aurora (Rory) Deveaux is definitely a Louisiana catfish out of water. Due to her professor parents’ European sabbatical, the gawky Southern teen has just started her senior year at a tony English boarding school called Wexford in the heart of London. Small town Rory couldn’t be more different than her brisk British classmates, and struggles at first to fit in. But soon she is surrounded by new friends and even starts a mild flirtation with Jerome, the cute prefect from the boy’s dorm. Rory’s getting along so well that even the news that a serial killer who models himself after Jack the Ripper is on the loose in London seems more interesting than scary. Until a body shows up on Wexford’s supposedly safe school grounds, and Rory is the only one to see a strange man hovering nearby. Suddenly Rory finds herself at the heart of a terrifying investigation that has even the police baffled. The new Ripper leaves no trace, and even the many closed circuit cameras that are everywhere in London can’t seem to capture him. How can Rory see what the cameras can’t? And what does that mean when it comes to keeping herself and her friends safe from the Ripper’s knife? To say anymore would ruin the shocking secret at the heart of this romantic thriller that starts out like a traditional boarding school romp and then morphs into something that is part horror, part mystery and all quirky, cool Maureen Johnson. Rory, sort of a country cousin to Scarlett Martin, is full of heart and wit, and pitting her against the top serial killers of all time guarantees surprises, shivers and Johnson’s inevitable trademark sarcasm. By the end of book one, Rory discovers her true destiny and let’s just say it’s not a talent for needlework or languages. I can’t wait for the sequel of this projected trilogy! And you won’t be able to either after Star comes to a library, bookstore or e-reader near you.
Summer and the City: A Carrie Diaries Novel by Candace Bushnell
07.15
Seventeen-year-old Carrie Bradshaw finally sets foot in the City in the second volume of Candace Bushnell’s delightful Carrie Diaries. Carrie is ecstatic to be spending the summer in the Big Apple taking a writing course at The New School before heading off to Brown in the fall. After getting thrown out of her first apartment due to an altercation with her nasty landlady, she ends up bunking with friend of a friend Samantha Jones, a stylish rising advertising executive. Samantha helps starry-eyed Carrie learn the NYC ropes by inviting her to all the right places and introducing her to all the right people. Soon Carrie is dating a famous older playwright and regularly attending parties and art openings with Samantha and her other new friend Miranda Hobbes, a raging red-headed feminist who secretly longs for a boyfriend. But as Carrie gets swept up in the romance of being in New York for the first time, she seems to forget that dating a playwright doesn’t make her one. If she’s going to make it in Manhattan, she’ll need to produce some serious writing, and fast. Because her summer in New York will end all too soon and college is calling. Just like at the finale of the first book, Carrie meets another of the famous four (I’m sure you can guess who) and her future is left in question. Of course, we already know what happens—but getting there is half the fun! Fast, flirty and oh so fabulous, this immensely satisfying sequel will please both aspiring fashionistas and wannabe writers alike.
Tighter by Adele Griffin
07.01
Jamie has a pill problem. It started innocently enough with a track injury. But then her teacher Mr. Ryan (“I’d called him Sean, a couple of times, in the end.”) told her that they had to stop meeting in the back booth of Ruby Tuesdays, so she needed more painkillers for her broken heart. Soon any pill would do—pain pills, her mom’s allergy pills, her dad’s sleeping pills. What kind didn’t matter, as long as they helped Jamie forget Sean, uh, Mr Ryan. Now she’s about to leave home to take a ritzy summer nanny job, hopped up on her parents’ prescriptions and feeling utterly alone. But the island of Little Bly and Isa, the girl she has been hired to care for, are charming and sweet. Maybe Jamie will finally be able to relax and leave the pills behind. Except then she hears the disturbing rumors of Isa’s last nanny, a wild girl named Jessie who died in a plane crash with her boyfriend. Worse yet, she starts SEEING the dead girl and her man on the cliffs near Isa’s house. As the doomed pair draw ever nearer, Jamie begins to lose her already tenuous grip on reality. Are the capsules she can’t seem to stop popping causing her to see the dead lovers? Or are the ghosts real? This hum dinger of a homage to Henry James’ classic The Turn of The Screw
Chime by Franny Billingsley
03.15
Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
03.05
Lord of the Flies meets 90210 (the Donna/Kelly classic version) in this hilarious send-up of a beauty pageant gone very wrong. The state contestants of Miss Teen Dream have just crash landed on a deserted island. Their chaperons and camera crew are dead, and most of their lip-gloss and flat irons have floated out to sea. At first they keep practicing their routines under the eagle eyes of Miss Texas, a take-no-prisoners blond glamazon, confident that they will be rescued before their suntan lotion runs out. But as the days go by and no plane or ship appears, the girls begin to form a strong matriarchal tribe, capable of defending itself with stiletto catapults, makeup splat guns and melted jewelry arrowheads. They start to ask each other questions like, why do girls always seem to say “sorry” whenever they happen to express a strong emotion or feeling? And what does “act like a lady” mean anyway? They begin to think, “Maybe girls need an island to find themselves. Maybe they need a place where no one’s watching them so they can be who they really are.” But even as they start to understand themselves better emotionally, the beauty queens are in real physical danger. What they don’t know is that they have actually settled on a top-secret government stronghold that is about to become the target of an illegal weapons trade. If the girls aren’t careful, they will become nothing more than pretty collateral damage. But then the reality television pirates show up, and what happens next could only be cooked up by the mad-cap brain of fiendishly clever award-winning author Libba Bray. While the booby/bullets (those are actually cheekily placed lipstick tubes) cover may lead you to believe that this is a fluffy beach read, think again, my teenage friends. This book may look like a cheesy reality-show rom-com on the surface, but under all the hairspray and beaded gowns is a deep read about what it means to be a girl AND a dude in today’s label-crazy society. A fun romp with food for thought–don’t you dare miss it!
The Sweet Life of Stella Madison by Lara M. Zeises
01.25
Let’s be very clear–almost eighteen-year-old Stella Madison is NOT a foodie. She prefers Cheez Whiz to aged cheddar and her pastry fried, not puffed, thank you very much. But it’s hard to maintain her junk food standards when she is the offspring of two hardcore gourmands. Her mother is a restaurant owner and her father is a famous French chef, but despite all their best efforts, Stella’s palate stubbornly remains stuck on chicken fingers. “I don’t know why my parents can’t accept the fact that I’m not and never will be a foodie. It doesn’t make me any less their daughter just because I prefer chicken nuggets to squab (which is really just a fancy name for pigeon, by the way).” All that changes when Stella is offered a restaurant review column at the local paper. It pays too well to turn down, but Stella doesn’t know a fig from a fish stick. Good thing her mom’s hunky new cooking intern Jeremy has offered to help her figure it all out. There’s just one little problem, and his name is Max. He’s Stella’s boyfriend, which Stella keeps forgetting every time she gets an eyeful of Jeremy. Soon she’s not sure who she wants more: the dependable boyfriend who already goes so nicely with her beige palate, or the spicy new intern who threatens to turn her taste buds upside down. One thing’s for sure—if this Stella doesn’t get her groove back fast, someone’s going to get hurt. And it just might be her. This fast, flirty romance is full of fun facts about food and restaurant culture for all you Top Chef and Next Food Network Star fans (of which I am one!) while also honestly depicting the difficulty of making the right choices when it comes to relationships. I downed the whole thing in one delicious read, and you will too. For more romantic foodie fun, try Flavor Of The Week