15: Confessions of a Triple Shot Betty

Confessions of a Triple Shot Betty, written by Jody Gehrman, is a young adult book about the trials and tribulations of love in high school. It’s witty, funny and easy to read.

The main character, Genna, has planned the perfect summer with her best friend and wild child Amber, and her pristine and virginal cousin, Hero (named for Shakespeare). However, like oil and water, these two do not mix. Throw in some boys, the heat and a few summer parties, and the fact that they all work together at the coffee shop and you have the recipe for a good story.

There was more sex stuff than I expected in this book. The storyline loosely follows Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing play, and I would love to see a high school class read this as a supplement to the play, but as a teacher it would get awkward reading this with students.

This book is the first in a series. It’s good, and definitely an easy and fun read, especially for high school girls. I give it a 7/10.

5: Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver is a Groundhog Day type book in that the same day keeps happening, again and again until the main character gets it “right.”

Samantha has worked hard to be in the popular crowd at her suburban high school, and dresses and acts the part of queen bee. However, when she is in a devastating car crash, she sees how her actions may have unknowingly hurt her peers. She bothered me while reading this book. She was snobby and mean and hateful to her peers, her little sister and her teachers. She was, in short, a bully.

However. She learns. She redoes her days until they are perfect and she ends by saving another person’s life. She becomes Real and she becomes a person that you can relate to and by the end, you end up liking her and she ends up realizing how bullying affected everyone around her.

Still, the monotonous reading got to me. I was ready for the book to be over, and I was ready to Sam to realize what a snot she was at the beginning of the book. It dragged on and on, to me. However, I think a lot of people will like this book. It kind of reminded me of The Lovely Bones, in that in-between state of life.

I give this a 7/10. A solid, good young-adult read.

1: All We Know of Heaven

All We Know of Heaven is a young adult book is written by Jacqueline Mitchard, who wrote some of my favorite adult books. However, I’m not sure about her writing young adult fiction. It seemed to me like she altered her sentence structure, and her new ones came out stilted and didn’t have the voice that she usually has in the writing.

That being said, the book was engaging. The story is (ripped from the headlines!) about two teenage girls who get into a car accident and one girl lives and one dies. The families are told who is whom, based off where the girls were sitting in the car. Because they were so similar in height/weight/looks and their injuries are so severe, doctors are not sure who is whom. Turns out, they got the girls switched.

The story deals with the family’s discovery and their healing. The two families do not end on good terms, and I did not like that. I cannot imagine what that would be like, but I would think that you would not hate the other family because their daughter lived. Also, there was a love connection in the book that honestly eeeked me out. The boyfriend of the dead girl ends up falling in love with the living girl and it was just weird to me.

All in all, I give this a solid 6/10. Good reading, not spectacular, but definitely kept my attention. A good high school/middle school book, although there is sex in it, the characters are careful to discuss protection and issues around that.