Mockingjay, a review by Jacob

Title:  Mockingjay
Author:  Suzanne Collins
Format:  Hardcover
Price: $17.99

The Hunger Games are over.  That should be a good thing, right?  Not for Katniss Everdeen.  As the Mockingjay, she joins the rebellion against the corrupt Capitol.  But, it will not be an easy flight.  She must draw the attention of the other districts to also act up against the Capitol, and kill President Snow.

Katniss is no longer the simple huntress she was.  She is hardened by too much blood and warfare in too little time.  After an attack from the Capitol that destroys Katniss' old life, she has even more personal motivation to take them down.

The theme of the book seems to me to be that things are always changing, and not always in the way you'd like them to.  Everything good comes to an end.  But in the same way, everything bad does, too.

I think that this book was overall pretty strong.  Some people don't like it as much since the Hunger Games are over, but I honestly like it more because they are over.  I really liked getting to know more about the society of Panem, and I enjoyed reading about the rebellion.  But, there are some things that I think could've gone better.  The main weak point to me seemed to be the ending.  The ending was way too sudden, and it didn't really satisfy me.  Other points were a little too sudden, but the ending really hit hard.  It was the "correct" ending to me -- everything went the way I was hoping -- but it was summed up in the last two or three pages.  The other endings of the books were good enough; they left a cliff-hanger, suspense, but this book was supposed to be the conclusion, and it just didn't seem right to me. 

Overall, I think the book deserves a well-earned 3.8 out of 5 chocolate bars.

The book's cover was, uh, pretty.  It was nice to see an actual(ish) Mockinjay.

This book, like the other Hunger Games books, has extreme violence, so be wary.

A Gift of Magic, a review by Stephanie

Title: A Gift of Magic
Author: Lois Duncan
Format: Paperback
Price: unknown

"Her voice was fading and she named the gift very softly, but her daughter, who loved her greatly, did not hear."  This is how it started, three children with gifts.  One of which, named Nancy.  Nancy  was a smart girl with the gift of magic.  Her older sister Kirby had the gift of dance, while her little brother Brenden had the gift of music.  These three kids are children of a woman named Elizabeth, and the story starts with the family moving.  The last move.  Elizabeth and her husband finally decided to go their separate ways, and Elizabeth and the kids settled down in Florida.

Now the kids find their way in life, whether it's Kirby finding a dance studio, or Brenden trying to stay out of trouble with his new friend Greg, or even the fact that Nancy is just figuring out her ability, her gift of magic.

A Gift of Magic was a very quick and good book to read that wasn't full of action at all times, but kept me engaged all the same.  I do wish they would have added more about Nancy's gift and Brenden's gift, too.  But the prologue was suspenseful, and the epilogue was very informative.  At the end of the book, if the epilogue wasn't there, I would be very confused on how they could just end the book there.

But as for the cover, I absolutely loved it!!!!  It was simple, and the way it pictured Nancy's gift was spot on.  It showed how much Nancy can see through her thoughts.  I thought it was very cool.

As for appropriateness, it was a completely and utterly appropriate book for all ages.

Goy Crazy, a review by Michy

Title:  Goy Crazy

Author: Melissa Schorr

Format:

Price:

Anywho, I read a book called Goy Crazy, by Melissa Schorr. And yes, it really is called Goy Crazy. I found it to be a very strange book, especially since I’m not religious… But I’m fairly certain a “goy” is a Christian boy… Anyway… This is the story of Rachel Lowenstein. She’s a Jewish fifteen-year-old girl who’s never really had a serious boyfriend, and is yearning for some action in the love department. And her parents are kind of religious… obsessed. Kind of. 

At her brother’s bar mitzvah, she meets Luke. Anywho, she falls for him. This is bad, very bad, seeing as he’s Christian. Bad news for Rachel. So, on the only occasion that the Lowenstein family goes to service, she asks a friend, named Leah, for some guidance. Leah asks if her parents would let her date him because he’s Christian. Which brings up more questions. Then at school, she plays dumb in geometry, her friend goes on a crazy no-meat diet, and she hates gym-class. So, after fast, Rachel and Leah decide to go stalk Luke until they can eat, and Luke ignores her. So she makes up some New Year’s resolutions: Get Luke, Flirt madly with some popular guys, wash her face with Proactive, stop biting her nails, get to geometry on time, stop letting her parents rule her life, and break the teen commandments. Simple. You would think so, but the adventures Rachel has may prove otherwise.

