Imagine growing up in the woods alone believing that few humans were left alive. Imagine having to hunt for every meal and going hungry in the winter and spring. Imagine learning everything you believed to be true to be a lie. Cade grew up in the woods with his parents, and they told him most of humanity was wiped out by a plague. Then he sees Dara, a girl with golden hair, who is camping with her boyfriend in the wilds of Cade's home. First, he watches her, mesmerized. When he saves her life and ends up in a hospital, Cade learns that everything he has been told by his parents was a lie, and the authorities won't believe Cade's remarkable story. As Dara and Cade grow closer, this "wild" boy struggles to survive in modern society. Dara, Jane to Cade's Tarzan, must decide if she can say goodbye to modern conveniences like Jane. This modernized version of the Tarzan story is lovely with some great new twists. This Tarzan can speak and read, but he can live off the land like our ancestors. I also like that his parents chose to run to the wild. The romantic tension between Dara and Cade is steamy. Although I wanted her to believe his story sooner than she did, it may be more reasonable that she would not believe he could have lived his whole life in the wild. This books is both survival story and romance, told from multiple perspectives. It is hard to classify, like Cade, but ultimately, satisfying.
Wild by Alex Mallory
Imagine growing up in the woods alone believing that few humans were left alive. Imagine having to hunt for every meal and going hungry in the winter and spring. Imagine learning everything you believed to be true to be a lie. Cade grew up in the woods with his parents, and they told him most of humanity was wiped out by a plague. Then he sees Dara, a girl with golden hair, who is camping with her boyfriend in the wilds of Cade's home. First, he watches her, mesmerized. When he saves her life and ends up in a hospital, Cade learns that everything he has been told by his parents was a lie, and the authorities won't believe Cade's remarkable story. As Dara and Cade grow closer, this "wild" boy struggles to survive in modern society. Dara, Jane to Cade's Tarzan, must decide if she can say goodbye to modern conveniences like Jane. This modernized version of the Tarzan story is lovely with some great new twists. This Tarzan can speak and read, but he can live off the land like our ancestors. I also like that his parents chose to run to the wild. The romantic tension between Dara and Cade is steamy. Although I wanted her to believe his story sooner than she did, it may be more reasonable that she would not believe he could have lived his whole life in the wild. This books is both survival story and romance, told from multiple perspectives. It is hard to classify, like Cade, but ultimately, satisfying.
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The Bridge from Me to You by Lisa Schroeder Lauren is the new girl in a small town. Living with her aunt and uncle while taking a time-out from her mom, she is not sure where she can call home and does not know when she will get to see her brother again. Colby is a football star under pressure to perform for his dad and his team. The only problem is that he does not know how to tell people that his future dreams do not include football. Told in both verse and prose, these two meet while Lauren is feeding her addiction to Bugles, To Colby, it is refreshing to meet someone who does not want to talk to him about football, and for Lauren, it s nice to meet someone who truly wants to know her. With their futures uncertain, how can they fall in love? This sweet romance from Lisa Schroeder is perfect for fans of Sarah Dessen. I liked the story of a football player who dreamed of other things for his future. My heart ached for Lauren's pain over her mother's betrayals. I cheered as they fought to make their future better. This is a light romance with a lot of heart. Love Letters to the Dead by Ava Dellaira “When we are in love, we are both completely in danger and completely saved.” “Truth is beautiful, no matter what the truth is. Even if it's scary or bad. It is beauty simply because it's true. And truth is bright. Truth makes you more you.” “There are a lot of human experiences that challenge the limits of our language,” she said. “That’s one of the reasons that we have poetry.” "You might want someone else to save you, or you might want to save someone so badly, but no one else can save you, not really, not from yourself." Reading Love Letters to the Dead was a poetic and painful journey into one girl's fight to keep living after her sister dies. What starts as an English assignment to write to someone who has died becomes profound as Laurel pours out her worries and hopes in letters to famous dead such as Kurt Cobain, Amelia Earhart, and Janis Joplin. As she deals with the emotional fallout caused by her sister's death, she must face the terrible truths surrounding it that continue to haunt her. At the same time, she must navigate starting high school, finding new friends, and falling in love without the advice of her beloved older sister. Filled with quotable lines (see above) and powerful poems from the masters, this is a book whose story and language you will savor long after you finish the last line. Reminiscent of Chobsky's Perks of Being a Wallflower, fans of that novel should definitely