Ask Again Later (Liz Czukas)

Despite what her name might suggest, Heart has zero interest in complicated romance. So when her brilliant plan to go to prom with a group of friends is disrupted by two surprise invites, Heart knows there's only one drama-free solution: flip a coin. Heads: The jock. He might spend all night staring at his ex or throw up in the limo, but how bad can her brother's best friend really be? Tails: The theater geek...with a secret. What could be better than a guy who shares all Heart's interests--even if he wants to share all his feelings? Heart's simple coin flip has somehow given her the chance to live out both dates. But where her prom night ends up might be the most surprising thing of all..

I swear, if people start falling over themselves over Schroeder like the people fan-girling over immortal stalkers like Edward Cullen, I'm going to scream!

This book literally only had a handful of guys I actually liked. And only one of them was a secondary character who was actually developed past his name and relationship to the protagonist. That was Ryan. Ryan is the first guy (actually the only guy) that asks Heart (I think this author won the award for wildest, most out there names for YA protagonists) to prom. He actually is gay and I think he's going it to cover up the truth. I'm not exactly sure. Anyway, he and Heart are actually cool, they bond over French and are both drama geeks. He was the only one who didn't walk around with typical sexist thoughts and ideas and kept calling Heart out on her gayist (? I don't know what to call this) remarks towards him during their night.

The other three guys who got frequent page-time were straight up jackasses.

First, you got Phil, the epitome of misogynistic guys. He's Heart's brother, a football player and typical to most YA stories: with parents who are never around (their dad is busy with his carpet business and their mom ditched them a long time ago). Anyway, Phil promises his recently dumped football buddy, Troy, that his sister will go with him to prom so he doesn't have to experience it alone. He doesn't even ask Heart and she has a problem because she tries to make as many people happy at once. However, she doesn't realize or care that it comes at the expense of herself.

In the life where Heart chooses to go to prom with Troy, her brother is a complete jackass. There's this point where a drunken Troy forces his lips on a unwilling Heart and her brother has the audacity to tell her she's "overreacting" and stop being such a baby when she tries to tell him that she didn't want it. Phil even goes on to say, "he probably thought you wanted it."

And that, my dear children, is what you call rape culture. And it only gets worse as the story goes on. Heart begs him to take her home and he refuses. Heart spends the rest of the prom with her friends until he manipulates her into being Troy's babysitter since he's drunk out of his mind and spending the rest of the night taking care of him.

Heart's original plan was to go to prom with her big group of friends, including her real love interest Schroeder. He calls her different parts of the human body and she also addresses him by a nickname. His real name is Chase but he reminds Heart of this kid:

Now I hated his character. He is a straight up jackass. And the reasons given to explain his screwed up behavior don't sit well with me. He has a problem with Heart choosing to deviate from the original plan of going to the prom with her friends because he doesn't have the balls to ask her out himself. Sure, Heart has this poorly developed idea that she won't date therefore she can't end up like her mother: getting pregnant and starting a family you aren't ready for and skip the town on.

However, he spends most of the book mad at her because she went to prom with other guys. When some condoms come out of her purse (that her aunt provided in her prom-goodie bag) and she and Ryan laugh about it, he looks at her with disappointment. I really hope that look was because he was jealous and not that he was putting her down for having sex with Ryan on prom night.

Either way, the exchange he and Heart have about her drinking in a car with Troy after he tried to tongue-her-down really sealed the deal about my feelings towards him:

"I can't believe you," he said.
I drew back with a pissy look. "Excuse me?"
"I just can't believe you'd be that stupid....It didn't occur to you that being incapacitated might be dangerous around Troy."

Oh yeah, dude, because if Troy had raped her, it would've been Heart's fault for getting into a car with him as well as getting intoxicated around him which invited the rape onto herself. It's her prom night too and if she wants to drink she should get to without having to worry about having to fight off attackers. How about telling him not to rape her, instead of blaming for putting herself at risks. He even tells her that she got lucky because Troy could've raped her, he just didn't.