Character Analysis: Rachel Lowenstein: Typical fifteen year old girl, well, woman, with acne and no confidence, in my opinion. She has her father’s hair, “kinky, black,” and apparently really high metabolism. She is really nervous, and, well, a “stereo-typical” girl, nervous about guy issues, why she doesn’t have a boyfriend, etc, ect, ect. Then she starts to “not understand” geometry, and she starts getting attention from the guys in her class. And all this is after she meets her future boyfriend, Luke. She’s Jewish, and her family isn’t very religious, they almost never go to service, but her brother is “interested” in their culture (meaning he wants more video games), so her parents always are so thrilled that their culture will be passed on. By the end of the book, she grows up a lot, I think, because she takes control of a bad situation and uses her knowledge to solve the problem. Her major motivation is to get a boyfriend, namely, Luke. This drives her throughout the book to defy her parents, and she wouldn’t (most likely) have the nerve to use her quick thinking to solve the big issue at the end of the book.

Theme: I think that the theme is that you almost always fall for the people who could potentially hurt you the most, and that the people you fall for are, most of the time, the people who will hurt you the most. Oh, and don’t lie to your parents, because in most cases, they find out anyway.

Strengths, weaknesses, favorite parts of the book: Some strengths were that it was at times humorous, or fairly serious, and the mood kept changing. This was also one of the weaknesses. It could be very hard to follow at times, and was especially confusing for me not being Jewish. I didn’t really have a favorite part of the book, but I enjoyed it as a whole.

Ending thoughts: It was an interesting book, I thought, and I really liked the ending. I didn’t really like Luke much, so I wasn’t bummed about what happens with him. I was glad that Rachel starting thinking about Howard, I liked Howard, I thought that he was an interesting character and hard to figure out. 

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 chocolate bars (swearing)

Appropriate Rating: Vampire, again, swearing.

Cover Thoughts: I really don’t think the cover shows the theme of the book, or what the book is about. It shows Rachel “looking” over at Luke, which is strange because they don’t even go to the same school…

This Lullaby, a review by Lauren

Title:  This Lullaby 
Author:  Sarah Dessen
Format: paperback
Price: $7.99

Remy Starr is an 18-year-old girl who is excited to go off to college in the fall.  Before she does that, she has a big summer in front of her.  She has to plan her mother, Barbara's wedding...her fifth wedding...to car salesman Don.  So while Barbara writes her latest romance novel, Remy works out the nuts and bolts of the wedding and consequently meets Dexter, a messy musician that is a singer in the band that will be playing at Barbara's wedding.  From the moment they meet, Dexter is 100% sure that they are meant to be together.  Remy, however, is much more hesitant.  Her mom's experiences with her different husbands and boyfriends has left Remy with a belief that there really isn't such a thing as true love.  Dexter sets out to soften Remy out...Will he succeed?  Read to find out!

Remy:  the protagonist of the novel, a calm, cynical neat freak.  She is more of a mother to her mom than her mother is to her.  After witnessing her mother's four failed marriages, Remy declares that she no longer believes in love.  Remy never gets too close to her boyfriends; she likes to "keep them at arm's length," so that she constantly has the upper hand.

Remy's motivations throughout the book change a fair amount.  First, Remy hopes to pull off her mother's wedding successfully, and more importantly, not to end up like her mom.  Her other motivation towards the beginning of the book is to make it to college in the fall.  After meeting Dexter, her motivations are basically to not get too attached because she knows she will end up losing him at the end of the summer.  If I told you what her motivations are at the end of the book, I may spoil something.  We don't want that, now do we? :)

Remy starts out as this tough, cold girl.  Then she meets Dexter, and everything changes.  He slowly but surely opens her up a bit.  It was really interesting to watch Remy's character change throughout the novel.

The theme of this book would be hope.  Hope for change, for courage to start again, and just hope as a whole.  To me, the theme really goes hand-in-hand with the growth of Remy's character.  Remy has a lot of hopes throughout the book, although she hides them below a frigid exterior.  I thought this book taught a good lesson simply by encouraging hope.

Sarah Dessen does an absolutely wonderful job with her characters in this book.  Each character was described in vivid detail, and by the end of the book, I could have sworn I knew them in real life.  I also liked the way she developed and changed Remy throughout the book.  All in all, I thought the writing was great, and I was resistant to put it down as I was reading.

The only real weakness I could find in this book was the lack of build-up and foreshadowing.  It was a pretty unpredictable book, which I liked, but there could have been more suspense built up by the author before some of the big events in the book.

