Books Love Me – Reviews

Jenna Fox woke up one fine day remembering nothing from her past. The 17-year-old doesn’t remember who she was, who her family was, who her friends were, where she went to school, nothing. After a year’s long coma caused by an accident, Jenna woke up trying to remember as much as she can but finding it quite difficult.

Mother provided Jenna home videos to watch hoping to trigger some of her lost memories. But all Jenna sees is a girl who looks like her doing things she doesn’t remember doing. Her grandmother, Lily, urges her to skip the rest and watch the final video, the video which was made just before Jenna’s accident. Jenna ignores Lily and continues to watch them in order. Lily is the only one who behaves coldly towards Jenna, unlike her Mother and Father who obviously dote on her.

Then Jenna also meets her neighbour and first friend post-coma, Clayton Bender, a photographer who likes to feed the birds. Her parents initially didn’t allow her to leave the house alone so Mr. Bender’s like her confidante. He may not be a typical teenager’s friend but he’s someone whom Jenna can talk to and also someone who doesn’t seem to be keeping secrets from her. Well, not that he has his own personal secrets.

Why did they move away from Boston, their home? Why stay so far away from Jenna’s doctors? Why don’t any of her old friends contact her? Why don’t her parents let her attend school? So many questions but nobody’s answering them. Lily does give Jenna a hint or two and it’s definitely not to strengthen their relationship.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox is written from Jenna’s point of view so we readers are also trying to figure out the truth about everything that’s happened. Chapters are really short and abundant. There are also poems written by Jenna to reflect her feelings and emotions in the process of discovering her identity.

For me, it was slow to start with but Jenna’s relationship with her Mother and Lily are certainly intriguing. I also like the part where Jenna goes to school for the first time post-coma and was wondering how she’d interact with her new friends, given that she remembers nothing from before. Oh well, she manages well and even does a good impression on some of them. And especially one of them, Ethan.

I wasn’t totally moved by the book, it was just okay to me. It’s a quick read, with lots of short chapters and sentences along with dictionary definitions of some words. I guess Jenna doesn’t remember parts of her vocabulary too.

With numerous awards already in hand, this book is going to be turned into a movie coming from 20th Century Fox! So, who do you think would make a good Jenna Fox?

Lastly, thanks to Em from Em’s Bookshelf for I won this book from her giveaway.

I’m now onto the third book in the Song of the Lioness series which is The Woman Who Rides Like a Man. Alanna, the only female knight there ever was in Trebond has set out on a journey with Coram, her servant, in a bid to find exciting adventures and villains to fight with.

After battling with some desert raiders, Alanna and Coram meet Halef Seif, the headman of the Bloody Hawk tribe who are of the Bazhir clan. They all then return to the Bloody Hawk village where they were eventually adopted by the tribe.

But not everyone was welcoming or accepting Alanna as she walks around wearing men’s clothes and her face unveiled unlike good Bazhir women. The one who is openly hostile towards her is the shaman, Akhnan Ibn Nazzir who believes that she was sent by the devil to corrupt them all. In a later event, both of them fight where Alanna triumphs over the unfortunate Akhnan. As a result, Alanna is expected to become the next shaman for the Bloody Hawk tribe.

Besides having to worry about her duties as the new shaman, Alanna is also bothered with the evil magic in a crystal sword that she’s using and also having to train her three young apprentices to be the next shamans of the tribe. Kara and Kourrem are obedient students while Ishak, the hot-headed one who also shows extreme interest in Alanna’s crystal sword.

Let’s also not forget that Alanna is somewhat caught in a love triangle with Jonathan of Conte and George, the King of Thieves. Jon plans to make Alanna his wife while George has promised to wait for her no matter what. Jon will always be Number One in Alanna’s heart but she’s not ready to walk down the aisle.

This book was alright where we meet new characters from different cultures and customs. You can expect a lot of events happening but don’t worry, you won’t get lost in the plot. Pierce has cleverly written out the story so readers don’t confuse themselves.

So who are you voting for to end up with Alanna? Jon or George? I know that some of you know how the story ends but don’t let it out, okay? If you ask me, I’m all for George. Jon just didn’t impress me much I guess.

Can’t wait to get started on the final book, Lioness Rampant!

