Release Day - Friend is a Four Letter Word by Steph Campbell (Grounding Quinn Series #3)

This is the third book in the Grounding Quinn series (comprised of the awesome and totally not to be missed "Grounding Quinn," and its sequel, "Beautiful Things Never Last.") It is a standalone, spinoff companion novel to its sister books, and doesn't require you to have read them to fully access the story of FFLW (although in this humble blogger's opinion, you'd be crazy not to read those two beautiful books!)  

Head on over to Have Book Will Read for an EXCLUSIVE excerpt!

BLURB

Shayna Gillan is on a mission: start fresh in a new state without the small town gossip that has haunted her since her bad girl days of high school.

Carter MacPherson has long been the most together member of his crazy family--until now. With a secret threatening to crumble everything he's worked for, he wishes he could forget the recent past, too.

The last thing either Shayna or Carter are looking for is a relationship. It's best for everyone that they be left alone while they sort out their issues.  At least that's what they tell themselves - the truth is that maybe they're just too scared, skittish and full of self-doubt.

So, yeah, friends, right, that is absolutely, utterly all they can ever be.  Period.

But the best laid plans of mice and men ... don't allow for feelings, failings and friendship's limits. Once Shayna and Carter cross the Rubicon, leaving their ambiguous friendship behind, the die is cast ... and there can be no turning back.

The only question left is--whose past will catch up to them first?

Fred's Notes

I don't think it's any big secret that Grounding Quinn (and it's sequel, the lovely and poignantly titled "Beautiful Things Never Last") is one of my all-time, best book ever favorites.  It's such a delicate and subtle book that I feel kind of dumb being so cheerleady about it - it's like breaking out the pom-poms for an Emily Dickinson poem or something.  But it's hard to restrain my book-thusiasm about Quinn, and about Steph's gorgeous, spare but evocative style.  It's not just her characters, it's the subtle way she creates them.  It's not just her style, it's the emotional veracity and psychological depth of what she perceives and describes.  So, it's also probably no secret that I'm delighted, enthused and excited (I'm rah rah, who are you?) to return to Quinn-land, and understand more of what's happened, what is happening, and what might happen, between Quinn's brother Carter and her brittle bestie Shayna.  I'm going to save my major encomiums for my review, but let me simply say that fans of Steph's insightful, poetic and poignant world, will find pleasure and rich enjoyment here.  I urge you strongly to get your copy, either at Amazon, or by entering the Rafflecopter below, so graciously hosted by Kelly Moorhouse of Have Book Will Read! 

AUTHOR BIO

Steph Campbell grew up in Southern California, but now calls the Northeast home. She has one husband, four children and a serious nail polish obsession. She's repped by Kevan Lyon at Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.

Steph's works include Delicate, Grounding Quinn and Beautiful Things Never Last; My Heart for Yours and My Fate for Yours (with Jolene Perry); A Toast to the Good Times (with Liz Reinhardt) and the bestselling new adult LENGTHS series with Liz Reinhardt.



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Don't Panic, by Lindsay Paige

Lindsay Paige is the popular author of the "Bold as Love," series of contemporary young adult novels that I, for one, am extremely enthusiastic about. They combine sweet lyricism with gritty family and romantic drama. Now, in her most personal book yet, Lindsay is taking it to the next level with "Don't Panic," her new contemporary novel. "Don't Panic" is slated to appear on October 8, 2012 (my birthday, btw - coincidence? I think not!), and here's Lindsay's new blurb, to put you in the scene:

Samantha Branson is having severe anxiety attacks. Her heart beats unusually fast, her breath quickens and her hands sweat. Every detail screams in her head that she is the center of unwanted attention. Everyone can hear her thoughts, her heart and her breathing. The silence of the classroom is so loud that focus is impossible.
After an attack lands her in the wrong bathroom, Sam meets Eli who offers to provide help. Faced with the return of her possessive ex-boyfriend and the blossoming of a new romance, Sam must find the strength inside herself to face her anxieties head on.

Head on over to the Goodreads page for "Don't Panic," and add it to your tbr, asap, you won't want to miss this one, I promise!

Control Freak, by Copeland, a band I loved that sadly is no longer together, always gives me that same sense of creepy, clammy, claustrophobic anxiety. Check it out and let me know what you think!