As much as I adore this book, I did find the ending a little unsatisfying.  It may just be that I don't care too much for open endings...Oops, that was a bit of a spoiler.  However, I think the ending did fit in with the book and I thought it worked for the book as well as the genre.  I have and most likely will read more books by Sarah Dessen.

Rating:  4.999999 chocolate bars
Cover Thoughts:  I liked the cover, but I didn't really understand what it had to do with the story.
Appropriateness:  mild sexual references and medium language

Thirteen Reasons Why, a review by Karen

Title:  Thirteen Reasons Why
Author: Jay Asher
Format: paperback
Price: $10.99

This book is about Clay Jensen.  In the beginning of the book, he received a shoe box full of cassette tapes.  The tapes were made by Hannah Baker, who had recently committed suicide.  On the tapes, Hannah instructed 13 people, who the tapes are being sent to, to listen to the tapes because they, or their actions, are one of the reasons why she killed herself.  If they don't listen to the tapes, a second copy of the tapes will be released to everyone.  As Clay listens to the tapes, he discovers the truth.

Clay is an average high school student with a good reputation.  His appearance doesn't really matter in the story, so it isn't mentioned.  Before Clay gets the tapes, all he wants to do is survive high school.  After he gets the tapes, he has a better understanding of people.  The tapes change Clay, and by doing that, change his whole life.  Through the changing of his life, he changes others' lives, too.

The author, Jay Asher, says the message of the book is, "Even though Hannah admits the decision to take her life was entirely her own, it's important to be aware of how we treat others...it's impossible to know everything...going on in [a] person's life, an how we might be adding to his/her pain." 

One strength of Thirteen Reasons Why is the connection to readers.  It is extremely realistic because it is partially based on the story of a relative of the author.  The only weakness I could find was that it was sometimes a little hard to follow because the point of view changes often.  I can't pick a favorite part because everything left such a big impact on me.  The writing was easy to understand and had a clear plot structure.  Thirteen Reasons Why pulled me in right from the beginning.  Then I couldn't put it down.  It was extremely entertaining.

The end of the book was very satisfying.  It was exactly how I would end the book.  It wasn't cheesy or depressing.  It was perfectly balanced.  I would definitely read another book by Jay Asher because I like his writing style.  Thirteen Reasons Why worked very well for realistic fiction.

5 out of 5 chocolate bars

The cover I have is of a girl (Hannah) on a swing.  It is in black and white.  The swing works well because an important event for her happened in a park.  The black and white stood out to me because it seemed like the author was saying that some people see the world in black and white.  That means an event like Hannah's suicide would just be "Hannah's Suicide" and there would be nothing else to do with it.  The title is TH1RTEEN R3ASONS WHY which has the number 1 and 3 in red.  I think the red stands for anger but possibly love.

Thirteen Reasons Why  has some offensive language and a small amount of sexual content.

One last note: I encourage everyone to read this book.  I would read it again and again because it had so much of an impact on me.

Mockingjay, a review by Jude

Title:  Mockingjay

Author: Suzanne Collins

Format: Hardcover

Price: $17.99

Plot

The final book of The Hunger Games trilogy takes place in the same post-apocalyptic North American nation of Panem, which is now experiencing a fully-fledged revolution.  After being rescued from the Quarter Quell along with several other tributes, Katniss Everdeen becomes “The Mockingjay,” a symbol of the revolutionary movement. Throughout the book, Katniss seeks to be more involved in the rebel cause, and is used to film inspirational “Propos” to further motivate the rebels. After continued success of the rebels to gain control of the districts, Katniss is enlisted into a special group of people including Gale Hawthorne, Finnick Odair, and certain soldiers from among the general rebel army. This team ends up in the capitol, racing towards President Snow’s mansion to finally put an end to the war. Intense fighting takes place throughout the majority of the journey to the mansion, which results in the deaths of most of the group. In the end, chaos ensues, Katniss suffers a great loss, Snow is captured, but Katniss makes a sudden choice that leaves everything in confusion. In the end, she returns to what’s left of District 12 and settles there for the remainder of her life.

Character Analysis

Katniss has changed immensely since she started out as a simple 16 year old girl living in a poor district in Panem. After living through two Hunger Games and being the face of the revolutionary movement, she has suffered unimaginable loss.  She blames herself for the thousands of deaths caused by the war, and at times becomes self-destructive. She gets caught in an odd love triangle, and is heavily motivated by protecting Peeta and Gale, as well as her family and friends. In the end, she has matured greatly, perhaps too much for a girl her age, and she must live with ever-haunting memories of tragedy and violence.