Ugh, in the end, Ryan makes her realize that she has feelings for Schroedur but he's too busy being stupid that they can't work it out. So their friends lock them in a trunk to work out their problems. And they do, annoyingly enough. Heart realizes that her no-dating rule is a little strict and decides to give way to Schroedur. They start dating on the end of both sides of Heart's choices. We never learn which one she really chose but at the end Heart gets deja vu about things that she's experienced in both lives. But either way she ends up at the lake with her friends and Schroedur. 

Ugh, please do not waste the time I did reading this book. 

The Probability of Miracles (Wendy Wunder)

Dry, sarcastic, sixteen-year-old Cam Cooper has spent the last seven years in and out hospitals. The last thing she wants to do in the short life she has left is move 1,500 miles away to Promise, Maine - a place known for the miraculous events that occur there. But it's undeniable that strange things happen in Promise: everlasting sunsets; purple dandelions; flamingos in the frigid Atlantic; an elusive boy named Asher; and finally, a mysterious envelope containing a list of things for Cam to do before she dies. As Cam checks each item off the list, she finally learns to believe - in love, in herself, and even in miracles. A debut novel from an immensely talented new writer, The Probability of Miracles crackles with wit, romance and humor and will leave readers laughing and crying with each turn of the page.

First off, yayyyy for a protagonist that's not white for once!

Or, at least not full white. Not to mention Cam's other culture (she's half Samoan) is completely embraced in this novel. There's even a scene where one of her friends tries to make a little joke about her Samoan side but she quickly sets them straight. You go, girl!

There are few books that make me want to reread them in physical form (versus in electronic form), but this is one of them. Despite the different plot points and characteristics that frequent most contemporary YA novels, this one managed to stay original...mostly.

Most importantly, Cam is dying of cancer. And Since her father died, Alicia (Cam's mom) has been with a bunch of different guys. Therefore Cam has learned true love=not real. Commitment=doesn't exist. People=are fickle. Also, Cam is a very sarcastic, I'm-not-a-typical-teenager teenager. The story isn't told through her point of view but third person, however the focus remains strictly on Cam. 

Cam has a best friend (who also has the same cancer) who is having an affair with another girl's boyfriend. I was really hoping this plot-line was going to be different. First the guy, Ryan, goes to youth group and his girlfriend won't have sex with him. Lily (the best friend) goes to youth group too but will have sex with him. When we first see Ryan and Lily interact he seems to go beyond the stereotypes the plot demands of him. He waits for Lily to eat before he does, he helps her when she has a remission-caused nosebleed and seems like he genuinely cares about her. But when Cam gets him alone and asks his intentions, Ryan basically states he doesn't see the point of dumping his girlfriend for him. I can't decide if he thinks this because she is dying or because he really doesn't want to be with her. It sucked.

Cam's best friend also ties in another plot device from other YA stories. When she and Cam were younger and were away at what seemed like a cancer camp, they each made bucket lists. However, to keep them from sounding so depressing they call them Flamingo lists. 

A lot of Cam's sarcasm and personality comes out in her penning of the list, which is a sad ode to the life of a teenager/teens in YA. (Is this really what we're like?)

FLAMINGO LIST (I rearranged them in the order they are achieved)

* Experiment with petty shoplifting.

* Have an awkward moment with my best friend’s boyfriend.

* Dabble in some innocent stalking behavior.

* Drink beer.

* Lose my virginity at a keg party.

* Have my heart broken by an asshole.

* Stay out all night.

* Wallow in misery, mope, pout, and sleep through Saturday.

* Get fired from a summer job.

* Go cow-tipping.

* Kill my little sister’s dreams.

