ARC Review: The Distance Between Us by Kasie West

Seventeen-year-old Caymen Meyers studies the rich like her own personal science experiment, and after years of observation she’s pretty sure they’re only good for one thing—spending money on useless stuff, like the porcelain dolls in her mother’s shop.

So when Xander Spence walks into the store to pick up a doll for his grandmother, it only takes one glance for Caymen to figure out he’s oozing rich. Despite his charming ways and that he’s one of the first people who actually gets her, she’s smart enough to know his interest won’t last. Because if there’s one thing she’s learned from her mother’s warnings, it’s that the rich have a short attention span. But Xander keeps coming around, despite her best efforts to scare him off. And much to her dismay, she's beginning to enjoy his company.

She knows her mom can’t find out—she wouldn’t approve. She’d much rather Caymen hang out with the local rocker who hasn’t been raised by money. But just when Xander’s attention and loyalty are about to convince Caymen that being rich isn’t a character flaw, she finds out that money is a much bigger part of their relationship than she’d ever realized. And that Xander’s not the only one she should’ve been worried about.

From Goodreads

Caymen Meyers usually feels as isolated as the dolls in the doll shop below her apartment. She leaves school every day at noon to work in the shop that her mother owns so that they can continue to eek out their simple existence and is the illegitimate child of her mother's teenage tryst with a well-off young man who cut all ties with her mother as soon as she announced her pregnancy. Naturally this has lead to a unique life on the fringe of poverty. Caymen doesn't want for much other than her continued friendships with other misfits and maybe a little good fortune for her mother.

In walks Alexander "Xander" Spence. The grandson of one of the doll shop's main patrons and heir to a large international hotel chain, he oozes wealth, status, and confidence. While infuriating and enticing Caymen with his comfortable lifestyle, he seems to find himself drawn to her sarcasm and wit. Befriending her is easier than he thought, but definitely more than he bargained for.

The two begin a precarious dance wherein they spend inordinate amounts of time together without ever really admitting what they're looking for with the other. The imbalance of their relationship comes to a head when the two are confronted with just how different their two worlds are from one another. Can they reconcile their differences while accepting their similarities?

The Distance Between Us is a standard wrong-side-of-the-tracks love story with some original details. Caymen's animosity and blatant trust issues with people of a wealthier persuasion coupled with her dry humor create a sort of anti-hero. You're not sure if you really want her to succeed because of just how unfair she's being, but you also sympathize with her plight. Xander is a typical heir figure in that he feels burdened by all the pressure to take up the family business when he's really just trying to find himself. Of course these two happen upon one another and get tangled up in each other's messes. As cliche as it sounds, I didn't mind it all that much because the details were what made the story fun.

Their "career days" where they explore the idea of specific careers (including grave digger) were such a great venue for character exploration because by getting them out of their element, we get to see who they really are on their own. Even the supporting characters had their chances to shine occasionally in both group situations and one on one discussions.

I will say that there were a few things that didn't add up by the end of the book. The situation with the doll store, a mystery man, and Caymen's mother's health were all connected, but never elaborated upon or explained. You could make educated guesses as to what they all meant, but it would have been nice to have some official closure. There was also some issue with Caymen's lineage. I know that miscommunication happens and that assumptions are some of the worst things in relationships, but the shroud of mystery and sudden revelation was all a bit awkward.

It's possible that the few things that bugged me will get cleaned up before final printing, but no guarantees. If you're looking for a light, summer read then this has "BEACH" written all over it. Enjoy!

ARC graciously provided by Around the World ARC Tours for honest review

Waiting on Wednesday: The Distance Between Us by Kasie West

Waiting on Wednesday recognizes that we as bookies pine for books. This post is about what I am impatiently waiting for right now. It was started by Jill at Breaking the Spine.

Sorry I skipped last week, but I figured with all the Armchair BEA fun that was going on, Waiting on Wednesday wouldn't be missed too terribly. This week's selection is a unique contemporary romance book. The Distance Between Us by Kasie West is slotted for a July 2 release and I can't wait for my library to order their copy. I haven't read anything by Kasie before, but I'm hoping this book will be a better version of She's All That. Check out the synopsis.

Seventeen-year-old Caymen Meyers studies the rich like her own personal science experiment, and after years of observation she’s pretty sure they’re only good for one thing—spending money on useless stuff, like the porcelain dolls in her mother’s shop.

