This is the story of a 10 year old boy with a facial abnormality who enters school for the first time. The writing style is very simple, which I liked because it's told from a child's perspective (for the most part), so that makes sense. What I didn't like was how neatly this tied together at the end. Kids are cruel, and I think life would have been much more difficult for this little boy than it was in this book (not to say things weren't difficult for him). That being said, this is a book written for young adults, and tying things together and not dwelling on how mean spirited children can be to each other probably isn't a bad thing for this audience. I feel bad giving it only three stars when I acknowledge that I am decidedly not the intended audience, a fact I didn't realize until after I had started reading. I would recommend this for friends looking for a good book for a middle school aged child, as I think it explores a lot of important themes and could be a good discussion piece for parents to engage their children about how to treat people and about bullying.
This was a bit of a disappointment after Divergent and caused me to lose some steam for this series.
This is a remarkable, captivating story of survival, endurance, and love. I previously wrote about what a feisty and endearing protagonist Lily Casey Smith of Half Broke Horses was, but Sarah Prine is a true rival, and let's face it, an even BETTER female protagonist. I confess I was a little put off by the title of this book and thought the voice was going to be really off putting, but that wasn't the case at all. Sarah has a thirst for learning, and as she becomes increasingly educated, her grammar improves, which I thought was a nice detail.
I am not a huge fan of western movies (though I admittedly LOVE Larry McMurtry), but pioneer stories are part of my DNA, so it turns out that despite my initial misgivings, this book was totally up my alley. Since I was about seven I have been making up stories in my head before falling asleep at night. It helps clear my mind and usually helps me drift off fairly quickly. It's like reading a favorite book with the lights out. At age seven until probably 12 or so, it was a pioneer story. I've always found this habit a little embarrassing, and it was YEARS before I one day told my mom about it. Well, it turned out that when she was a child (she outgrew the habit unlike me) she did the same thing, and she also made up pioneer stories. See, DNA?
32. The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty ☆☆☆
I can't quite figure out if Moriarty is a chick lit or mystery/suspense writer.... I don't quite think her books fit into either category. This is the story of a woman who finds a letter from her husband that is addressed to her with instructions to open in the event of his death. He's not dead but is acting odd, so in a moment of weakness, she opens it and learns his deepest, darkest secret. Nice premise. Good book. Nothing mind blowing, just good. I wonder what my husband isn't telling me.... Hopefully nothing like this!
31. Allegiant by Veronica Roth ☆
What happened Veronica Roth??? This book was just a hot mess. After starting off so strong, how did she end here? The writing is crappy. The chapters are supposed to alternate perspectives between the two main characters, but there is no discernible difference in the voices. The plot kind of unravels, and then she does something with the story that really just pissed everyone I know who read this book off. After all of the anticipation after reading the first book, I didn't even go see the first movie in this series when it came out. I just couldn't be bothered. Kind of like how Roth and her editor couldn't be bothered to spend another month or two on this book before churning it out to capitalize on the series' popularity and make some money. Boo.
I know this book has been very polarizing, but I loved it. This is a coming of age story about a young boy, Theo, whose mother is killed in a terrorist bombing at a museum. Theo survives the bombing and walks away from the wreckage almost absentmindedly with a small but valuable painting. With his mother's death, he is left with nowhere to go and no clear first choice caretaker. In the following years, Theo is passed from one temporary guardian to the next all the while harboring intense feelings of guilt about his mother's death, clinging to her memory and to this painting, The Goldfinch, which is his one last piece of her. The best part? I've mentioned my love of good character development before, and Tart is an absolute master. There is no possible way I could pick a favorite character -Hobie (the Lower East Side antiques collector who lost his partner in the bombing), the protagonist Theo, Theo's ne'er-do-well gambling addict father and his trashy Las Vegas girlfriend, the snooty and socially elite Park Avenue family he briefly lives with.... They. are. all. so. good. I understand that some readers may find this book much too slow and a bit too long. Because the novel is slow, and it is long, and frankly, not that much happens. But I didn't mind one bit because of the characters. I wanted more of them even if they were doing something relatively mundane. If you are a character junky like me, read this. If you need a quick paced plot and a lot of action, you will probably be in the camp that just doesn't get what the buzz is about. 29. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline ☆☆☆
Desperately seeking all 80s enthusiasts! This book is sheer fun and is apparently being made into a movie, which I will definitely see, and which my husband will probably see 500 times with his brother because it's about everything from our childhood, classic video games, and a guy who is a total video game dork. It's also set in the future and a little science fictiony in a way that will appear to any computer enthusiasts. In other words, there was absolutely nothing about this book (aside from the 80s pop culture references) that should have appealed to me. I still thought it was enormously fun, and I zipped through this. 28. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd ☆☆☆☆
This novel is told by two different narrators. The first is Sarah Grimke, a member of the Charleston elite, and the second is her housemaid slave, Hetty. The story begins on Sarah's eleventh birthday when she receives Hetty as a birthday present from her mother, and it tracks the two women into their adulthood. From a young age Sarah recognizes the inherent wrongs associated with owning slaves, but she is constrained by her age, her class, and her sex from doing anything about it. She secretly teaches Hetty to read, and the two develop a close friendship over the years. As they enter adulthood, their paths diverge, and they both encounter heartache, disappointment, and societal barriers. Kidd explores the two women's very different quests for freedom, one searching for the most fundamental physical freedom and the other for freedom of the mind. The juxtaposition is perfectly done.
Shortly after reading this, my book club heard Kidd speak at SMU (I love my book club), and that was when I learned that Sarah Grimke was a real person, which honestly just made me appreciate this book a little bit more. Sarah and her younger sister, Angelina, were early leaders in the abolitionist and women's rights movements. Kidd was inspired by their story, and she built a story around them, inventing two other powerful female characters, Hetty and her mother Charlotte, to flesh out their remarkable story.
27. The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion ☆☆☆
This is the story of Don Tillman. Don is a genetics professor and has an undiagnosed (and what seems like a fairly severe) case of Aspergers. Don embarks on The Wife Project with plans to use a very scientific method of finding the perfect partner. Enter Rosie who is everything Don is NOT looking for but who is on her own mission (The Father Project) to find her biological father. Who better to help her in this quest than geneticist Don? The result is an unorthodox love story. It made for a quirky, fun read, but at times I had the sense that I was laughing at someone behind their back and worse yet, the person I was laughing at had Aspergers and didn't know it. That was a little unsettling. That being said, this book has a 4.02 rating on Goodreads, so maybe it was just me. 26. Beneath a Marble Sky by John Shors ☆☆☆
I loved this book. I initially gave it four stars. It's the story of the Taj Mahal, a monument one emperor built in memory of his beloved wife, but which was designed by a young architect who falls in love and has a secret affair with the emperor's daughter. It's also a story of betrayal, as the emperor's sons feud for their place as leader. It's historically rich and a wonderful love story. OK, so why did I give this three stars here? None of it is true, and that just really irked me. Don't get me wrong, I didn't expect the part about the architect and the princess to be true, but there were just so many MINOR historical inaccuracies that I discovered on wikipedia when I finished reading this. Would it really have been so hard to remain a little true to history without jeopardizing the story, and if not, then the author should have just made the entire story fiction. This is my own personal issue, so if you are in the market for a good story and don't care a lick whether it's historically accurate, then I recommend this book to you. 
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