ARC Review: Graffiti Moon

Graffiti Moon

by Cath Crowley

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Purchase: Amazon | BookDepository
Release Date: February 14, 2012
Publisher: Knopf
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Source: NetGalley
Rating: Perfect Bed Partner

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About the Book:

Senior year is over, and Lucy has the perfect way to celebrate: tonight, she's going to find Shadow, the mysterious graffiti artist whose work appears all over the city. He's out there somewhere—spraying color, spraying birds and blue sky on the night—and Lucy knows a guy who paints like Shadow is someone she could fall for. Really fall for. Instead, Lucy's stuck at a party with Ed, the guy she's managed to avoid since the most awkward date of her life. But when Ed tells her he knows where to find Shadow, they're suddenly on an all-night search around the city. And what Lucy can't see is the one thing that's right before her eyes.

I pedal fast. Down Rose Drive, where houses swim in pools of orange streetlight. Where people sit on verandas, hoping to catch a breeze. Let me make it in time. Please let me make it in time...

Graffiti Moon is like a dream that entraps your consciousness and urges you to leave reality, and all it's difficulties, behind. Crowley's soft whimsical flow of writing are luminous clouds in a bright blue sky, something beautiful that, when you stop to pay attention and really look, sweetly lulls the mind and heart. It's as if Crowley took the world we live in and put it behind another pair of lenses, granting us a heartachingly wonderful view of the same place only with infinitely more color and vibrancy, a precious place that we wish we didn't have to abandon for our own. For the first time, things cease to seem ordinary and the characters are little points of light that stand out even among all the charm already present in the fancifully written setting. They are weird and fascinating and dazzling, and they never give us a reason to want to escape them. They are open books themselves that constantly tug on our sympathy and ignite our smiles, leaving us with a burning need to see them all happy by the end.

Lucy wants Shadow. Once, Shadow had wanted her. She just didn't know it then... Lucy and Ed can be so opposite yet they share similarities that aren't easily observable, to us and between each other. Lucy is strong-willed, dreamy, optimistic, and even naive, and grabbing the events of the story and trying to focus in on them through her eyes is definitely a fun adventure. Lucy has this way of making us laugh even as we feel something profound, has the ability to cut through the BS and see into the other side. That's what gravitates to her interesting people like ourselves and Ed, the extreme loner-looking guy who has all his words shut in but all the pictures of his thoughts and memories dripping out of his fingertips. Not only is he very cute, but he appreciates art and most of its many faces, has a keen sense of loyalty and a hard strategy on how to show his feelings to others. Lucy and Ed couldn't be a better suited match. The problem? The fact that their first date dropped into a new level of hell and Lucy ended the night in a way that left Ed in pieces of doubt and chunks of disappointment. Their reconnection after these past couple of years is a syrupy progression, with sticky areas of discussion and a slow melting quality.

The other characters were just as thickly characterized, with so much going on inside, and Crowley writes little to let us know it but shows us so much about each person. It isn't a far stretch for us to fall in love with each face and attitude we hang with throughout the novel. The predictable plot was successfully carried out and never once fell and cracked to reveal a familiar dull story. Graffiti Moon is a clever interpretation of a place and storyline we may have seen before, and is also one that's more alluring and beautifully devastating and warm than any I've ever found and enjoyed. Crowley truly has to hatch another sweet, romantic idea told in an equally mesmerizing way as Graffiti Moon.

Lucy looks out the window, staring at something that's in her head, the same way she did two years ago when I watched her. She hasn't changed much except now she's bunching up her hair with paintbrushes. She's still smiling like she's thinking something you want to hear.
"Why do you want to find him so bad?" (25%)

Review: The Beautiful Between by Alyssa B. Sheinmel

T h e  B e a u t i f u l  B e t w e e n by Alyssa B. Sheinmel

Release Date: 5/11/10

Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
Age Group: Young Adult (14+)

Pages: 192

Source: Borrowed/school library
Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository | Kindle

Word Blurb: Saddening, interesting, and mysterious!

"If high school were a fairy-tale kingdom, Connelly Sternin would be Rapunzel, locked not in a tower by a wicked witch but in a high-rise apartment building by the SATs and college applications—and by the secrets she keeps. Connelly's few friends think that her parents are divorced—but they're not. Connelly's father died when she was two, and she doesn't know how.

If Connelly is the Rapunzel of her school, Jeremy Cole is the crown prince, son of a great and rich New York City family. So when he sits down next to her at lunch one day, Connelly couldn't be more surprised. But Jeremy has a tragic secret of his own, and Connelly is the only one he can turn to for help. Together they form a council of two, helping each other with their homework and sharing secrets. As the pair's friendship grows, Connelly learns that it's the truth, not the secrets, that one must guard and protect. And that between friends, the truth, however harsh, is also beautiful.

This lovely and memorable debut by Alyssa B. Sheinmel contains many of the hallmark themes found in young adult literature—friendship, coming of age, finding a place to belong, and overcoming the death of a loved one. Emotionally moving from start to finish, The Beautiful Between introduces a strong new voice to the genre, a voice with a long future ahead of it."

I was thoroughly disappointed with this book, as it happens. I was expecting this book to be more. Filled with emotion and depth. It isn't. THE BEAUTIFUL BETWEEN has a nice synopsis, and a potentially good story, were it not for the many, many, many things that bothered me about it. While it's still saddening, and holds a touch of sad emotion, there's nothing about it that screams authenticity or amazement.