So when Xander Spence walks into the store to pick up a doll for his grandmother, it only takes one glance for Caymen to figure out he’s oozing rich. Despite his charming ways and that he’s one of the first people who actually gets her, she’s smart enough to know his interest won’t last. Because if there’s one thing she’s learned from her mother’s warnings, it’s that the rich have a short attention span. But Xander keeps coming around, despite her best efforts to scare him off. And much to her dismay, she's beginning to enjoy his company.

She knows her mom can’t find out—she wouldn’t approve. She’d much rather Caymen hang out with the local rocker who hasn’t been raised by money. But just when Xander’s attention and loyalty are about to convince Caymen that being rich isn’t a character flaw, she finds out that money is a much bigger part of their relationship than she’d ever realized. And that Xander’s not the only one she should’ve been worried about.

From Goodreads

I'm not really sure what to make of that last bit. There are so many possibilities that I could give myself a headache before getting anywhere near the truth. I really like the names of these characters and that there's a hint of romantic triangle. While that is not always a great way for these situations to play out, I find this one unique because Caymen's mother would rather have her daughter dating a local rocker over a rich guy. Now that's something you don't hear very often.

What do you think about this blurb? Does it remind you of any other books? What releases are you eagerly anticipating?

Waiting on Wednesday: The Moon and More by Sarah Dessen

Waiting on Wednesday recognizes that we as bookies pine for books. This post is about what I am impatiently waiting for right now. It was started by Jill at Breaking the Spine.

I have a confession. I am not a die-hard Sarah Dessen fan. There, I said it. She reminds me a lot of Nicholas Sparks in that her novels tend to have a formula that sometimes works for me & sometimes doesn't work for me. The Moon and More set for a June 4 debut seems to fall in the former category. It just looks so enticing. I adored Along for the Ride and I am hoping that this will continue that feeling. What do you think?

Luke is the perfect boyfriend: handsome, kind, fun. He and Emaline have been together all through high school in Colby, the beach town where they both grew up. But now, in the summer before college, Emaline wonders if perfect is good enough.

Enter Theo, a super-ambitious outsider, a New Yorker assisting on a documentary film about a reclusive local artist. Theo's sophisticated, exciting, and, best of all, he thinks Emaline is much too smart for Colby.

Emaline's mostly-absentee father, too, thinks Emaline should have a bigger life, and he's convinced that an Ivy League education is the only route to realizing her potential. Emaline is attracted to the bright future that Theo and her father promise. But she also clings to the deep roots of her loving mother, stepfather, and sisters. Can she ignore the pull of the happily familiar world of Colby?

Emaline wants the moon and more, but how can she balance where she comes from with where she's going?

From Goodreads

This book oozes potential & is definitely something I can relate to; although I have definitely moved beyond this stage in my life, I still remember what it was like to have two very different paths laid out in front of me with everyone expecting me to make a decision. Dessen's characters straddle a fine line between being just right & being too much/too little of something important and something just tells me that Emaline has got the right amount of it all. 

What are you waiting on this week?

February Genreflecting: Romance: The Details

Based on the Collins English Dictionary, a subgenre is "a category that is a subdivision of a larger genre." (Source) Romance is a complicated and yet fundamental part of the young adult experience. There are so many changes going on during that time in a young person's life, so naturally we have a whole genre dedicated to it! Primarily, romance books tend to fall into one of these subgenres: contemporary, chick lit, historical & serial. While the others are self-explanatory, that last one actually covers two types of serial romances: the first type follows one character's love life while the other one follows a different individual from a specific group during each book.

One of my absolute favorite contemporary romances is Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist by David Leviathan & Rachel Cohn. These two created an incredible book that volleys between its two protagonists to tell the story. Here's a snippet about how this awesome book came to be:

One day David and I were having lunch together and I mentioned that I had a vague idea for a book: I wanted to write about two New Jersey, straight-edge characters named Nick and Norah (after the Thin Man movies) who would meet at a music club in Manhattan. I wanted to follow their adventures throughout the one night, and just see what would happen. ... We didn’t plan any of the book out in advance, we just picked up each chapter where the other left off, and I think the fun David and I found in writing to challenge one another translated into a true adventure for Nick and Norah – just like a real first date, where there can be great chemistry, but you really have no idea if it will turn out well or not. You can only dive in and hope. -Rachel Cohn's website

And while I'm not an outright fan of romances, almost anything set in a historical time wins my vote. That's why Anna Godbersen's The Luxe series was so perfect for me. In an interview on Galleysmith she explained why she liked writing historical books:

When I was a bookish teen, I loved novels set in other times, other realities, other universes. So that’s part of it—being able to create this world that looks and smells and sounds different than the one my readers and I walk around in every day. I want to transport them, and myself. And then, once you’re there, the historical setting means that the realities of life, the situations my characters are going to find themselves in, will often be ones you couldn't have in a contemporary setting, which is exciting stuff for a writer! Very plot-friendly.