Buy The Woman Who Rides Like a Man (The Song of the Lioness)

Anna Hanson, 16, thinks her life is boring. She’s a prefect in school, pays attention in class, goes home, does her homework, and if she feels like it, she’ll talk with her mom for a while. Her mother suffers from stress and is unable to go to work. Anna lives with her mom while her dad’s remarried and her brother lives with him.

The story starts with Anna in class, learning about the play, Macbeth, when a new boy enters the classroom. He’s not dressed in the school’s uniform, has a shaven head and looks like he’d rather be anywhere else than there. Anna is the only person to introduce herself to him after class.

Anna doesn’t really belong to a particular group or clique in school. So when a girl from her class, Karen, invites her out for the night, she was quite happy to go. Finally, some plans with friends! She found out later that Karen was only using her as a substitute friend. She then left the club and went home, feeling that there wouldn’t ever be anyone who would genuinely want to be friends with her. That’s how she was mugged on her way home. By the new boy.

His name is Craig Ritchie but Anna calls him Ritchie. Instead of reporting him to the police, she kind of bonded with him. He told her stories of his life, his perspective of the modern world and she was utterly fascinated by them. Perhaps this boy was her gateway to a much more exciting and fulfilling life.

Ritchie and his pals are thieves. They steal stuff from other people because they feel that they deserve to do that. They are like the outcasts in society: one has been bullied, Ritchie has been ridiculed in school, abandoned by his father who left his mother, etc. So they think that robbing from rich people is like taking back what should be theirs.

And suddenly Anna pitches plans and ideas to Ritchie about how both of them can steal something from a store and later give away their ‘earnings’ to somebody who needs them. They’d steal from stores that have branches and franchises all over the world. Since these big companies are already making millions, a few lost pounds wouldn’t hurt them. Anna saw themselves as Robin Hoods. Stealing from the rich to give to the poor.

I am familiar with the saying ‘Crime doesn’t pay’ and I’m sure most of you have heard of that too. Well, I was wondering how these two kids will end up in the end. It is interesting to read how they tried to steal from a bookshop without getting caught. But I was skeptical. Wouldn’t they be caught on the CCTV? I doubt that the shops would leave any area unguarded especially if it’s some huge store like Borders or something.

This book does make us reflect on issues like exploitation and consumerism. You should read the part where they talk about shoes and the Third World. Who made them? How much were their wages? How much are we paying for the shoes?

All right, I thought Anna really went through an extreme transformation. Since she met Ritchie, she’s become braver and in a way, happier. But not necessarily wiser. Ritchie is also another complicated character.

I can’t say that I enjoyed this book. It was a slow start but it did pick up pace when Anna and Ritchie go Robin Hooding. I guess this book tells us that we learn things by making mistakes.

Buy Something Wicked

I may be too old to read this kind of books but I do enjoy them so much! Until now, I’ve already read four books by Jean Ure and their protagonists are all approaching their teen years. Ah, who cares? These books make me laugh out loud so I don’t have a problem with how young the characters are.

In Hunky Dory, the narrator is Dorian Jones or Dory and he’s “having terrible trouble with girls”. According to him, girls in his form keep acting weird around him. For example, a girl named Amy Wilkerson sat next to him in Geography class and kept getting cosy leaning up to him while talking to her friend who was sitting on his other side. And another girl kept beaming at him in class.

What makes it even more interesting is that Dory’s younger sister’s friend, Linzi, has a crush on Dory. Dory’s younger sister, Annabel or Microdot (Dory’s nickname for her) regularly gives Dory personality quizzes to do so that she can write his profile to tell what kind of person he is. She also hints to him about why he keeps avoiding Linzi. Dory just goes along with these tests to humour his sister.

Dory cannot understand why other girls can’t be like the Herb, his good friend. Her real name is Rosemary but the Herb is her nickname. I don’t know how she got it anyway. Dory, the Herb and Dory’s other good friend, Aaron, spend their free time in Dory’s garden, digging a hole to look for artifacts. Dory is passionately fond of dinosaurs and hopes to become some sort of dinosaur archaeologist when he grows up.

When Dory finds out that his best friend, Aaron, is going out with a girl, he becomes even more confused. He had always thought that his friends were never into girls and that they think girls are quite silly. He is also puzzled when the Herb acts weird sometimes. Once when he suggested inviting another girl over to help dig the hole, the Herb went quite ballistic.