Theme

To me, this book relayed messages pertaining to the realities of war, as well as revolutionary movements. Collins portrayed the brutal violence of the story somewhat bluntly, not trying to lighten the realities of the intense violence. I also found the corruption on both sides of the war a major part of the book’s theme. As President Snow’s regime was obviously harsh and oppressive, President Coin of district 13 didn’t have the best of methods or ways of gaining power, and showed some obvious corruption. Even though you overthrow the oppressive regime, if you’re not careful, the new order may turn out bad as well, causing only more problems.

My Opinion

Overall, I thought the book was all right. I did, however, find it disappointing in comparison to the previous two books, which I think are phenomenal.  The biggest thing about this book that I don’t like in relation to the previous two is how different the feel is. The first two were all about independent survival, and needing to use cunning and stealth to survive in an arena full of murderous teenagers. This one felt too militaristic and political to complement and give a good ending to the series. I did enjoy the portion of the book leading up to the climax, but the climax itself and the ending were both disappointing. Everything happened too abruptly, and everything seemed rushed without much real thought going into it. Not only did it end too abruptly, but I hate what actually happens in the end.  I would definitely read other books by Suzanne Collins, but in this book it seems as if she was trying too hard to make it an epic and crazy ending, and ended up with a mediocre to poor conclusion to an amazing series.

3 out of 5 chocolate bars.

I enjoyed the cover, as it correlates to the feel of the book as well as the theme of the entire series.

The only questionable material Mockingjay involves is, at times, intense violence.

Tuesdays with Morrie, a review by Solveig

Title: Tuesdays with Morrie
Author:  Mitch Albom
Format: Hardcover
Price:  $15.59

Basically, Tuesdays with Morrie is about a man named Mitch who rediscovers his old college professor, Morrie Schwartz, when Morrie is diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease, and is interviewed by Ted Koppel.

The story is about Morrie holding one last class, with one student.  They meet every Tuesday because they are "Tuesday People."  Mitch brings in a list of topics he wants to discuss, such as family, life, death, etc., as Morrie slowly dies. 

The two main characters are Mitch and Morrie, and Mitch is just a rich sports reporter who is trying to get through life.  He grows from a cold businessman to a loving person.  Morrie is a dying old man who is loved by everybody and also loves everybody in return.  Morrie just wants to live the last bit of his life as best he can. 

This book was extremely strong in the "teaching" aspect.  There were a lot of life lessons in there.  I thin its biggest weakness was that whenever Mitch spook, his quotations didn't have quote marks, which really bothered me.  The book was never slow, and there wasn't too much description, which helped the story move along.

The ending of the book had some really good closure, with everything really resolving itself.  I don't know if I would like other books by Mitch Albom, I think the character of Morrie Schwartz really holds it together. 

I would rate Tuesdays with Morrie 4.75 chocolate bars out of 5.

The book's cover was just beige with the author, title, and some quotes on the top in red.  I thought it was classy and simple, like the story.

The book was mostly appropriate--there was a little use of the "a-word."

Hunted, a review by Miranda

Title: Hunted
Authors: P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast
Format: I read Hunted as an ebook on my nook.
Price:  $8.99

Summary:  Zoey and red fledglings are fighting Neferet and Kalona. They stay underground while the raven mockers run rampant throughout the streets and House of Night (for vampyre fledglings.) Zoey is injured and must go back to the House of Night in order to survive. She finds out that Neferet wants her to leave her goddess, Nyx, for the fallen angel, Kalona.
 

Characters

Zoey: a young fledgling priestess who has affinities for all five of the elements: wind, water, fire, air, and spirit. She is fighting for her life as well for her friends lives while she stays faithful to her goddess Nyx. She has a very confusing love life as she struggles between her vampyre, human, and red fledgling lovers.
Aphrodite: a previous fledging who becomes human after saving red vampyre, Stevie Rae.
Stevie Rae: First red vampyre who is Zoey’s best friend.
Erik: Zoeys vampyre boyfriend
Heath: Zoey’s human boyfriend
Neferet: Vampyre priestess who is under the rule of Kalona.
Kalona: Fallen angel who has been trapped underground for many years after being trapped by native women. He is the father of the raven mockers.
Stark: red fledgling who has a special power and Zoey has feelings for him.