So there you have it. A little insight into the world of romance books. What are your favorite types of romance? Do you enjoy a heart-wrenching roller coaster or a more subdued novel? Be sure to check back next week when I review Forever by Judy Blume. 

January Genreflecting: The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky review

Charlie is a freshman. And while he's not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond his years yet socially awkward, he is a wallflower, caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it.

Charlie is attempting to navigate his way through uncharted territory: the world of first dates and mix-tapes, family dramas and new friends; the world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite.

But Charlie can't stay on the sideline forever. Standing on the fringes of life offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.

From Goodreads

First off, we'll start with my review of the book. Having grown up when YA was just starting to blossom, it's not surprising that I missed this book the first time around. It also wasn't my kind of reading at the time. Well, it's apparently not really my style today. Told in the form of letters to an unknown recipient, we meet the brilliant, if awkward Charlie. The kid brother of the star football player & a boy-obsessed sister, Charlie has never really fit in socially.

While I can relate in a way to this, the book spiraled into something weirder and more dark than I imagined. There is pervasive drug & alcohol abuse, as well and sexual & emotional assault on many characters. I think the core message of the book could have been brought to fruition without all this, but in a way these things are so ingrained in the personalities & lifestyles of the older teens that Charlie hangs out with that I think the book would have been missing something without it.

For such a short book, told in four parts over about 200 pages, it packs a wallop of a punch. The world as we see it is through the distorted perception of Charlie, but the message that he seems to latch onto throughout the book is one of individuality & trusting oneself. The narrative & word choice give a clear picture of just how removed Charlie is from the social interactions he is supposedly taking part in. His incomprehension of other people's actions coupled with his cognitive abilities reminds me of someone with Asperger Syndrome. All of this combined to make a powerful, if sometimes overstated, storyline.

With respect to the genre analysis, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is indeed a prime example of a contemporary life book. While we listen to Charlie describe his emotions & events of his life, what we're really focusing on is how he interacts with his own world. We don't focus in on the fact that he smoked pot & took LSD, we focus in on the fact that in his desperation for acceptance, Charlie was willing to experiment with things outside of his comfort zone. We get to live alongside Charlie as he travels the confusing path that is adolescence. It is especially difficult for him for reasons that he himself is unaware of, so it makes the overarching story (and not the minutia) the most important.

I think this book has successfully explored the teenage experience at a very pivotal time in our nation's collective history. Being published in 1999, but set in 1991-1992, would normally make this book seem "dated" to the majority of the population. While there are definitely some obvious "signs of the times" in the book, it is a timeless novel. I could see it being set anywhere from the 1960's to in the near future. A good contemporary novel has the ability to transcend time in order to be approachable by the audience, present & future. This is evidenced by the fact that this book is just now being made into a major motion picture starring Emma Watson (of Harry Potter fame), Ezra Miller, and Logan Lerman.

What do you think about The Perks of Being a Wallflower? Have you seen the movie? Do you intend to?

If You Find Me by Emily Murdoch review

THERE ARE SOME THINGS YOU CAN'T LEAVE BEHIND ... 

A broken-down camper hidden deep in a national forest is the only home fifteen-year-old Carey can remember. The trees keep guard over her threadbare existence, with the one bright spot being Carey's younger sister, Jenessa, who depends on Carey for her very survival. All they have is each other, as their mentally ill mother comes and goes with greater frequency. Until that one fateful day their mother disappears for good, and the girls are found by their father, a stranger, and taken to re-enter the "normal" life of school, clothes and boys. 

Now, Carey must come to terms with the truth of why their mother spirited them away ten years ago, while haunted by a past that won't let her go ... a dark past that hides many a secret, including the reason Jenessa hasn't spoken a word in over a year. Carey knows she must keep her sister close, and her secrets even closer, or risk watching her new life come crashing down.

From Goodreads

Carey has made as much peace as is possible with her "home" in One Hundred Acre Wood. She and her little sister Jenessa (Ness) have a (run down) camper, (some) canned food, a shotgun for self-defense and hunting, and most importantly each other. That's why she feels completely distraught when a man and woman show up at their campsite to take them away. With their mother MIA for several weeks now, on one of her worst meth benders in a while no doubt, Carey doesn't understand how the people knew where to find the girls and (more importantly) how they know the truth about the girls' mother.

