I recently completed the (lowest level possible) Young Adult Reading Challenge, and will post this wrap-up with a few final reviews of a couple of books. I read 7 of the books I had originally put on my pool of books in my sign-up post and someday, I'll get to the rest of them. Thanks to J Kaye for hosting, and I'm heading over to link my wrap up post at her site.
Young Adult Challenge
I keep trying paranormal type books, since they are so popular, but I just don't see the what the fuss is about. This was okay, about werewolves, and I really liked the legend and background of how they live, and how they could conceivable live, but it doesn't make me want to keep reading. I had high hopes for this one, as I was judging a book by its cover, as it is gorgeous, and the next two books in the series are similar, with different colours, and they really appeal to me visually. But alas, not enough to read the next books.
It was an enjoyable enough read, with teenagers on the loose, fascinated with werewolves, and the characters were fine, just not my style.
also reviewed: kristina at kristina's favorites; bart at bart's bookshelf; suey at it's all about books; colleen at lavenderlines; beth f at beth fish reads;
Young Adult Challenge; RIP V
This was a wonderful little book I heard mentioned somewhere on the blogosphere, maybe in relation to the YA Dystopian challenge at Bart's, but whoever mentioned it, thank you. A super slacker student in a fancy New York private school is assigned a project on infectious disease. He reluctantly gets interested in small pox, and then accidentally inhales an old, dried up small pox he found in an extremely old medical text. The book takes off from there, as he tries to decide what to do, when doing much of anything really isn't his style. But is he infected with small pox? The idea of a small pox epidemic in post 9/11 New York City provides a scary background to tell this story, and forces our main character to do some serious thinking and research. I was on the edge of my seat, (note I am counting it for the RIP V Challenge as well) and found the characters realistic and modern, with cellphones and internet a part of the teenagers' life.
I gave it to my 13 year old son, who also enjoyed the book. I'll look for some more Caroline B Cooney books at the library. Code Orange was a great find.
Completed:
1. I Am Mogan La Fay - Nancy Springer 01/29
2. Knife of Never Letting Go - Patrick Ness 02/21
3. Paper Towns - John Green 04/04
4. Zero - Diane Tullson 04/05
5. Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List - Rachel Cohn and David Levithan 04/11
6. The Ask and the Answer - Patrick Ness 06/14
7. Feeling Sorry for Celia - Jaclyn Moriarty 08/22
8. When You Reach Me - Rebecca Stead 08/26
9. The Westing Game - Ellen Raskin 08/28
10.Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins 09/06
11. Code Orange - Caroline B Cooney 10/18
12.Shiver - Maggie Stievfator 11/07
Best book on this list: Paper Towns by John Green had the funniest road trip I ever read. Other good reads were When You Reach Me and Code Orange. I read two of the Chaos Walking series, and even had the last one here, Monsters of Men, but couldn't get going in it. Maybe another time I'll get it from the library.
