Delirium by Lauren Oliver

It is the future. America has become a much different place. Government surveillance is widespread, cities are fenced in, and love have been outlawed. Yes love. It is now considered a disease--amor deliria nervosa--characterized by a quickened pulse, distraction, and irrational obsessions. At age 18, everyone is given "the cure" which wipes love of any kind out of the brain forever. Lena's mom died from love, and the stigma of this has followed her for her whole life. All that Lena wants to do is turn 18, get the cure, and live a normal life. But then she meets Alex. And she starts to question whether everything she's been told her whole life is true. Is life better without love?

I've read a lot of reviews that called this book derivative or considered it a letdown after Oliver's smash debut Before I Fall. I really, really loved this book. It's true that there are inconsistencies, as in any book, and that the premise not particularly unique or even that interesting. It's pretty cheesy to be honest. I found the slightly different premise of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies to be much more interesting in and of itself. However, I thought that the quality of the language, the suspense and the characterization overcame these issues to make a book that can be forgiven, because it was such a pleasure to read. I listened the audiobook mainly because I enjoyed Sarah Drew's reading in Before I Fall so much. She blew me away with that book, and she blew me away with this one. I was literally sitting in front of my computer unable to stop listening after my ipod died for most of the book. The audio equivalent of "I couldn't put it down." So I think this is a book that you love or you don't. And I loved it.

Beastly by Alex Flinn

Beastly is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast set in modern day New York City. Most other elements of the story closely follow the common version of the fairy tale. Kyle is your typical rich, handsome teenage boy who has everything money can buy, with the personality you would expect. He is self-absorbed, unkind, and materialistic. He plays a prank on a freaky girl at school, Stephen King's Carrie style, and ends up cursed. The freaky girl turns out to be a witch who transforms Kyle into your run of the mill beast--claws, fangs, excessive body hair, the works. He's given a magic mirror and a time limit to fall in love and seal it with a kiss or he'll remain that way forever. You can see where it goes from there.

This book came highly recommended to me by two teens who loved it and I thoroughly enjoyed Alex Flinn's other book, Breathing Underwater. This was honestly kind of a let down for me. I found the plot boring and barely changed from the familiar Disney version of the story. The story was not engaging enough to let me get over those little inconsistencies that plague any book, such as the lack of embarrassing moments that would inevitably come with a mirror that allows one to look at any person at any moment in time. I also wasn't crazy about the reader's voice in the audiobook that I listened to. He was fine when he was speaking as Kyle, but Lindy's voice was extremely jarring. Overall, this gets a 2 out of 5 from me.

The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner

This was an awesome book. It begins in a prison in the kingdom of Sounis. The main character is Gen--a thief, imprisoned indefinitely because he bragged too loudly about stealing from the King. One night he is dragged from his cell and brought before the King. He's told he's going on a secret mission, and his skills are needed. His task will be to steal the legendary Hamiathe's Gift, a stone that confers the authority of a royal ruler to whomever receives it. Gen isn't sure which is worse--going on the quest or rotting in prison. But he's not given a choice. He's dragged along with the king's magus, his two apprentices, and a no-nonsense professional soldier on a quest through two countries where every ounce of his cunning is needed. This book will surprise you regularly and it does not end anywhere close to how you think it will. The characters are impressive and distinct from other fantasy. The setting is reminiscent of ancient Greece--olive trees and a pantheon of gods and goddesses, but it is unique and enthralling. Definitely recommended.

Impossible by Nancy Werlin

This is the story of Lucy, a practical seventeen year old who refuses to believe all the strange things happening in her life are signs that she is part of a line of women who are the victims of an ancient curse. For generations, the Scarborough women--Lucy, her mother, her grandmother, and so on--have all had the same fate. They become pregnant at age seventeen then go insane--abandoning their newborn daughters to whoever will take them in and the cycle repeats. The key to freeing herself from this curse is in a song passed down from mother to daughter since the time of the curse--a peculiar alternative set of lyrics to the song "Scarborough Fair" that spells out three strange and seemingly impossible tasks. When Lucy becomes pregnant and starts to see her life heading in the same direction as her mother's she finally starts to believe that this could really be happening to her. But can she solve the riddle of the song before it's too late? Can she save her unborn daughter, and maybe even herself?

