Review: Wonder

Title: Wonder
Author: R.J. Palacio
Format: Paperback
Pages: 315
Date(s) Read: November 20-23, 2015
Rating: 4

Summary: 
August Pullman is not your ordinary ten-year-old.  Ordinary kids don't make other ordinary kids run from them on the playground.  Auggie was born with a terrible facial defect.  He's been homeschooled for his whole life, and for the first time he is being sent to a real school.  He wants to be accepted, but will he be? 

Review: 

Wonder is one of those books that will resonate with anyone that reads it.  Anyone who has been bullied while growing up, or is currently still being bullied.  This is a coming of age story, and ultimately it is something that all of us fight with.  Accepting who you are, accepting what you are and being proud of that - no matter what.  No matter your looks, no matter your clothes, no matter your family.  Be proud of who you are and who your family is.  

This book teaches us that, you really shouldn't judge people by initial impressions and appearances.  You have no idea the fights that they fight, the troubles they are dealing with or what truly lies within their hearts.  This book reminds us to strive to be less judgemental.  

Augustus is by far one of my favorite characters, and while the end was a touch neat and shiny for my tastes....I would still highly recommend this book to anyone and everyone.  

This isn't a book with an action packed plot, this isn't a book with a plot that is super exciting.  It doesn't need to be, and doesn't need any major plot twists or turns to make it anymore interesting than it already is.  Some of it was transparent, and I could guess which way things were going to go, but I honestly don't really care.  The writing makes it easy to imagine the world, to make it feel all the more real and you could actually picture the family as a real family you'd want to be a part of. 

What's On My Kindle? Pass The Tissues Please

Welcome to the tenth installment of What's On My Kindle?

What exactly is What's On My Kindle?  This is my own little thing that I am going to be getting out every Sunday.  Within this post I'll list a few of the books that are currently on my TBR list on my Kindle.  Some are freebies (or were when I bought them), and others I paid for with gift cards, or had a few spare bucks to spend on a book.

All of them, I fully intend on getting to, at some point (and taking a massive chisel to my to-read list and hopefully hack it down to under 1000, again).

There are books that tend to make us cry, it can be anything from a stirring romantic scene to the death of a favorite character (DO NOT GET ME STARTED ON SONG OF FIRE AND ICE).   One of my favorite authors for books that are constant tear-jerkers is John Greene.  I've also been known to cry during other books, and I will list some of my favorite go to tear-jerkers and those books that have potential on my TBR pile on my Kindle, to make me cry.  All blurbs and images are taken from the book's page on Goodreads.

Paper Towns by John Green - This book is most usually classified as Young Adult, Teen Romance, Mystery, and even Realistic Fiction.  It is currently on my TBR pile, because it is not one that I've gotten to yet, but it will definitely be completed by the end of the year, because I can't go more than a few months without getting a John Green fix.

Quentin Jacobsen has spent a lifetime loving the magnificently adventurous Margo Roth Spiegelman from afar. So when she cracks open a window and climbs back into his life—dressed like a ninja and summoning him for an ingenious campaign of revenge—he follows.
After their all-nighter ends and a new day breaks, Q arrives at school to discover that Margo, always an enigma, has now become a mystery. But Q soon learns that there are clues—and they’re for him. Urged down a disconnected path, the closer he gets, the less Q sees of the girl he thought he knew.

Looking for Alaska by John Green - This book is a difinative coming of age book, written by John Green, and you may or may not need the tissues or this one, but it strikes all of us to the core at some point through out the story.  Life for Miles Halter, when he begin attending a boarding school becomes something completely different than what it had been, one continuous nonevent.  I've read this one and I continually go back to it, because it is by far one of my favorites.

Before. Miles "Pudge" Halter's whole existence has been one big nonevent, and his obsession with famous last words has only made him crave the "Great Perhaps" (François Rabelais, poet) even more. Then he heads off to the sometimes crazy, possibly unstable, and anything-but-boring world of Culver Creek Boarding School, and his life becomes the opposite of safe. Because down the hall is Alaska Young. The gorgeous, clever, funny, sexy, self-destructive, screwed-up, and utterly fascinating Alaska Young, who is an event unto herself. She pulls Pudge into her world, launches him into the Great Perhaps, and steals his heart.
After. Nothing is ever the same.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green - This book will make you cry.  You will need the box of tissues to get through this one.  It is by far one of my favorites, by far one of the books that I will always turn to when I need the cleansing of a good cry from a book. My review can be found here at the original incarnation of my review blog.

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.

Review: The Earth, My Butt and Other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler

Title: The Earth, My Butt and Other Big Round Things

Author: Carolyn Mackler

Format: E-book (Kindle Edition)

Read: July 15-17

Rating: 5/5

Recommend: OMG Yes!

Summary: Virginia Shreves is fifteen. She is larger-than-average, and has the plus-size inferiority complex to go with. Her best friend has moved to Walla Walla, Washington (as far from NYC as you can get) and she's just gotten to second base with Froggy Welsh the Fourth (yeah, that's his real name). There are moments of light-heartedness, and moments of seriousness that will take your breath away.

Review: This book has appeared numerous times on the American Library Association's banned/challenged book list for a variety of reasons, most of which are 'unsuitable to age group,' however that is a load of crap.

Find me one teenage girl who is the 'fat girl' and tell me she doesn't have self-esteem issues. I know, I was that teenage girl. I was the 'fat girl,' 'the nerd,' and pretty much anything else you could call me. No, my life was not as tragic as Virginia's is, but I still dealt with my fair share of weight bashing from my peers, I had the places that I could 'hide' when I didn't want to be seen, that sort of thing. It took me ages to finally accept myself, accept who I was, and learn what -I- had to do to change things.

After Virginia's brother, Byron, falls from grace and comes home from Columbia for a semester. Things are tense and at the most a failed attempt to be 'picture perfect' in the Shreves household. A trip to Seattle and other life changing events continue to open up Virginia's eyes until she is completely (or as close to completely) at ease with herself. There is a happy ending, and purple hair, and an eyebrown piercing, and even a forbidden public display of affection (that goes against the Fat Girl Code of Conduct!).

All in all, this is a very well written story of every overweight teenage girl who strives to 'fit in' in high school and fill a role that was originally carved out by their older siblings in a picture-perfect family.

I recommend this to anyone who has ever had self-esteem issues for weight, or whatever other reason, and ultimately needed to learn to be true to themselves no matter what others may think of them.