Anyways, in the beginning of the novel Cam has just found out that she is in remission yet again but this time there is nothing the doctors can do for her. This flashback was really sad because Cam's doctor was upset and she was trying to make him feel better. So her mom is like, we're going to find a cure. She hears about this magical miracle town in Maine called Promise and whisks Cam and her little sister Perry away from their DisneyWorld life (they work/live at DisneyWorld, BTW) and leaves her current boyfriend behind.

Once in Promise, miracles ignite. Almost immediately in their entrance to the town Cam meets a boy named Asher. Asher is a bunch of cliches. He is a good-looking football player who has the cream of the crop (what the hell does that saying even mean?) to chose from with girls. However, in his spare time Asher enjoys getting hand jobs from older women. Also, Asher is afraid. He's afraid to leave Promise because his parents died when they left, so what if he does too?

In the beginning I liked Cam and Asher's relationship. Yes, she thought he was cute and engaged in some innocent stalking from her widows walk but he wasn't all that she was thinking about. Cam still had a personality past her crush on Asher. And their relationship seemed to progress at a good phase. That is, until Cam's new employer and Asher's aunt reveals his back story to her. I felt like this took the place of a actual intimate bonding moment between the two characters that could've furthur developed their relationship. Instead, it was still used as such. Soon a rift occurs between Cam, Asher, Perry and Alicia, they kiss and soon are all touchy-feely with each other.

Cam soon gets a lot of her list done. In one night and the fallout that follows, she manages to knock a good three or four off her list. Perry insists that she goes to a island rager which you have to zip-line to get too. Once there Cam actually makes some friends her age like this girl named Sunny and starts hula dancing. She also drinks a little and manages to catch a drunkie. The guy's name is Alec and he is a French exchange student. He leads Cam to this boat where they start making out. She tries to tell him no, but he's all:

and takes her virginity even though she didn't say yes. In fact, she specifically said no. So it was non-consensual sex. I know she didn't fight and later said that it actually started feeling good...until it didn't but still. If someone says no, it means:

I didn't even really process what the fuck had happened until later when I re-read that scene. Ugh, what a fucking loser. Then on top of that, (of course) Alec has a girlfriend. A girlfriend that Cam sorta-kinda-but-not-really be friends as time passes. I know she had given up on finding love before she died but I really wish that she could've had a different first time.

This book brought up some good points. Like Perry goes off on Cam once for not recognizing that as young as she is, she's had to make sacrifices for Cam's illness too. Cam isn't the only one being effected by her cancer. So is her mom and her sister. I think it's fairly easy in books like these for the authors and main characters to get lost in their struggle and seeing the grief in the people around them that they forget this aspect. The loved ones of someone with cancer aren't just mourning, they are making sacrifices for the cancer patient whether they are dying and trying to find a cure. It was so sad though to hear Perry have to tell Cam this. 
One of the main issues in the story is that Cam refuses to believe in miracles. She refuses to believe that the town was magical. She even gets into a fight with her mom and sister about this. They beg her to believe and she refuses. Trying to help them, she tries to make her mom's garden magically grow overnight and makes a donkey into a unicorn for her sister. However, she fails miserably.

At this point Cam hits the lowest of low points. Desperately needing someone to talk to, she tries to call Lily but her mother informs her that Lily actually died three days ago and they had forgotten to call Cam and let her know. Finally Cam is done.

She decides that she's tired of living and takes a bunch of pills and tries to drive her car off a cliff. But the pills kick in too soon and she crashes into a bouncy house and Asher manages to find her (after his dick's happy time) and forces her to throw up the pills. After this, she manages to work everything out with her family and Asher. This actually leads to Asher cutting off the older girl and he and Cam eventually start dating.

Everything seems good for a while. Somehow Lily managed to send Cam a couple of gifts beyond the grave. The first is the now-bedazzled picture of them that Cam stole from her house. She also actually made a real version of that book thing they were writing together. She also sent Cam her own Flamingo list. The only thing that wasn't checked (I was soooooo sad. I had hoped things would change for her) was "find true love" but Cam decided that she, herself had. The last thing Lily arranged was a Make a Wish gift that ironically sent Cam back home to DisneyWorld with her friends.

