Book Beat Reviews

We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

Hi, I am Sarah. I am fourteen years old and an avid reader; it is one of my favorite things to do. Inspired by authors’ creations of magnificent places and surprising havens built by simple letters, I aspire to be an author and, meanwhile, nurture the love to write.

17-year-old Cadence is a Sinclair: tall, white, beautiful. She lives in Vermont all year and spends the summers on their family’s private island, Beechwood. There, Cadence becomes a Liar: one of the three older cousins and Gat, an almost-step-cousin who’s been there as long as it matters. 

Beechwood is a place of glorious memories, of long summer days spent lounging as cousins, as best friends. It is spent in the glamorous halo of friendship and family and the beautiful facade of Sinclair perfection.

Under the surface, however, all is not as it seems. 

In her fifteenth summer, Cadence suffers an accident, resulting in crippling migraines and terrible amnesia. In her sixteenth summer, she’s gone to Europe. It is summer seventeen, and Cadence returns to Beechwood, determined to find out what really happened two years prior.

We Were Liars is the suspense novel the likes of which you’ve never read. Its prose is daring and original. Its story spills from complicated, cracked-open secrets at every turn. It is intense and heartbreaking and intricate and mindblowing. It is a pretty picture cracked into a thousand unrecognizable pieces. What I like best about this book, however, is that despite its twisting plot, it is unapologetically whole. The characters are imperfectly human. They are flawed and broken, they are brave and true. And they are liars.

Welcome to Beechwood Island, and the story of a lifetime. You’ll read this book, you’ll hate it or love it, but one thing is certain: you’ll never be the same. 

Find it in print, ebook, eaudiobook and CD here.

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Hi, I am Sarah. I am fourteen years old and an avid reader; it is one of my favorite things to do. Inspired by authors’ creations of magnificent places and surprising havens built by simple letters, I aspire to be an author and, meanwhile, nurture the love to write.

Ketterdam is a city of kill-or-be-killed, where the only god honored is profit and the only moral is the one that suits the job. Located on the island nation of Kerch, it’s a bustling center of commerce and crime. Within its boundaries are the makings of an unlikely team: Kaz Brekker, master thief; Inej Ghafa, acrobat turned spy; Jesper Fahey, a sharpshooter with a gambling addiction; Nina Zenik, Grisha Heartrender; Matthias Helvar, witch-hunter and convict; and Wylan Van Eck, demolition expert.

Beyond the borders of Kerch, a dangerous drug is brewing. Jurda parem, a concoction that only affects those born with Grisha powers, could entirely change the world as known. The only person who knows the exact recipe? A hostage of the Scandinavian-based nation of Fjerda, held in the securest prison in the world. The only team who may have a chance of breaking him out before it’s too late? You got it: Kaz Brekker and his crazy team.

Six of Crows by Leah Bardugo is the first book in the second series in the Grishaverse. This duology stands alone, or it can be read after the Shadow and Bone series. It’s one of my favorite books by far, mostly because of how it swallows you into the story, the world fleshed in full color around you, the characters incredibly well-developed. It subverts the hero’s journey narrative, but it’s not just a heist plotline. It’s so much more. And you’ll only find out if you read it too.

Find it in print here.

Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

Hi, I am Sarah. I am fourteen years old and an avid reader; it is one of my favorite things to do. Inspired by authors’ creations of magnificent places and surprising havens built by simple letters, I aspire to be an author and, meanwhile, nurture the love to write.

Alina Starkov has never been anything but ordinary. Orphan, soldier, mapmaker—she’s always been able to blend in, and is perfectly okay with that. In the ranks of the Ravkan First Army, where part of the job is crossing the Shadow Fold, a dangerous—and potentially fatal—swath of land shrouded in darkness, being invisible can play to your advantage.

But everything changes on her first crossing. When their skiff is attacked by monsters who threaten Alina’s dearest and oldest friend, Mal, something inexplicable happens. Before she knows it, Alina is swept up into the ranks of the Ravkan Second Army. Made up of the Grisha, people born with science-based magic abilities, they inform Alina that she, too, is one of them—one like no other: a Sun Summoner, and the only Grisha capable of destroying the Shadow Fold.

But all is not as it seems, and once-invisible Alina Starkov is now the target of awe, suspicion, violence… and betrayal.

Shadow and Bone is the exciting start to an incredibly detailed world by Leigh Bardugo: the Grishaverse. As Alina races to figure out what is right, what is wrong, and how to save the world from the horrors of the Shadow Fold, before you know it, you’re wrapped up in it too.

Find it in print here.

The Rest of the Story by Sarah Dessen

Hi, my name is Cora. I love to read and play sports, especially soccer. I also love to read and play with my cats. My favorite color is blue.

