Book Review: "The Fever"

The Fever by Megan Abbott is an interesting book, written in a unique style that goes back and forth between three narratives -- a father's, a brother's, and a daughter's. Falling somewhere in the categories of drama and mystery, this book revolves around the lives of the teenage female inhabitants of one particular town, who one by one, all contract some mystery illness. All sorts of potential theories abound -- have these somehow been caused by the HPV vaccine? How about tainted water in the local lake? How about... the questions go on and on, with no real, concrete answers, and no real conrete links between any of the illnesses, either. No two show the exact same symptoms, which only intensifies the worries. Seemingly, nobody's safe if they can't come up with any answers. And yet, the main character of the story seems to be excluded from what's happening. She worries -- understandably so -- whether or not she'll be the next casualty? Given there aren't any answers, the fears are not unfounded.

Without giving too much away, the resolution of the book did not end up feeling very satisfactory for the story. The ending was incredibly rushed, lots of loose ends were left untied, and it's not the sort of book that would warrant a sequel when the culprit is discovered. Add this to the myriad of typos and fragment sentences that seem to be a large part of this author's style, and this book felt very lacking on multiple levels. I feel generous in rating it even a 3 out of 5 stars.

Book Review: "The Four Dorothys (Drama!, #1)"

With a title like The Four Dorothys, my initial assumption was the book was likely about drag queens. (No really...for those not in the know, Judy Garland is more or less the patron saint of the LGBT world. The rainbow flags are even a nod to her.) Well, this book isn't about that (although I wouldn't have been opposed if it were -- quick, somebody write one! ;)). No, this story is about an ill-fated high school production of The Wizard of Oz that was doomed from the moment it left the gates, and ended up in complete and total utter sabotage. Without giving too much away, this story quickly becomes that of a whodunnit? nature. It's well-done though, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I also give props to all the chapter titles being named after different Broadway shows. (I literally squealed when I saw one was named after The Boy From Oz.) Even if you're not a Broadway geek like me, you'll probably still enjoy it even if some of the more subtle references sail over your head; the story itself is still phenomental. Big 5 stars for this one!

Book Review: "dancergirl"

dancergirl by Carol M. Tanzman is somewhat of a tale of warning of the perils of becoming a viral internet star. Just how easy it is for things to spiral out of control, for people to become obsessed, deranged, and a dangerous stalker...

It is also a mystery and suspense novel, as our heroine/victim Ali tries to figure out who's doing this to her, all whilst the acts becoming increasingly worse and far more disturbing with every step, perpetually ruining Ali's life. In our modern digital age, this is something that can, and does, happen quite frequently and is almost enough to be classified as a horror story for anyone who has ever uploaded a video of themself to the internet. For all the good that our modern age brings us, it brings along with it very real dangers lurking in the dark corners, and this book is very much a reminder of that.

That said, this story is exquisitely told and I couldn't put it down. 5 stars!

Book Review: "Diva (The Flappers, #3)"

I know I should have read this series in sequence, but I just couldn't help myself -- I was so in love with the cover of this one that I read it first. ;) (I'm going to backtrack and read the other two though.) Anyhow, Diva, the third book in Jillian Larkin's The Flapper series, is a perfectly marvelous romance/drama/mystery about the 1920's, right in the height of the same era as The Great Gatsby. The author certainly did her homework in terms of fashion, slang, popular locations, you name it... I was absolutely thrilled to see this. The book is really about three miniature stories all in one book, all intertwined and running parallel to each other. Each chapter is labeled with which woman it involves, so once you realize that, the book is far easier to follow. I don't know how much I can truly say here about the plot without giving it all away, so I'm going to just leave that part a mystery for you to find out if you should choose to read it. ;) Anyway, I absolutely adored this book and I'm rating it 5 stars!

Book Review: "Twenties Girl"

Even if you're not a fan of the 1920's, you'll still be able to appreciate this book! Admittedly, I am a fan of the 20's, but that's beside the point. ;) Regardless. I'd never heard of Sopie Kinsella by name before, althoug I knew it had seemed familiar from somewhere... Turns out, she's the one who wrote Confessions of a Shopaholic! So that should tell you that the quality of this author is high.

I love the premise of this story, because it plays into SO many "what if?" scenarios in my mind. Basically, this girl has to go to her great-aunt's funeral who died at 105 years old. Never knew her aunt in life... in fact, practically the whole family blew her off and abandoned her in a nursing home. Almost no one was at the funeral. And yet, suddenly during the services, the girl hears a voice. And sees a person who wasn't there before. Little does she know it's the ghost of her great-aunt Sadie.

The whole story becomes a whirlwind as Sadie begs the main character, Lara, to stop the funeral somehow, because she needs her necklace. Just what necklace, Lara doesn't know. Before she knows it, she gets herself tied up in trying to track down this necklace at any cost. At the same time, during the weeks she spends with the ghost, she learns about who her aunt really was and becomes friends with her, which makes it all the more devastating and heart-wrenching when Sadie finally does fully cross over at the end. There's so many plot twists in this story though.... I can't even begin to tell you how much I love it. This is quite possibly my newest favorite book! I'd rate it even higher than a 5 star rating if I could! :D

Book Review: "The Boy Next Door"

I've heard mention of Meg Cabot many, many times over the years, and for some inexplicable reason, had never actually picked up one of her novels. I'm not sure why, but I figured it was about high time that I fixed that. And now I'm so glad that I did.

This particular book has a very unique style to it. Much like the Internet Girls series, this book jumps the internet bandwagon, although slightly different. Instead of using instant messages, the entire story in this book is told through emails back and forth between the characters. Nothing but. I was a little skeptical as to just how that would work initially, but I'm kind of surprised how telling such emails could be! You've got a love story unfolding, marital drama, a mystery, scandal... lots of elements at play. And of course, humor. And yet, we never see these characters outside of behind their keyboards. I'm very impressed by this. However, one minor detail (that I must dock my review a point for) is that all the emails are written in exactly the same style. In 20+ years of using the internet, this came as a minor pet peeve to me that all these characters would write EXACTLY the same way, with the same literary nuances and such. In reality, everybody has a writing style unique to they and they alone. So this does take away from the realism a bit, and gets a little cringe-worthy with how many "______, I mean"s throughout the book. But other than that, I found this to be an incredibly enjoyable read and highly recommend it! 4 stars.