pick up this one. Before You by Amber Hart Faith has grown up fighting to be the perfect preacher's daughter at her dad's strict church. She feels like she is never true to herself and never can be. Diego is a Cuban boy new to America. He and his dad escaped the Cuban cartel, and he is hoping that he has more to look forward in America than hunger and violence. When Faith is assigned as Diego's peer mentor when he starts school, sparks fly every time that meet. Their romance has epic potential if Faith can lets herself be free. Fans of the Perfect Chemistry will embrace this novel. Hart creates unique characters who you will cheer for as they fight for happiness. I can't wait for the next book in the series about After Us. If You're Reading This by Trent Reedy A few week's before Mike's 16th birthday, a letter arrives that says, "If you are reading this, then I'm very sorry, but I was killed in the war in Afghanistan." Eight years after his father's death, Mike is receiving letters of advice that his dad wrote to him while he was in Afghanistan. In each letter, his dad encourages him to complete a mission: take a chance on a girl, go out for an activity, go to a party, read a book. As Mike strives to complete his dad's missions, his life is transformed. However, he still has to find out who is sending the letters, how his dad really died, and how to fix his broken family. This book is now on my list of best books of 2014. Written with heart, readers will cheer for Mike as he gets to live out his childhood dream of playing high school football and starts dating a girl he really likes. The letters from his dad are inspirational, and I may have shed a tear of the changes the bring to Mike's life. Moreover, I loved that the book is set in my home state of Iowa, even if Mike is a Hawkeyes fan. A combination of military and sports story, this story ranks up with Hoosiers, The Blind Side, and Remember the Titans. I highly recommend reading it! Call Me by My Name by John E. Bradley This is the legend of Tater Henry, as told by his best friend and teammate Rodney Boulett. Tater Henry has grown up dreaming of becoming a quarterback who eventually plays in the NFL. The only problem is that he was born in Louisiana in the 1960's where segregation decided winners and losers based on a person's color. Because of integration, Tater finally gets a chance to fight for his dream. He and Rodney become an unstoppable team off and on the field, pushing their community, coaches and school to be more accepting. However, when Tater and Rodney's twin sister Angie show an interest in each other, Rodney finds himself overwhelmed by the hatred still lurking within him from his year's listening to his father and the world tell him that whites and blacks dating is wrong. What will win out - love or hate? This is a powerful tale of football, friendship, and fear. Rodney and Tater's unlikely friendship harkens to the best scenes in Remember the Titans. As the coaches, students and town slowly outgrow their segregation shell and become bigger and better, Bradley also allows for the more undermining hatreds that even friendship cannot erase. Filled with legendary football games and heart, this novel is best football book I have read since Leverage. I highly recommend it! The Winner's Curse by Marie Rutkoski The winner's curse is phenomenon in auctions where the bidder overpays, never able to recoup their losses for the item. In this book, a girl named Kestrel is cursed when she pays a huge sum for a defiant slave based on their combined love of music. In doing this, a girl respected for her knowledge of secrets and strategy falls prey to powers of the human heart. In Kestrel's world, women must join the military or get married by age 20; no other option is allowed. Certainly, the general's daughter cannot fall in love with a slave, but she cannot stop herself, even when the slave fights destroy everything she holds dear. I loved Kestrel's contradictory nature. She relished her knowledge and skill at creating unbeatable war strategies, but she refused to kill. She hated slavery but owned slaves. Kestrel knew everything about secrets and strategy, but she was naive about falling in love. Equally, I appreciated the slave Arin's struggle as he came to love the girl whose father enslaved his people. I was transfixed as I sped through the tale trying to find out not only if Arin's people could be freed but if both Kestrel and Arin would fight for their heart's desire. When I finished The Winner's Curse, I was so angry at the ending. I read and reread the ending searching for more. Certainly an author so adept at making me fall in love with her protagonists would not be so cruel as to end the story as it was. Thankfully, Goodreads told me this book is the first in a trilogy, and I breathed a sigh of relief. For the first time in a long time, I am so happy to learn that this book is the first book in a trilogy. Lately, I am exhausted by the unending supply of series books; sometimes it feels like there is no originality. However, this book is no winner's curse; readers who take a risk on this original tale will come out ahead. I highly recommend it. |
AuthorMs. Smith has been the librarian at Washington HS in Sioux Falls, SD, since 2005. She enjoys reading, watching K-Dramas, Harry Potter and hanging out with her family. Archives
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