This book, The Rest Of The Story, written by Sarah Dessen, is meaningful, powerful, and adventurous. A young girl, Emma Saylor, spends the summer with her deceased mother’s family on a lake, a little ways from where she lives with her dad and grandmother. Emma’s mother always used to tell Emma a bedtime story about a never ending lake with clear water, and a creaky old house with uneven floors. Emma’s original plan, spending the summer with her best friend, Bridget at the pool, gets interrupted when Briget’s grandfather has a stroke. Hoping to save her father’s and new stepmother’s honeymoon to Greece she offers to stay at the lake with a bunch of strangers she met only once when she was four, and doesn’t remember anything.

When she arrives, she doesn’t realize that there are basically 2 different lakes, even though there is just one. Lake North is where her father’s family spent most of the summer in a fancy resort where the rich people lived. North Lake is the community completely opposite from Lake North, where her mother and the rest of her mother’s family lives. Saylor is what her mother’s family calls her, and Emma is what her dad uses as a name, this book is all about discovering who you are when you are torn between 2 things.

During her time at her Mother’s family home, she finds out things she never knew about her mother. Hoping to connect her history she befriends Roo, her best friend when they were younger, and finds out things she never knew about her family. Throughout the book, Emma tries to understand her family better, and not just be the rich kid they know her to be. Emma must learn to confront her fears and learn her past to find the rest of the story. I really liked this book because it was about finding your past and who you are without other people telling you.

At times this book would get really slow, and then dramatically speed up, so I think the flow could have been better at times, but other than that I would highly recommend this book to anyone who likes a good adventure.

Find it in print here.

Carry On by Rainbow Rowell

Hey, I’m Finn; I’m a 17 year old in the valley who loves to read, and loves writing about what he reads just about 10x more. The analysis and application of literature is the second lyric in a duet between reader and author, and I love being a part of that!

How many of us have the “it hurts too good” feeling for a spoiled ending? The “edge of your seat, just push me off, but not yet!” feeling? The affectionate thrill of knowing what
happens before you appropriately get there is an equally exhilarating and infuriating feat. Few will venture to the final page of their novel, and fewer will be satisfied with the jarring jump ahead. However, Rainbow Rowell captures the sweet spot of ‘knowing the ending’ in her striking fantasy novel, Carry On.

Acting as an implied finale to an on-going story, Carry On follows the ferocious and rambunctious life of the magical world’s ‘Chosen One’, Simon Snow. Within this beautifully
crafted story, discover striking fantasies of spell casting, creature killing, and classical heart-throb vampires, all wrapped up in Rowell’s exquisite romance skills. Forgo the exhausting, overdone plotlines of dreamgirls and love triangles, and embrace the innovative allure of falling in love with unlikely soul-mates, authentic queerness, and discovering a way to exist outside of the expectations of being the protagonist.

Simon must defeat the Insidious Humdrum (a malicious evil with a familiar face), talk to
spirits, attempt to control his overpowered magic, and differentiate between killing or kissing his
newly made, and most unlikely, partner, who happens to be a vampire, a room-mate who eats
Salt and Vinegar chips in bed, and a whole lot more Simon never expected to reveal. Lose
yourself in the magical mystery of it all, and then find yourself all over again in the captivating
weaving of real connection, all in Rowell’s incredible novel.

Find it in print, eaudiobook and CD here.

The Manny Files by Christian Burch

Hello! My name is Lexi. Some of my favorite activities are skiing, baking, crafting, and volleyball. I love reading great books and sharing my favorites with others.

The book I am reviewing (that I have read three times) is The Manny Files, by Christian Burch. This book is a funny and sweet story about the life of Keats Dalinger (a 3^rd grade boy.)

Keats has had many female nannies, all of whom enjoyed dressing up his sisters and painting their nails, but they were never really interested in Keats. Keats never connected with the nannies because they didn’t really care about him and all they ever gave him “was dental floss.” One day a new nanny shows up at Keats’s door, “except it was a man, a male nanny, a manny.” Keats is thrilled about his new nanny and so are his sisters India (4^th grade) and Belly (preschool), but not so much Keats’s 8^th grade sister, Lulu. Over time, Lulu keeps a secret notebook of all the so-called immature things the manny does. Then, Lulu reports the contents of the notebook to their parents. In Lulu’s attempts to fire the manny, Keats must highlight all the manny’s great qualities to convince his parents to let the manny stay.

In The Manny Files Christian Burch captures the fun of 3^rd grade, the downsides of teenagers, and the laughter that the manny brings to the Dalinger family. If you enjoy this book as much as I do make sure to check out the sequel Hit the Road Manny, in which the Dalingers go on a family road trip and decide to bring the manny along.

Find it on CD here.