I like the illustrations that go with the story. They’ll appear after every few pages and it helps the reader to visualize what’s going on. A quick, funny and perfect read if you want to know what young kids are up to nowadays.

Buy Hunky Dory

It’s already bad enough worrying about grades and exams during high school without having to add peer pressure and other juvenile issues like bullying and picking on new kids. Have you ever been the new kid in a new school before? How did your school treat the new ones? Were your classmates nice or nasty to them?

16-year-old John Malarkey is the new kid in town and in school, Brook High. He and his mom have just moved to this new town and his mom decides to open a store selling second hand books. (Wouldn’t I like to live near that one!)

Before this, I have never come across the word ‘malarkey’ before. On the cover of this book, the definition given for the word is ‘bullshit’. Yikes! Imagine having such a name! But I also just looked up Answers.com and it also means ‘exaggerated or foolish talk, usually intended to deceive’, which in short means ‘bullshit’. Returning to the book, it suits well as the title and the name of the boy. John Malarkey did more than once tried to talk himself out of trouble.

So one day, a beautiful classmate speaks to John and points him out to two other boys who decide to nab his school bag and run away with it. He naturally chases the boys to try to get his bag back. He failed to catch them but needn’t worry because his bag showed up on his desk in his next class. With a stolen teacher’s wallet in it. John is then accused of stealing.

With John taking the blame for a couple of thefts in school, a shady group called the Tailors who loves to wear Adidas shoes, runs the school like never before. They sell stuff like cigarettes and drugs at the tuck shop but the teachers know nothing about it. They also sell signed report cards without teachers’ comments – meaning the students can be their own teacher and write out their own comments!

They don’t even spare the smart kids out of their cunning schemes. The brainy ones make up the Homework Club and they’re forced to do the Tailors’ assignments with no time to concentrate on their own. John then tries to enlist one of the Homework Club kids’ help. What he plans to do is to clear his name as a thief and also to bring down the Tailors. Both in less than 24 hours.

It’s quite an exciting read and felt suspenseful. I also didn’t realize that a few hours in school could feel like a few days! The first 89 pages were focused on what John did after having his bag stolen by the Tailor boys. I thought it went on for days but it’s only hours actually.

You can say that John’s the high school James Bond. A group of trouble makers pick on him, he comes up with plans and tactics, faces the leader of the pack and then figures out on how to proceed from there. Pick up this book to read about how a new kid fights off the bullies in his new school.

Other Reviews: Chicklish

Buy Malarkey

I’m beginning to adore graphic novels and this book is to blame for it. I bought it at a bookstore in Giant for only RM16.90. What an awesome bargain!

It begins with Jane who had to move to suburbia Kent Waters. She and her parents were living in Metro City until an unexpected bomb exploded in a café in the city. Jane was strolling past the café when it happened. She wasn’t hurt but she didn’t look forward to entering cafés anymore.

She was surrounded by dead bodies but she managed to save a young man’s life. He’s known as John Doe throughout most of the story and is in a coma. Jane tries to visit him often and tells him stories of her everyday life. John Doe appears to be an artist since he had a sketch book with him. As Jane is also an artistic person, she keeps the sketch book with her and fills it with her own sketchings.

Afraid that another bomb would explode or some other disturbing event would occur in the city, Jane’s parents moved the family to peaceful Kent Waters. Jane attends the school over there and awkwardly befriends the reject group of girls: Jane, Jayne and Polly Jane. That’s how Jane got the idea for P.L.A.I.N.

The three Janes only allowed Jane into the group after she suggested a seemingly brilliant idea that’ll somehow make their voices be heard. They were the rejects in high school and it was thrilling to leave eccentric messages for the people in an anonymous way. It’s as if they weren’t that invisible after all. Soon, they go on to leave their P.L.A.I.N. marks all around their neighbourhood. P.L.A.I.N. stands for People Loving Art In Neighbourhoods.

I don’t want to give away too much of the story now. There are only around 100+ pages of the story with great graphics and great storyline. I was simply hooked till the last page. The sequel to this book is Janes in Love! I’m definitely looking out for that.

A few graphic novel titles such as Re-Gifters, Clubbing and Good As Lily were advertised on the final pages of this book and they do seem fun to read. If you’ve read them before, please tell me all about it!

You can check out the preview for this book here.

Buy The Plain Janes (Minx)