Theme: The theme to me seems to be that you need to stay true to yourself and faithful to those around you. Also to choose good over evil and protect what’s important to you.

Strengths: it has a great pace, it’s action-packed, it gets you hooked immediately, and it was very suspenseful!
Weakness: has a little too much sexual content and is confusing at parts.
My favorite part is when Zoey uses the elements to attack Kalona after he hurts Darius. It’s very descriptive, and I can see what is happening in my head!

Ending: is very catchy and hooks me to read the next book.

Rating: I’d rate it 3.5 out of 5 chocolate bars.

Cover Thoughts: I always enjoy the book covers because they have the cool tattoos all over them and they have an eerie picture of someone from the book.

Appropriateness:
language--there is occasional swearing but that is most because of the character speaking. Zoey tries to censor her language while Aphrodite does not hold back.
violence--it is very action packed to the point of getting over-the-top gory.
sexual content--There is a fair amount of sexual content but I think that it is enough to handle for most young adults.
Maturity--I think that it is not for most middle schoolers because of the sexual content but if you are comfortable with the sex and swearing then it is all right for you to read.

To Be a Slave, a review by James

Title:  To Be A Slave

Written by: Julius Lester

Paperback, $6.99

Recently I read the book To Be A Slave by Julius Lester. The book is a compilation of testimonies given by former slaves in a series of interviews conducted by the American Anti-Slavery Society supplemented with comments and notes written by the author. It covers the history of slavery from the voyages of the first slave ships to the end of the Civil War. 

The book is a compelling firsthand  account of what it was like to live as a slave in America. Lester covers the topics of transportation to the New World, the life of the average slave, slave auctions, slave rebellions and uprisings, and reactions to the Emancipation Proclamation and newfound freedom. To Be A Slave demonstrates the cruelty of slavery and recounts horrifying tales of inhumanity on the part of the slave owners. 

Lester's notes are both enlightening and shocking, and they also clarify some of the slang and sometimes confusing dialect of the interviewees. The book is very cohesive and goes from topic to topic in a sensible way. The author's choice of selections perfectly conveys the information he intended to convey. The book does have some downsides, though. While Lester's notes are informative, they sometime fail to explain certain slang words. The narratives sometimes got very lengthy, and I believe more cutting could have been done on the author's part. Also, I would have appreciated seeing stories of slavery from outside America, despite Lester's saying that the slavery in America was the most barbaric and cruel. 

For these reasons, and also because this style of writing is not my favorite, I give To Be A Slave 3 ½ chocolate bars out of five. I thought the ending of this book with the end of the Civil War, was fitting and a good place to end. I would recommend this book to anyone older than 10 due to mentions of nudity, violence, and profanity. Overall, To Be A Slave was a gripping account of the horrors of slavery in America.

Rating: 3 ½ chocolate bars out of 5

Cover Thoughts- I thought the cover was simple yet fitting.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, a review by Stev17

Hello there, my avid fans! I’m back! And I’ve been reading! What exactly have I been reading, you ask? Oh, this and that, but what I’m here to review is Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan. I read the hardcover version from the library, and had I bought it, it would have been $16.95. Thank goodness for libraries.

           
Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist is about two teenagers, Nick and Norah. The chapters from Nick’s point of view are written by David Levithan, and the chapters from Norah’s point of view are written by Rachel Cohn. They planned nothing in advance and emailed the book back and forth chapter by chapter.

           
Anywho.  Nick, the poor schmuck, has recently been dumped by his girlfriend of six months, Tris. He is the bassist in a band with two other guys (their band is lacking a drummer) and he is a music fanatic. Norah has recently gotten rid of her controlling boyfriend, Tal. She spends her days looking after her best friend Caroline while they roam Manhattan clubs at night.  Norah is a music snob who dislikes the Beatles. Which makes me like her less.

           
I know, sounds cliché. But it gets better.

           
Nick’s band has finished playing at a little club, when Nick notices Tris with a new dude. Nick has no inclination to talk to her, so he turns to the nearest girl and says “I know this is going to sound strange, but would you mind being my girlfriend for the next five minutes?” The girl happens to be our lovely Norah. This is where the chapter ends. The next chapter begins in exactly the same place, only now it’s from Norah’s point of view. It starts out with, “I answer his question by putting my hand around the back of his neck and pulling his face down to mine.”

