Category Archives: The Must Reads

These are the books that I think are a must read.

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How to Kill a Rock Star by Tiffanie DeBartolo

It is hard for me to put words together to decide how much I loved this book. It drove me absolutely insane and in turn, I think I drove my friends a little crazy as well. I wished so many times I had this book as a physical copy instead of on my Kindle because I wanted to throw it across the room, cover my ears and just block the rest of the world out because I was feeling too much.

I had a feeling when I started this book that it was going to be different. In fact, I even told my friends that I was afraid to love this book too much because writing this beautiful can’t be happy all the time. I thought this book was going to rip my heart out and stomp on it. And it did. And yet I finished this book happier than I thought possible.

I think the thing that made this book so emotional for me was the characters. They are real people. They have their flaws and their love isn’t perfect rainbows and butterflies and the writing felt so raw that I felt every single thing in this book. I soared when Eliza did and I felt my heart being slowly crushed as well.

And the writing. Oh my god, the writing. If I am ever able to put words together a tenth as well as DeBartolo did in this book, I will thank my lucky stars. There were so many lines in this book that spoke true and real. It was powerful and I think the writing itself was a character within the book.

I don’t think I will ever stop singing DeBartolo’s praises and I will tell every single person I know to read this book. It’s a romance, but it’s real, and yet I could escape through it. This was an amazing book and I’m so glad it found its way to me to read.

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Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

I was very cautious going into this book. The reviews for it were great, but sometimes those don’t tell the whole truth about a novel. Especially when it comes to Young Adult novels.

I’m incredibly happy I was proven wrong. Unearthly is a fantastic book that takes the basic elements of a Young Adult book and instead of becoming a cheesy book that makes me roll my eyes every other paragraph; it becomes a wonderful, realistic story about knowing yourself and teen love.

Clara is a wonderfully written teen character. She’s mature, but still acts like a 16, 17 year old girl. She’s not whiny or weak, but instead she’s confused by everything happening in her life supernatural and normal. Her mother, unlike most YA parents, doesn’t disappear for most of the novel. There are parts where he mother isn’t there, but you never get the “disappearing parent syndrome” that seems to be so common these days.

The relationships are not the “just add water!” types so many books have these days. It’s not an instant love. There’s instant attraction, but that always happens in life. However, the relationships build over time and through talking and being around the other person. They are healthy and true and don’t feel forced, at all. It’s easy to understand why these people love each other.

The issue of God was handled flawlessly, in my opinion. When you write a story that centers on angels, you know God will come into play. Hand manages to handle this in a way that does not preach to those who don’t believe, but does not offend those who do. I applaud her for being able to write about something so important to so many people with as much grace as she did.

Tucker. I am in love with Tucker. He is such a wonderful boy and he is perfect in how much he cares for Clara. I swoon harder each time I think about him and can’t wait to read more about the relationship between him and Clara.

The one thing that bothered me a little bit about this book and what kept it from being 5 stars was how the purpose was played. I liked the idea of angels having one task to complete in their life, however I didn’t enjoy how it seemed most characters thought that in order to fulfill her purpose, Clara had to fall for Christian. I felt like that forced a relationship between the two when it could have grown instead.

I am incredibly pleased I decided to give this book a chance. It blew past my expectations and I can’t wait to read the next book.

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Hand Me Down by Melanie Thorne

I don’t have enough words in my vocabulary to describe how much this book moved me.

I could feel the pain Liz was going through each time I turned the page, and the anger she had at the world around her. I had more hope for her than I’ve had for any other character in a long time. She was such a strong character, with so much determination to not let the mistakes of those around her bring her down to their level.

I wanted to shake some sense into the adults in this book. They are flawed and not very good human beings, but as horrible as they are, it is written so wonderfully there are a few you feel a tiny bit of sympathy for. You learn enough about why some people are they way they are that, while it doesn’t excuse them, it makes their behavior believable. Each person is the way they are for a reason, and after you learn those reasons, each character becomes a real person.

I was incredibly touched by this book and will tell every single one of my friends they need to give this book a read.

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Still Missing by Chevy Stevens

I’m having a hard time coming up with the words I need to describe this book. I loved Never Knowing and was excited to start Still Missing. I’m not sure what I was expecting when I started read it, but I certainly wasn’t prepared for what I went through reading this book.

I love the way Stevens wrote this book as a set of flashbacks, each “chapter” book ended by Annie’s therapy sessions. I think the reason I love it so much is because it makes this a story about Annie and how she deals with the world after this horrible things happens to her.

The one line from the book that really stuck out to me was, “I just wonder why nobody cares much about the after—just about the story. Guess they figure it stops there. I wish.”

It’s one thing to write a moving story about the “during,” but to tackle a novel about the after really got to me. Yes, Annie’s depictions of what happened to her in the cabin were horrible, and there were times I had to stop reading for a little while. But what really made me feel for Annie was her struggle to return to something normal, her fights to eat whenever she pleased, or to sleep on a bed instead of in the closet.

Annie fought in one way to stay alive when she was in captivity, but she was fighting a completely different fight when she returned to her life. That is what made me love this book. Everything is out there and it’s raw and while I have never been through anything Annie went through, I felt a little bit of her pain.

The last line of this book made me cry more than I thought a book could make me cry. This is a book that has made me think and feel and I will tell anyone who will listen to read this book.

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Dog’s Purpose by W. Bruce Cameron

After I finished reading this book, all I wanted to do was drive home and give my own dogs a huge treat and all the love I could.

This was a heartwarming book that made me laugh and cry. As a person who loves her dogs more like little people than actual dogs, I simply loved reading about life through a dog’s eyes and his search to find his purpose. Why was he put on this earth and what can he learn each time his soul is brought back?