Just as she prepares to take Asher and her friends to DisneyWorld, Asher notices a blue spot (a symptom of her disease) on her, but she blows it off. Her focus is getting him and her friends outside of Promise to show them what the world is like. Her mother kept refusing to let her go because she was scared that leaving Promise would send Cam in remission. She's partly right, but the new blue spot appears right before they even leave. Anyway, the trip is nice, she and Asher have sex (although they've had sex before this and are dating now, hence the touch-feely period) and they bring back Alicia's left behind boyfriend because Cam realizes now that her sister and mother love him more then just temporarily. The boyfriend proposes to the mom and they get married in Promise.

This is where the next couple of chapters keep having the perfect endings for the novel, but they aren't the endings. It'll just be another chapter. Cam starts semi-dreaming of the future. She's been accepted into Harvard and Asher is semi-considering leaving Promise. However, Cam can feel death coming for her. The symptoms started just before she left Promise and are only getting worse. But then the two of them get into a  huge fight as Cam tries to push Asher to leave Promise. It almost sounds like a last wish. Angry, Asher goes out in the sea and a huge storm appears.

A ghost ancestor of his appears to Cam and tells her that yes, she will be dying soon but she has to call him back. Cam holds on for as long as she can before she passes out. Her family has to leave Promise to get her to a real hospital. Cam says goodbye to her family and luckily Asher appears and they say their goodbyes.

And then she dies. My first thought was: What? WHAT? She dies? She dies? What the hell kind of book is called The Probability of Miracles and she actually dies!!?! Was that the point? So we could calculate the chances of the things that Cam did experience in Promise were actually miracles? Or were they just a bunch of coincidences? Was it a coincidence that the flamingos came there or were they really for her? Was it a coincidence that she was getting better before she died or was it really the works of a miracle that didn't work?

But maybe the miracle wasn't that Cam was supposed to live. Maybe the miracle was that she actually saw and experienced love and died with it. I know when she died she was surprised she still felt the love of all her loved ones. Maybe the miracle was Asher. Maybe the miracle was finding friends, a family. Maybe the miracle was seeing that true love and commitment were real despite her past and people like Alec probing her wrong. Maybe the miracle was the love Cam actually had to earn from Asher and Sunny and the others and the love she witnessed between Perry, her mother and her boyfriend. Maybe that's the miracle: love.

Anyway, despite my spoiling of the plot you should definitely read this book. I loved the writing and some of the characters. This book is underrated on Goodreads and should definitely be read more.

The Spectacular Now (Tim Tharp)

Summary: 
SUTTER KEELY. HE’S the guy you want at your party. He’ll get everyone dancing. He’ ll get everyone in your parents’ pool. Okay, so he’s not exactly a shining academic star. He has no plans for college and will probably end up folding men’s shirts for a living. But there are plenty of ladies in town, and with the help of Dean Martin and Seagram’s V.O., life’s pretty fabuloso, actually. Until the morning he wakes up on a random front lawn, and he meets Aimee. Aimee’s clueless. Aimee is a social disaster. Aimee needs help, and it’s up to the Sutterman to show Aimee a splendiferous time and then let her go forth and prosper. But Aimee’s not like other girls, and before long he’s in way over his head. For the first time in his life, he has the power to make a difference in someone else’s life—or ruin it forever.

What I Thought:
When I first finished reading this book, I couldn't believe that was the end. I literally kept flipping back in forth on my e-reader, sure that I must've lost or missed a chapter or something. Because that couldn't be the end. Sutter leaves Aimee and gets drunk before asking a bunch of other old drunkards if he did the right thing and they agree with him. "He's a hero!" they proclaim. It's kind of sad, really. It's like we saw a glimpse of Sutter's future when he was in that bar. He's going to become one of those drunken losers.