Whisked away into the land of plenty by Carey's biological father, the girls find themselves overwhelmed by all the differences between their idea of normal and society's idea of normal. With a world of indoor toilets, light switches, and unfamiliar words, Carey and Ness begin to unravel the truth about their existence in the woods. The hardest part is sharing that truth with those who hold the power to destroy all that Carey loves in this world. Stuck between two worlds, Carey must help Ness find her voice and in doing so, find her own.

Wow. This is without a doubt one of the most triumphant and moving YA books I have read. While outwardly it seems to be such a simple premise, the contents of this book gripped me tight and made me see the truth of the story. It's not just about family, love, and hardship. It's about truth, beauty, and above all hope.

With the story being told from Carey's point of view, we get an encompassing tale. If the story were told any other way, I don't know that it would have had as much power. Carey is the key to the story since she is the only one to experience all the central events. She is the bridge that takes us from the woods, to town, and then into the past to explore the truth of the situations she is facing.

The incredible thing about the writing in this book is the detail. Emily Murdoch did a marvelous job conveying the girls' experience of such simple things that we take for granted every day. Light switches, hot water, opening a vehicle trunk, even bedazzled jeans were so foreign to these girls that the author had to convince you that they were experiencing it for the first time, but without boring you. She did an incredible job because I continually felt like I was in their shoes and never once found myself bored.

The author also took tremendous care with the subjects she broached in this book. Being a kidnapped child of a bipolar, drug-addicted parent is beyond my comprehension, but the more disturbing things that Carey and Ness had to experience were handled with the delicacy of a rare flower. Most of the gritty events the girls' endured are told through specific verb-age and euphemisms that get the gist across to the audience. While there is one scene (towards the end) where she spares few details, it's still presented in a manner I think most young adults who've ever seen an episode of Law and Order: SVU can handle.

In short, don't pass this one up. I know it's not even coming out until late March, but it'll be well worth the wait. You'll love the characters and you'll have the pleasure of reading one of the most poignant books of 2013.

Provided by Around the World Tours

Overnight Sensation by Hal Eisenberg review

Fifteen year-old Jonah Levine is practically invisible at Applecrest High. His Facebook page is pathetic, his baseball skills are mediocre at best, and his IQ seems to drop 50 points when talking to girls. But everything changes when his rock band, Hitstreak, becomes the hottest teen sensation in the country. And now they’re about to perform in front of 15,000 screaming fans.

So why isn’t he jumping for joy?

Well, for starters, that hit on the radio wasn’t really recorded by his band. In fact, six months ago, he and his friends could barely play a note between them. And now they’re about to perform in front of 15,000 screaming fans. What begins as a mindless prank quickly spins out of control, involving his father’s secret past as a 70’s rocker, a high school bully who wants in on the action, and a powerful, ruthless, media mogul who will stop at nothing to claim the band as his own. Will Jonah prevail? Or will he and his band go down in flames and become the biggest farce in pop music history?

From Goodreads

Jonah has always loved music. His friends share his love as well and together they formed a band. The fact that none of them really play and mostly just want to be in a "band" for the girls is a moot point. He never expected that his own dad had a rock 'n roll past or that it would so greatly affect Jonah's band's future.

Through a series of missteps, miscommunication, and teenage hubris, Jonah and his friends find themselves pretending the be the band behind the hot new song on the radio. The truth? The song was recorded by Jonah's father's real band. It may start out small, but when a big wig producer sinks his hooks into these young guys, there is no time to stop what they started.

I'm gonna shoot this one completely straight. I loved the story behind this book. I did not love the writing.

Jonah, his friends, and his family are such great characters that I enjoy watching fumble through this impossible scenario. Their humor and history allow for quirky and fun exchanges to develop the story. The musical references are just nostalgic enough to still be relate-able. Even better was the story idea itself. I can see most of this story happening up to a point. The boys' hubris makes perfect sense for the ages and personalities they represent.

I had a really hard time overlooking the writing in this book. The content was good, but the execution was not quite as polished as it could have been. I think a more severe editing brush was needed to clean up the dialogue that seemed to have a "and then he said..." feel to it. Punctuation and paragraph structure were also off, but not so often that it detracted too much from the story.

So...if you like music and like teenage boy shenanigans (especially those embarrassing first date scenes) then be sure to pick this book up. I tore through it despite the writing flaws. I have a feeling that since this a relatively new addition to the YA writing scene, that the author will definitely learn as he goes. Overall though, a fun, light read for all!