BPL Teens

Teen review by Emma

A Little Wanting Song
By Cath Crowley
Fiction

A Little Wanting Song is about two girls whose lives become intertwined over a summer. Charlie loves to play music but only when she’s alone. She is also unhappy about having to spend the summer with her grandpa in a small rural town. Rose lives next to Charlie’s grandfather and can’t wait to get of town, and she sees Charlie as her way out. The novel’s chapters alternate from the points of view of both protagonists, which lets the reader get into their heads and really understand the characters’ motives.

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Teen Review by Stephany

Scarlett Fever
By Maureen Johnson
Type of Book: Fiction
Rating 3 of 5

Scarlett Martin is working hard for the newly established AAA, a talent agency — not car-related whatsoever. She is working hard to help her brother, Spencer, work while helping her boss score her second client. This second client happens to have a brother, Max, who seems to hate everything. However, Max seems to annoy Scarlett. Will that help Scarlett heal her broken heart?

I didn’t like the first book, Suite Scarlett, in the first place, but I believe in second chances, so I gave it a second chance. The secondary characters seemed to be less developed. Scarlett seems like a rather acceptable portrayal of a student driven to succeed in everything.

Teen Review by Stephany

Heist Society
By Ally Carter
Type of Book: Adventure
Rating 4 stars

Heist Society is a really quick read, like all of Ally Carter’s books. Heist Society focuses on a girl named Kat. She’s a great con artist, and she cons her way into a private school. Katarina has been wrongfully expelled from her school, because of a prank that she didn’t do. She learns that her father is being targeted for stealing pictures from a powerful person.

I knew that I would like this book, because Ally Carter is one of those authors who never fails to impress. The storyline was really easy to understand, which in my opinion is the basis of understanding the overall story. My only problem was that the characters were a little underdeveloped. The characters seemed more 2-D.

Teen Review by Shyenne

Secret Saturdays
By Torrey Maldonado
Type of book: Realistic fiction
Rating: 2 stars

In the Red Hook district, life is hard, and worse for some. Fatherless children are considered normal there. Druggies crawling the street, asking for money are even more common. It’s difficult to try to stay on the right path, but for Justin, and his best friend Sean, they’re doing their best. But Sean starts acting weird, making Justin worry. He doesn’t know how to confront Sean about it, though. This book was good, with the ups and downs of reaching puberty added on to real-life situations. It gave the book a sense of ‘wow, they go through a lot, but they’re holding on’. The story was easy to follow, and to understand. I rated the book 2 stars because it was predictable. I could see the ending a mile away. It was a touching story, but one that I have heard before.

Teen Review by Stephany

Vinyl Princess
By Yvonne Prinz
Type of Book: Realistic fiction
Rating: 4 stars

Allie loves music, but not your typical music, she loves vinyl music. Her love of music has led her to work at Bob and Bob Records. She spends her time talking to customers, hippies, random people from the street. Allie’s love of music leads her to start her own blog about music, but the store that she has been working in is becoming more and more dangerous.

A major plus of this book is that it is set in BERKELEY, and it doesn’t talk about fictional places. The book actually talks about Telegraph, San Pablo, and other places. The downside is that the few characters that are present seemed to be underdeveloped. I will give props to the author since writing isn’t her profession, she is a owner of a music store here in Berkeley. AMOEBA — sound familiar?

Teen Review by Stephany

Cashing In
By Susan Colebank
Type of Book: Realistic fiction
Rating: 2.5 stars

Regina Shaw has been paying for her mother’s gambling addiction for the last three years, and she works her butt off trying to save money for other expenses. One day after coming home from Cash Mart, her mother tells her that she won the lottery. FINALLY, all the bills that have been accumulating since her father’s death can be paid off, but they aren’t. Instead the money is spent on random luxuries that aren’t necessary.

This book was pretty simple with a beginning, middle, and end. However, the plot seemed flawed. No person in their right mind would let a person spend so much money without even the consideration of help. However, this book does show how pressure does eventually cause a person to lie about what is happening. Overall, I didn’t really like the book because of the many flaws in the storyline.

Teen Review by Stephany

Living on Impulse
By Cara Haycak
Type of book: Realistic fiction
Rating: 2.5 stars

Mia Marrow is caught shoplifting one shoe, and with that comes punishment. Mia is forced to get a job feeding and counting the dead flies at the university. There are many things that are lost, and many gained. Ranging from a relationship with her mother, or improving her life so that she can have a future.

One positive thing about this book is that it’s not a story that is commonly told. The characters in this book have relationships that can be broken when they really express their feelings. Mia’s mother is shown as an uptight mother who hates her father, but her father only wants the best for her and her daughter, Mia. Not a typical story.

Teen Review by Stephany

Flight
By Sherman Alexie
Type of book: Realistic fiction
Rating: 3 stars

Flight focuses on a boy named Zits. Zits lost his mother at age six, and his dad left right as he was being born. Zits bounces from foster house to foster house, and his anger only grows as he moves. There is also the whole thing about not knowing who he is, being half Native-American, and half Irish. He sets out on a journey, whether it’s voluntary or not, it’s for the reader to find out.

I liked the book, except for a few parts. Mainly the last part, when the ending was not expected and rushed. The characters were well described, especially Zits, a whole chapter dedicated to his characteristics. This is one of those books that I was glad to read for English class.

Teen Review by Stephany

Princess Ben
By Catherine Gilbert Murdock
Type of book: Fantasy
Rating: 2.5 stars

Princess Ben is described as a plump young lady with her aunt acting as her country’s regent. Of course, her aunt has to be evil just to progress the book, so Ben is locked up in a high tower. Little does everyone else know, but the tower leads to magic and that becomes Ben’s comfort. One day the magic goes a little haywire….

I liked the fact that the author took time away from her series, Dairy Queen, to write a book totally different. The plot was good, but I felt that it went too quickly, and the ending seemed rushed. After reading the first few chapters, I could predict the ending and was correct. Also, Ben’s transformation was easily predicted as soon as Ben stated that her aunt starved her.

Teen Review by Shyenne

As Easy as Falling off the Face of the Earth
By Lynne Rae Perkins
Type of book: realistic fiction
Rating: 3 stars

Lynne Rae Perkins’ book is fresh. The characters are real-life easy to relate to, and the story is something that anyone could see happening to themselves. It’s not dramatic, or predictable. It’s a simple story, with the air of, ‘that’s just what happened,’ to it. In the book, a boy named Ry is lost in the middle of Montana, far from any town. It seems that life just keeps placing obstacles in his way, and with an almost-dead cell phone as the only thing he has with him, how will he get home? The story is enjoyable.