But after a little more time processing, the ending began to make sense. After I finished reading it, I went online to read other people's reviews to see if they were as confused as I felt. But two embodied it the best:
"The book ended with the main character just as he was in the beginning."

After thinking about this, I admit I can't help but disagree. I see how someone may think this. Sutter obviously is an alcoholic. Everyone knows it but no one actually says it to his face, but I'm sure everyone is saying it behind his back.

However, in the beginning of the novel. Cassidy, Sutter's soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend asks him to "for once, put someone else's feelings before your own." By the end of the novel, Sutter actually does do this. He puts Aimee's feelings before his own but it takes a lot for him to get there. It takes Cassidy, the guy she starts dating, Marcus and Sutter's best friend, Ricky, trying to give him an "Aimee intervention" where they point out his negative influence in her life. And it's definitely obvious. This girl goes off on her only friend, starts doing shots at different points in the day just because she can and getting sloppy drunk at a party that causes the intervention in the first place.

But Aimee isn't hopeless. She has this dream of her and Sutter starting a new life together in Saint Louis with her sister. They'll get a apartment in her sister's complex there and she'll start attending WashU and he'll go to community college there and they'll be happy. Sutter's never had someone whose happiness that is effected so much by himself until Aimee. Which is why he can't let her down and goes along with her plan. The ending of the book is so sad; Sutter ends up telling her to go ahead without him and after he finishes summer school and get money for their apartment, but he has no true intention of following her, he just wants her to go so that once she's begun her new life it'll be easier for her to let him go.

"This book is just like Sutter. It only cares about now. It doesn't think about solutions, resolutions, or even conclusions. Just the now."

What I will say is the book is properly named. Sutter lives in the now and remains to do so even when the book ends. I both agree and disagree with this idea. On my disagreement side, the book has plenty of endings and beginnings. The ending of Sutter's relationship with Cassidy, the beginning and end of his relationship with Aimee, the ending of his idolization of his father, the self-recognition of Sutter about some of his character flaws. Sure, he never addresses his alcohol issues but he comes to terms that he refuses to believe that he can't be loved and that he's selfish. There is no true resolutions but I think that that's what makes it realistic. If anything Sutter giving up Aimee when he doesn't want to is unrealistic. He could've very easily kept her in a long and eventually unhappy relationship, but he chose to let her go.

Compared to the Movie:
I will admit that I saw the movie only a few days before I actually decided to read the book. And in some ways I did enjoy the movie more because it was more hopeful. Aimee was perfectly chosen in Shailene Woodley. She really embodied the innocence and vulnerability of the character and especially how highly influenced she is by Sutter. She is so hopeful, I was actually glad that the part when Aimee reveals that a guy had taken advantage of her before was taken out. But in a way it made her even more vulnerable to Sutter so maybe it should've been included.

Anyway, I loved the movie more because it gave Sutter and Aimee a Romeo-and-Juliet feel. You want to be hopeful that their relationship will survive but you know if nothing changes, they are doomed from the start.

There are some scenes that are word for word came from the book.

I definitely recommend the movie, but I'm not entirely sure how I feel about the book yet. The two scenes that happened in both, I loved far more in the movie.

The first was the first time Aimee and Sutter had sex was sooo sweet and funny all at once. But at the same time it wasn't romanticized. It had enough raw and genuine moments that kept it from turning into one of those unrealistic, too romantic and perfect Hollywood-first-time-having-sex scenes. Haha, I'll admit that I watched this scene over and over. It was soooo well done.

There was also the scene when Aimee gets hit by that car after Sutter throws her out of his car on the highway. The book definitely doesn't do this scene justice but it's hard to do a scene like this with the right amount of words and description while pulling you into it at the same time. Anyway, go see this movie. I loved it so much it actually became one of my favorites. Go see it! Go read it! Just do it!