Tag: Walker Books for Young Readers

Review: Just Like the Movies by Kelly Fiore

Posted September 7, 2014 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Rowena’s review of Just Like the Movies by Kelly Fiore.

Pretty and popular track star Marijke Monti is confident about almost everything – she’s got great friends, a great family, and she’s on her way to the State Track Championship. In fact, the only thing Marijke isn’t confident about is her relationship with Tommy Lawson.

Lily Spencer has spent her entire high school career preparing for the future – she’s participated in every extracurricular activity and volunteer committee she could. But, at home, she watches her mother go on date after date with dud-dudes, still searching for “the one.” Lily realizes that she’s about to graduate and still hasn’t even had a boyfriend.

While they live on each other’s periphery at school, Lily and Marijke never seemed to have much in common; but, after a coincidental meeting at the movie theater, Lily gets an idea – why can’t life be like a movie? Why can’t they set up their perfect romantic situations, just in time for their senior prom, using movie techniques?

Once the girls come up with the perfect plans, they commit themselves to being secret cohorts and, just like in the movies, drama ensues.

What a cute book this turned out to be. This is one of those books that ended up being exactly what I wanted it to be and perfect for the mood that I was in.

Marijke is part of the popular crowd at school. She’s a track star who is heading to the state high school tournament. She’s got a great boyfriend that all of the girls like and like a lot of teenage girls her age, she’s insecure as all get out about that. She knows that Tommy likes her and only her but that doesn’t stop her from being insecure because Tommy hasn’t ever said that he loves her.

Lily on the other hand is the opposite of popular. She’s one of those overachievers who always goes unnoticed. She’s the person behind the scenes and nobody ever really notices her until she bumps into her long time crush, Joe Lombardi.

Marijke and Lily are at the same theater, watching the same movie when Marijke bursts out of the theater in tears and Lily follows her. They get to talking and they both agree that they wish their lives was just like the movies. Well, Marijke does. Lily’s spidey senses are tingling and she thinks a story is somewhere in this conversation so she comes up with the plan to help Marijke get the kind of love life she wants, by re-enacting famous grand gesture scenes from popular romantic comedies. But Marijke won’t do this alone. If she’s going to do this, she’s going to do this with Lily and Lily has to go after her long time crush, Joe Lombardi and just like that, the plan is put into action.

Marijke just wants her boyfriend to realize how much she loves him and in return, tell him how much she means to him. Lily just wants to go out on a date with Joe. But a lot of shenanigans follow these desires and it made for a fun read.

I will admit that Marijke’s insecurities drove me up the wall. Each and every single time that she doubted Tommy, I wanted to smack her upside her head. There were even times when I wanted Tommy to break up with her to show her that she can’t keep on not trusting him for their relationship to work. Tommy was a bonehead a lot of the time but he wasn’t a cheater. He was just a boy who did stupid things or didn’t think about anything but living in the moment. But in the end, I really came to like Marijke’s character. Of the two of them, I thought her transformation was greater. And sweeter.

But I liked Lily’s character as well. I liked the way that she thought (most of the time) and even when she did boneheaded things, I really liked her and I thought her little romance with Joe was just about the most adorable thing. I wonder if I would have thought the same thing had I caught on to the fact that Joe and Lily are my parents names. I doubt it, they were too cute for words.

Overall, this book delivered the goods for me. It was a cute story about two girls trying to make some changes in their lives and I liked it. I would recommend this to readers who enjoy contemporary YA stories, the cute ones. 🙂

Grade: 4 out of 5

This book is available from Walker Books for Young Readers. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

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Tagged: 4.0 Reviews, Contemporary, Kelly Fiore, Netgalley, Rowena's Reviews, Walker Books for Young Readers, Young Adult

Review: Wild Cards by Simone Elkeles

Posted May 10, 2014 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Rowena’s review of Wild Cards by Simone Elkeles.

After getting kicked out of boarding school, bad boy Derek Fitzpatrick has no choice but to live with his ditzy stepmother while his military dad is deployed. Things quickly go from bad to worse when he finds out she plans to move them back to her childhood home in Illinois. Derek’s counting the days before he can be on his own, and the last thing he needs is to get involved with someone else’s family drama.

Ashtyn Parker knows one thing for certain–people you care about leave without a backward glance. A football scholarship would finally give her the chance to leave. So she pours everything into winning a state championship, until her boyfriend and star quarterback betrays them all by joining their rival team. Ashtyn needs a new game plan, but it requires trusting Derek—someone she barely knows, someone born to break the rules. Is she willing to put her heart on the line to try and win it all?

It’s been a while since I’ve read anything by Simone Elkeles but I’m knee deep in a re-watch of the entire series of Friday Night Lights and I was in the mood for some high school football action so I picked this one up.

Derek Fitzpatrick just got kicked out of his fancy private school for a prank that he took the fall for. His father is somewhere in the middle of the ocean, doing big Navy things and Derek is sent to live with his step-mother who is moving out of their Southern California home to her hometown of Chicago. He’s almost a senior and he’s just trying to get through, one day at a time.

When he meets Ashtyn Parker, things get really interesting. First off, she thinks that he’s a thug who has come to rob her family and she stabs him. And then she locks him in the shed. When she finds out that he’s actually her sister’s step-son, she’s embarrassed. From then on, Derek and Ashtyn fall into a bickering relationship. There’s a whole lot of chemistry between the two of them but Ashtyn has a boyfriend and Derek isn’t there to meet girls.

But things happen and really, you can’t help who you fall in love with.

Derek and Ashtyn take a road trip to Texas where Ashtyn is enrolled in a football camp (she’s the captain of her football team) and Derek is set to meet his grandmother. Derek’s grandmother has never been in Derek’s life. She ditched his Mom when his Mom married his Dad and Derek is not happy about this little reunion. It is while on this road trip that you see Derek and Ashtyn’s relationship really take off.

Ashtyn has broken up with her loser boyfriend, Landon McKnight and she’s starting to be honest about how she really feels about Derek but he’s not the guy for her. At least in his head he isn’t. But really, Derek…you can’t run from who you’re meant to be with. Everyone knows that.

What I liked about this book is that Ashtyn was honest with her feelings for Derek almost from the moment she realizes she has feelings. She knows what she wants and she goes for it. She had that I’m woman, hear me roar mentality and at times, it got on my nerves. Her, I don’t need any help from anyone (even though the circumstances called for a little help) made me want to smack some sense into her but I had to keep reminding myself that she was a teenager and sometimes teenagers act ways that nobody understands.

Derek was one of the good guys. He came off as selfish and rowdy but at his core, he was a genuinely good guy. He cared deeply for the people close to him and he was a good step-brother to Julian. I really liked the growth we see in his character and that grand gesture at the end was the business.

This was an enjoyable read but it wasn’t without things that got on my nerves (mostly the way Ashtyn behaved toward Derek) but overall, I enjoyed this book and think that fans of contemporary YA will enjoy this one. I wish we could have seen some kind of interaction between Derek and his father but even still, this was a good one.

Grade: 3 out of 5

This book is available from Walker Books for Young Readers. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.