           
Now we all know what happens next. Nick and Norah fall helplessly in love and live happily ever after, yada yada yada. WRONG. Nick and Norah end up in several odd situations and encounters afterward, driving Nick’s car, Jessie, to this club, taking the train to that one, ending up in a Korean grocery store and a restaurant that serves good borscht. It’s an interesting night.

           
So, a little more about Nick and Norah… Let’s start with Nick. He’s somewhat shy, and extremely sarcastic. He stands up for his car, Jessie, when people call her names, and he writes poems and lyrics. He’s mostly motivated by desire to either get back together with Tris or get over Tris. He’s kind of centered around Tris. In the beginning, Nick’s nothing but a sad, heartbroken dude, but by the end of the book he’s had all these deep insights and he sees Tris for the, ahem, meanie she is. He certainly knows more about himself at the end of the book, and he’s learned more about other people in general.

           
Norah’s turn! I didn’t like her quite as much as I liked Nick, but she’s cool in her own way. She goes to a Catholic school, her dad’s a big record company CEO, and she wears flannel shirts. She’s Jewish, and she’s only ever had one boyfriend, Tal, who was, overall, not a swell guy. Norah is also sarcastic and she’s snarky and prickly at times, but it seems like she’s trying to hide inner turmoil and terror. Once upon a time she was motivated only to protect Caroline, and maybe to get Tal out of her head. All that clears up, and by the end of the book, she really just wants to get to know herself and Nick a bit better, which she starts to do nearing the end. She’s certainly more confident about herself (really confident, not the fake I’m-hiding-behind-swear-words-and-sarcasm confident).

           
I’m pretty sure the theme of Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist was something along the lines of Once you let go of the past and its issues you’ll be better off and happier. There’s some serious letting go of the past going on here. The authors seem to be saying that the past is the past and holding on to it is only going to make you bitter and unhappy.

           
Oooh, now comes my favorite part of the blog post: I get to tell you my opinion! YESSSSSSSS! Okay, here goes. I really, really, REALLY loved this book. It was sweet and VERY funny. I especially liked the chapters written from Nick’s point of view. I felt closer to him than I did to Norah, and I thought his voice was deeper and funnier at the same time. Norah’s chapters were good, just… Less so. I thought hers were a bit weaker than Nick’s. Nick’s chapters were more in depth and better written, almost like poetry.

I don’t predict that Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist will end up a classic or anything, but it was definitely worth reading. In fact, I read it twice. I think it would be really interesting to write an entire book the way Cohn and Levithan did, emailing chapters back and forth without any prior planning. It certainly explains some of the odd twist the book had.

But what do I think of the ending, you ask? I thought it was rather satisfactory. It left me wanting to know more about Nick and Norah, in the same way we want to know more about Harry and Ginny or Percy and Annabeth. I suppose I’m just a sucker for a good love story. I’m definitely going to seek out more books by David Levithan. Not so sure about more Rachel Cohn, though. I’ve already found another one by Levithan and Cohn, Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares which was almost as good and just as funny as Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. In the vast forest of contemporary fiction, I think Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist is probably one of the taller trees. Darn good book.

Oh! And I got an extra special little surprise! In the back of the book, written on a blue sticky note, was this message: “If you love this book as much as I story.” This was followed by a large and mildly creepy smiley face, and the date 8/7/09. This is why I love library books. And people who read them.

I’d rate this book Four out of Five Chocolate Bars.

Now I know you’re just dying to hear about what I thought of the cover. I thought it was kind of cool, especially the fonts in which the title was written. I liked that Nick’s name was in an almost Gothic font, while Norah’s was in a more modern, practical font. I feel like their names as written kind of describe them. However, I thought the bottom half was kind of random. As if the publishers couldn’t think of anything more meaningful than a couple kissing. I mean, sure, it’s a love story, but it’s a good thing I don’t judge books by their covers. The cover didn’t suit the book’s originality. I’ve seen a cover that was a dark purple, and smack in the middle was “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist” in the same fonts as my cover, and with a heart made of an earbud cord around it with Manhattan at night sort of reflected in the background. This cover made MUCH more sense to me. It has all the awesomeness of the name fonts, while incorporating both the music and love that the book is about. AND it looks really good. The city at night in the background was a nice touch, and it tied the cover into the book even more. Me gusta.

One thing about this book: mucho swearing and sexual content. Just saying.

All right, you’ve heard my thoughts, now off with you! Seek out Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist ASAP and read it and love it. Thank you. And. Goodnight.

~Stev17