I thought that this book was pretty good, but not great. I listened to the audio book and I have to admit that I was not a huge fan of the reader's voice. I think that this reader was a poor match for Lucy and my consciousness of this was jarring and prevented me from enjoying the book as much as I could have. I liked the premise, but I felt that the plot was a little weak and the characters didn't pull me in. The tasks that Lucy has to solve are barely riddles and seem relatively meaningless besides from their strange old-timey-ness. Plowing a field with a goat's horn? I thought it was going to turn out to be some sort of symbol or riddle, but Lucy literally makes a plow with a goat's horn purchased on ebay and plows a field. It seemed kind of odd and not really something that held my interest.

Eighth Grade Bites: The Chronicles of Vladimir Tod Book 1 by Heather Brewer

Vlad Tod is trying to survive eighth grade. It's hard enough that his parents died a few years ago and he's still not over it, but now weird things are happening. The girl he likes seems to be in love with his best friend, and the school bullies are worse than ever. But it's more serious than that. His favorite teacher has gone missing without a trace and he finds a mysterious book that belonged to his father that only he can open. Also, Vlad is a vampire--half-vampire to be exact. Vlad hates the taste of cooked meat, but can stomach it to keep up appearances. He much prefers the blood sandwiches and blood slushies that his guardian, Nellie, provides for him from the bloodbank at the hospital.

All these strange things happening are pointing to the fact that Vlad may not be the only vampire in the world, as he thought. And these other vampires seem to be a lot different from him. They've never had a blood-slushie, for one. They seem to prefer their meals hot. Could these vampires have something to do with his teacher disappearing? Or even his parents?

I enjoyed this book for what it was. It was a quick read with an entertaining voice. I enjoyed the world that the book set up and I'm looking forward to discovering more about it in the next book in the series.

Read-alikes: Artemis Fowl, The Hunger Games

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Another book from the perspective of a dead girl. Sam is the second most popular senior girl at Thomas Jefferson High. She has been happy to be best friends with mean, defiant, alpha-queen Lindsay--as their group of four girls dominate the school. Sometimes they're mean and horrible, but they always have the most fun. That is until one night when driving home from a party, Lindsay--generally invincible--loses control of the car and in a flash of light and fire Sam finds herself fading into death.

But she doesn't die. She wakes up and it's the morning of her last day alive. She relives this day seven times, growing from confusion to anger to understanding. This was a great book. It has all the draw of reading about the uber-popular, but the book definitely has a heart. The characters are excellent and it's a step above other books of it's kind.

read-alikes: anything by Sarah Dessen

Ghostopolis by Doug Tennapel

I thought this book was ok, but nothing to rave about. Garth is a boy who gets accidentally transported to the afterlife by a ghostbuster who is less than meticulous in his work. Garth already had an incurable disease, but he wasn't dead yet, so now he needs to find a way back home. He makes friends with a skeleton horse, which is probably my favorite element in the book. The ghostbuster at fault comes to rescue him and they have a series of adventures trying to get back home and also saving Ghostopolis along the way.

I thought that the fantasy world of this graphic novel lacked depth. It had some really appealing concepts, but they were treated so cursorily that it was hard for me to really like them. The characters were a bit stereotypical and flat. The good thing was that is was a fast read, so I didn't get a chance to get really annoyed by these flaws. The good things about this book were the surprisingly poignant family plot and ending. I was especially surprised at how good these were considering the flat characters.

Overall probably a 3/5 stars.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman is a very talented person. The book begins with the murder of an entire family of four except one--the toddler--who has boldly wandered out of his crib and crawled up the street to the neighborhood graveyard. The ghosts of the graveyard and a mysterious creature named Silas adopt the child, offering him their own unique protection from the man who killed his family, and still wants to kill him. The residents of the graveyard name him Nobody Owens--Bod for short. The book follows Bod as he grows up into a young man. He has a series of adventures, which are really well done and interesting, and eventually confronts his killer as well as the prospect of growing up and leaving the nest--in the case the graveyard--and joining the world of the living.

I really liked the feel of this book A LOT, even though I'm not a graveyard/ghost lover usually. Gaiman does an amazing job of mixing warm and friendly with cool and macabre to make a story that is exceedingly charming. What I really liked about this was the way that the graveyard was a peaceful place and almost never a scary one. In fact, Bod, having been raised in a graveyard, rarely feels fear or other emotions with much passion at all. Rather than making the book dull, it just gives it a sense of simplicity and this somehow adds to it.

Booktalk: My name is Nobody. I live in a graveyard. My friends include ghosts, ghouls, night-ghasts and the Hounds of Hell. These people are all dead, but I'm not. I'm as alive as you. But I live here in the graveyard because in the world of the living I'm in danger, and here with the dead I can be safe. When I was a baby a man with a long knife came into my house and tried to kill me. He's still trying to find me, and he's getting closer...