Are You Going to Kiss Me Now? by Sloane Tanen

Are You Going to Kiss Me Now? by Sloane Tanen

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


As one of the characters remarks, this is sort of a mashup of Lord of the Flies and the National Enquirer (more like TMZ, I'd say, but whatev). It took me a little while to warm up to this one, mostly because the MC Francesca is kind of a pain in the butt. Also, boy, she has a lot of nicknames, not really confusing, just kind of wtf (it's cute that she notices it, too). But, I digress. Because irrespective of what name she's going by (Bam?), she pretty much stays a pain in the butt through the whole book, although through some clever inexplicable author magic, over the course of events she becomes an extremely endearing PITB that you can't help but feel for and fall in love with. Part of her charm is that she tells a great story, and the other characters come to life through her eyes as the story progresses. The "celebs" are a wacky bunch, each with their own issues and baggage, but they also have real personalities and hidden strengths and vulnerabilities, which become apparent as time on their desert island without rescue peels back the veneer of their carefully constructed personas. Part of the fun is identifying the various characters with their real life counterparts (gossip blogger Dicole Richie is the most obvious example, c'mon you are laughing now, that is funny, admit it!) Anyway, I did come to care about Francesca, who really came to life as the story moved along (and it is really a pretty good page turner, btw, I had to read part of it under my desk after I got to work yesterday!), and although this is not deeply wrenching emotional territory, I did find the denouement moving and tender, something I really wasn't planning on (good thing I was still under my desk, potentially embarassing moment alert). So, this is really a good read, I liked it a lot. I think one of the things I admire most about this is that is takes an idea that is almost a parlor game (one that Francesca and her friend play in the beginning, btw), and makes it fresh, funny, real feeling and a great break from reality. Re-reading that sentence makes me wonder if I've mentioned enough how funny this book is, it's not just a study in Franny's emotional growth. It's clever, witty and smart. In fact it's so good that I put it on my immediate re-reads shelf, and I'm doing that now. So, to sum up, this is a lovely confection, albeit with some substance to it, but still a spun sugar castle that can't bear the weight of too many heavy feet tromping through it. So put on your slippers and enter, don't worry, there's enough acerbic, ironic j'ne sais quois to avoid any diabetes issues, and you will definitely enjoy the trip!



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Love Story, by Jennifer Echols

Love Story by Jennifer Echols

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I'm going to start rereading this again tonight on my way home, because a) it's worth it, there's lots to sink your teeth into, and it's a great story; and b), as usual, in my what happens next frenzy, I feel like I missed enjoying a lot of the subtleties, the foreshadowing and the imagery that I saw from the corner of my eye as I zoomed by on my plot driven rampage. One of the many things I like about Jennifer Echols' more serious books (although I love those Simon Pulse romcoms, too!) is that there is a depth to her stories that makes them worth reading thoughtfully, carefully, deeply, in a way that I remember from college. Why is this image used here, what does the setting tell us about the characters and their story, that kind of thing. I'm no literary critic or even an astute student, but I am a good reader who likes to think about those kind of things, like the bridge in Going Too Far, that was such a crucial plot point as well as a symbol for the characters' feelings and their relationship. So, in this book, I thought the choice of a horse farm was really brilliant, and the horses themselves (in the abstract, it's not like Walter Farley or something, and most of the book is set in NYC) were such an important part of understanding Erin and Hunter. For Erin, horses seemed to represent something she both loved and mistrusted, both the powerful unconstrained feeling of freedom to run/live untrammeled, and also the confined, closeted feeling of being shoved into a starting gate by forces and authority beyond her control. *SPOILER (SORT OF) ALERT* The circumstances of her mother's death also created a huge fear and bad association issue with horses, tempered by the rational realization that it wasn't the horse's fault. But the idea that "that's just the way they are," doesn't make them less scary, really now, does it? *OK NOW. For Hunter (and that's a kind of horse, right?), horses seemed to represent not so much freedom, but rather more constraint, since they were the means by which he became a social inferior, and also a source of constant work which he never really seemed to enjoy. I haven't exactly figured out why, on the first day of class, his "horse drawing," doesn't include an actual horse, but rather a cluster of images of tack associated with a horse, but I think this was a big clue to his ambivalence (at best) about them, and what they represented to him. It's cool to contrast that with Erin's drawing, which also tries to represent not so much an actual horse as the feeling of freedom in motion. So Erin's relationship to Hunter seemed to share some of the characteristics of her feelings about horses: conflicted, scared, yearning, tender, full of memories good and awful, and most of all, mistrustful of something that could be so beautiful yet leave such pain and sense of loss in its wake. I enjoyed the way this was written, too, with Erin and Hunter's class assignments interspersed. They were fun to read, they added variety to the tone in a fun and sometimes mysterious way, they moved the story forward, and provided lots of insight and backstory in a clever and interesting way without being all expository. So all in all, a rich reading experience with lots of emotion, expressed through many different levels of story, image, character and wonderfully chosen words. So yup, definitely worth rereading!