First, the heroine fell flat to the ideal heroine. This story is supposed to be more of a character-driven tale, in which the heroine develops, but that isn't what entirely happened. Sure, Connelly learned a little about herself and others, but she doesn't strike me as this amazing heroine because she's... well... boring. I couldn't get into her - her habits, her flaws, her insecurities. The only thing that made me feel a twinge of sympathy is the loneliness and isolation she feels because of her caring, yet distant mother. The mystery of her father's pronounced death didn't make me all that curious to know what was going on. And I felt bored along the way, trying to hang on until things started to pick up.

Things did not pick up.

Even worse, there was no burning desire to get to know the other characters. Jeremy is weird, in my opinion. I don't find him attractive, more I find him to be odd. Not exactly the ideal popular prince of the school, though granted he is going through some major familial issues. Then there's Kate, Jeremy's younger sister, whose character was about the only one I adored. She's sweet, kind, and intuitive, even for one so young. And about the only time I got emotional in the novel pertained to my liking her. Other than that, the characters did nothing for me.

It was clear, after I reached the climax, that I wasn't going to be entirely fond of this book. While I had good expectations, perhaps even high ones, THE BEAUTIFUL BETWEEN isn't at all what I had expected or had intended to read.

Thanks for reading! And happy blogging!

Review: Dash &Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

Dash &Lily's Book of Dares

Authors: Rachel Cohn (Site★Facebook)

David Levithan (Site★Facebook)

Release Date: 10/26/10 (Hardcover)

Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers

Age Group: Young Adult (13+)

Source: Public Library (Local)

Go Buy It: Amazon★Barnes&Noble
★BookDepository

Overall Feelings: Fun, deep, &heartfelt!

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(Summary) I have to say, beginning from page one, I cracked up alot, enjoyed myself.

The entire book is told between Dash and Lily's POV, so, for once, I truly lost myself in the first person narrative. The thing that really got me though, was that both these characters are deep and relatable people. I mostly resonated with Lily, but I sympathized with Dash also. It was a lovely, heartfelt combo.

Dash is not so much serious, more he's cynical and sarcastic and reserved, whereas Lily is quite the opposite. She's light and warm and optimistic. So, what makes these two mesh so well together? Well, while Dash may be one way, he still possesses a gleam of hope. And though Lily may be a very happy, caring girl she also has doubts, insecurities, and hurts. This provides them with a channel of similarity which they share. But, I wouldn't have grasped this had I not been inside their heads, had I not shared their every thought and feeling.

Cohn and Levithan did a fantastic job in bringing these two very different (yet similar) people together. The concept of the moleskine notebook filled with dares/challenges to pass back and forth between the two, for me, was fun, hilarious, and profound. I think I got to know Lily and Dash better when they began writing to each other, using the red moleskine as a medium. When they were without the journal, I had been immersed in their struggle. Dash explains it best: "When I got back to the apartment, I decided to write to Lily anyway. I fear you may have outmatched me, because now I find these words have nowhere to go. It's hard to answer a question you haven't been asked. It's hard to show that you tried unless you end up succeeding. I stopped. It wasn't the same without the notebook. It didn't feel like a conversation. It felt like I was talking to silence" (121). It had been nice to discover that while the book is downright entertaining and witty and side-splitting, there is some degree of seriousness, of depth.

I was pleased with the side characters, their roles in the storyline, their involvement in the red journal swapping between Lily and Dash. The correlation between Mark, Lily's protective cousin, and Grandpa, Lily's grandfather, is priceless. They are one defensive duo alright. I enjoyed Boomer, his weirdness, his insight, his ineptness. Langston, Lily's brother, and Benny, Langston's boyfriend, are a nice comical addition to the novel. I also liked Lily's strange family members, ESPECIALLY Mrs. Basil E. Oh, what a character she is!

A conversation between Mrs. Basil E. and Dash:
"'I need to gauge your intentions,' she said, 'before I can allow you to dillydally with my niece.'
'I can assure you I have neither dillying nor dallying on my mind,' I replied. 'I simply want to meet her. In person. You see, we've been--'
She raised her hand to cut me off. 'I know all about your epistolary flirtation. Which is all well and good--as long as it's well and good. Before I ask you some questions, perhaps you would like some tea?'
'That would depend on what kind of tea you were offering.'
'So diffident. Suppose it was Earl Grey.'
I shook my head. 'Tastes like pencil shavings.'
'Lady Grey.'
'I don't drink beverages named after beheaded monarchs. It seems so tacky.'
'Chamomile?'
'Might as well sip butterfly wings.'
'Green tea?'
'You can't be serious.'
The old woman nodded her approval. 'I wasn't.'

The romance aspect of the novel did not disappoint, thankfully. I'm very particular about how a romance evolves, and watching Dash and Lily get to know each other, dig down deep enough to find the core of each other, truly understand each other, had been incredibly rewarding. Their relationship gradually developed, then flourished by the end.

Ah, the end. The ending was just downright beautiful. A sensational, warm kiss impacted me unlike many other physical scenes I've read. //SPOILERISH//And then those last few paragraphs...Lily awakening Dash as someone who "was going to do her best to cherish this new person, whose name she finally knew" (260). Marvelous, just marvelous.

If you have a single funny, romantic bone in your body pick up Dash & Lily's Book of Dares.

Thanks for reading!