I fell in love with the dog a little bit more through each of his lives, completely immersed in the story he was telling. This wasn’t like The Art of Racing in the Rain where the dog understands words and concepts completely. Instead, this dog knows simple words, but builds the view of the world through actions and his own feelings. He trusts his dog instincts and uses those to guide his life. He’s more like how I envision a dog thinking about everything going on around him.

There were several times when I started to cry reading, so I suggest having a box of tissues near you as you read. It’s happy and sad tears, but it’s all worth it to read this stunning book.

I wish I was able to write more about how this book made me feel, but I can’t think of any words that adequately describe the feelings. If you are a dog lover, you must read this book. It will make you love your dog even more than you thought possibly.

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Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

This is a wonderfully fabulous book that I completely devoured. It was hard for me to put it down to sleep.

Juliette is a fantastically written character. She starts the book as somewhat weak, yet resilient. She thinks of herself as a monster, something that doesn’t really deserve to be around people. By the time the novel reaches its conclusion, you can see her strength growing, her acceptance of herself finally starting to come about. Throughout the entire novel, you can see that her heart is what makes her powerful, not whatever power she actually has. It’s her heart that gives her strength.

I love Adam. I want an Adam of my own. He is amazing and kind and wonderful. I’m sure I could come up with more adjectives to describe him, but I won’t. I just love him.

Kenji provides a bit of relief with his whole persona. His little comments, inserted exactly where they need to be, let me take a breath and prepare myself for more of the intensity sure to come.

Beyond the characters and the storyline, I adored Mafi’s writing style. You see inside Juliette’s head and are aware of just how broken she is in the beginning. You can feel her faith in herself grow through the writing. And the metaphors on every page really let you feel what she is feeling. As an example, there are many interpretations of how realization could feel for a person. But when you read, “Realization is ice-cold water and it’s dripping down my spine,” you know exactly what to feel. You feel that cold water dripping down your back. I can’t get over how stunning the writing is.

This may be the first book in a trilogy, but it is a complete book that I’ll definitely be telling people to read, as I anxiously await the second book.

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You Are My Only by Beth Kephart

I can’t get over the writing in this book. The plot itself is an interesting one, but the style of writing Kephart uses to tell the story makes this novel exceptional. The descriptions in this book are amazing and the imagery they create is incredibly unique. You can see the story unfolding as it happens; you are right there, feeling everything, seeing everything, experiencing it all.

I fell in love with Sophie and Emmy. Sophie is a girl who doesn’t know everything she is missing until she breaks the rules to find it and Emmy is the distraught young mother who wants to stop at nothing to find her missing baby. The aunts and Joey are Sophie’s neighbors and her introduction to the real world. Autumn was the girl who listened to Emmy and helped her keep from falling completely apart. These characters were so real, I couldn’t help but cry for them.

I loved this entire book, from start to end. The very last line of this book is one of the best I’ve read. It gets across the entire weight of Sophie and Emmy’s stories and was the perfect way to end this story.

Everyone needs to get this book and read it. It is one of the most extraordinary books I have read this year.

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Shine by Lauren Myracle

The cover of this book is what drew me in at first, but the amazing writing is what kept me reading from the first page to the very last.

This book deals with several hot-button issues, namely homophobia and what it can do at its worst. But even more than that, it deals with many other problems that exist in society. While the main focus is the horrible hate crime and its aftermath, you see abuse, alcoholism and how fear can turn into hatred and its ability to destroy.

I loved the slow build Myracle used to tell the story. You got enough information to make you turn the page, where you’d get just a tiny bit more before you hit the peak and it all came into focus. It made the ending much more powerful.

This is definitely a book people need to read. It’s powerful, and yet the message comes across in such a wonderful way, you can help but walk away feeling a little bit different.

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Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Wow. This book was wow.

When I started reading this, I didn’t think it would be as intricate and interesting as it was. The imagination and essence are amazing and I could hardly put this book down.

Humanity plays a huge role in this story, and Taylor uses this as the starting point of her characters and weaves their story through it. Karou maintains her humanity through the entire story, never losing the thing that makes her real. She goes from being a semi-normal 17-year-old girl to something else entirely, and the one thing that remains true is the emotions that tie her to her humanity. Akiva is made beautiful not through his looks or strengths or abilities, but his powerful connections to love and the love story wrapped around him and Karou.

The feelings I had reading this book were indescribable. My heart was beating faster, my mind was spinning and I couldn’t believe what I was reading. The writing was beautiful and made the story what it is. I can’t wait to hear the rest of this amazing love story.

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Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

I think one of the the reasons I enjoy young adult romance books so much is there’s such a wonderful, first love quality to them that’s hard to find some days in real life. The reader feels as head over heels about the characters and the characters feel about themselves. Yes, there’s a bit of a struggle, but there’s not of the adult “real life” involved. There’s no kids, no house, none of the typical “adult” things to overcome. It makes it easy to fall in love with the love.

I absolutely loved Lola. I’m not sure there’s an adequate word to express just how much I swooned through the entire book. Not only over Cricket, but the little piece of Anna and Etienne that were in there, too. Perkins has such a fabulous way for writing completely wonderful, swoon-worthy, perfectly imperfect guys that I’m not sure my heart could handle much more. Of course, that will never stop me from rereading Anna and Lola and eagerly awaiting Isla.

The huge difference I loved between Anna and Lola was the realness of Lola. Anna was amazing, but there was this special feel to it. It was set in Paris, with amazing English boys, living the life almost every girl dreams of. Going away to the city of love and finding it. Lola was set in San Francisco, with a delightful, tall, slightly awkward American boy. It was what could happen to almost any girl.

My heart hurt from all the happiness and love I felt reading this book. It was so amazingly sweet and wonderful and I fell in love with it several times over.