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Good Girls, by Laura Ruby

Good Girls by Laura Ruby

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I guess it's kind of a theme in YA books that a super smart, high achieving girl who has an intense need for control might sometimes fall for a guy who is either out of her league, or moves in a different social circle (he's a player, The Duff, he's a jock, Not That Kind of Girl, he's too old and taking advantage of her, Story of a Girl also the Duff, or a stoner, At the Party). They have a "relationship" that mostly consists of secret hook-ups, in order to assuage her anxiety about various issues revolving around parents, school, or self-esteem. The reason this works for her is because when they are kissing (or whatev) she is so caught up that she escapes her overthinking, overanalyzing mind for a while, and just feels the moment. Far be it from me to question whether this works in real life (or happens), because there must be something elemental and powerful about this idea in order for it to be so prevalent and popular.



So, obvs, this book is in that genre, and it's a good one. The MC is more mixed up than troubled, and seems to just find it unbelievable that the boy could actually like her beyond wanting to hook up, so she breaks off the limited, secretive relationship they do have, without explanation, without thinking about him or his feelings (or that boys even have such things!). So when that sexy times photo someone surreptiously snapped of the two of them makes the rounds at school, it's maybe even more humiliating, more overwhelming than might otherwise be the case, although, it's hard to imagine how it could be moreso, honestly. I found Audrey likeable, believable, and possessed of a quirky, fresh and appealing voice and point of view. The whole issue with her Dad, and how the picture impacts their relationship was maybe the most affecting part of the book for me (cause I'm a Dad maybe?), and the resolution of that element is one of the more touching parts (again, maybe just me). This was the part that was the most like Story of Girl, another great book, btw, if you haven't read it. How Audrey deals with the aftermath of the overexposure, and becomes a more open, forgiving, understanding and less crazy person, makes for a good story, with good supporting characters and, for a change, fairly believable parents.



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Not That Kind Of Girl, by Siobhan Vivian

Not That Kind Of Girl by Siobhan Vivian

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


It's almost always the case that how much I like a book depends on how much I like the MC, and Natalie Sterling is pretty hard to like. She definitely has a major stick up her butt, no question about it. She might even be proud to have you make note of that, in a smug, NPR know it all-ish sort of way, while pretending to be offended. So, it really takes some good writing to portray her in a way that makes her likeable, without lots of interior monologue or other heavy handed devices demonstrating that she's not really like that, or she's like that, but here's why. But her loyalty to her friends (even if misguided), her determination (even if it's based on unrealistic self demands), her vulnerability, and ultimately her bravery, eventually (it didn't really take that long, either) made her extremely appealing to me. And when she inevitably just can't carry the weight of the world anymore, her epiphany and how she deals with things falling apart for her was quite affecting for me. Siobhan Vivian made me care about Natalie, even when I didn't especially like her, and make me feel protective of her, too, even when she was dead set on a foolish course of action with a preordained bad end. The supporting characters were great, too. Autumn, Natalie's bff since before forever, and Spencer, the wenchy freshman Natalie used to babysit, are well drawn and move both the plot, and Natalie's growth, forward. Connor, the boy, isn't really a bad boy, even though Natalie seems to think so, and her inability to accept that is just one more irritating thing about her. I would even put him on a list of top YA bf's, he's certainly patient, forgiving and mature for a super hunkster. So, this is a bit more of a reaction than a review, and just to sum it up, I really enjoyed this, and was touched and satisfied when it ended.



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