The Siren by Kiera Cass
Release Date: January 26, 2016
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: ALAMW16
Rating: 
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
From Kiera Cass, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Selection series, comes a sweeping stand-alone fantasy romance.
A girl with a secret.
The boy of her dreams.
An Ocean between them.Years ago, Kahlen was rescued from drowning by the Ocean. To repay her debt, she has served as a Siren ever since, using her voice to lure countless strangers to their deaths. Though a single word from Kahlen can kill, she can’t resist spending her days on land, watching ordinary people and longing for the day when she will be able to speak and laugh and live freely among them again.
Kahlen is resigned to finishing her sentence in solitude…until she meets Akinli. Handsome, caring, and kind, Akinli is everything Kahlen ever dreamed of.
Falling in love with a human breaks the Ocean’s rules. But for the first time in a lifetime of following the rules, Kahlen is determined to follow her heart. – Goodreads
Review:
I wanted to like this book. I did. But it took me over a month to read and that’s not a good sign. The Siren was a complete and utter snoozefest. Shortly through reading about 50 pages of this book, I texted my friend telling her it read like it was Cass’ first book. I want to make it clear, there is nothing wrong with that. There are many debut books I adore, but The Siren was not one of them. I am aware of the fact that this version is completely different than the original book she wrote, but that actually worries me more.
The Siren is the story of Kahlen and her instalove boyfriend, Akinli and here’s the thing: the instalove does not work. If it was a Disney movie, the instalove would have worked. But Cass never made their love work for me, to the point I thought it was pulling the story down. I would have much preferred a story about Kahlen finding herself because that I could have seen working.
What also didn’t work was Her. Her was too much like God for my liking and the parallel was not working for my liking and made me extremely uncomfortable. What also made me uncomfortable was how “perfect” Akinli was. There seemed to be no substance to him and I was not a fan of that. Give me a reason to root for you! Too often parts of The Siren were idealized and were not working for me.
While I was looking forward to reading a light, fluffy, read. I was highly disappointed and let down that it was anything but that.
Towering by Alex Flinn
Release Date: May 14, 2013
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: e-book from library
Rating: 
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
High in my tower I sit. I watch the birds fly below, the clouds float above, and the tall green forest stretch to places I might never see.
Mama, who isn’t my mother, has kept me hidden away for many years. My only companions, besides Mama, are my books—great adventures, mysteries, and romances that I long to make my reality. But I know that no one will come to save me—my life is not a fairy tale after all.
Well, at least no one has come so far. Recently, my hair has started to grow rapidly and it’s now long enough to reach the bottom of the tower from my window. I’ve also had the strangest dreams of a beautiful green-eyed man.
When Mama isn’t around, I plan my escape, even if it’s just for a little while. There’s something—maybe someone—waiting for me out there and it won’t find me if I’m trapped here Towering above it all. – Goodreads
Review:
I am here for your YA fairytale re-tellings. Give me all of them! This is why I was so excited to read Towering by Alex Flinn. Told in multiple POVs Towering is the story of, Rachel, who is stuck in a tower, Wyatt who is dealing with his own demons and Danielle’s diary entries. From Long Island, Wyatt is forced to move up north, to live in a small no-named town and live, with who we are lead to believe, is the town crazy, Ms. Greenwood. It’s a dark and drafty old house and the first thing he sees is a ghost.
You came here to get away from your problems, but instead, you’re stuck with an old lady and her long-dead ghosts” — pg 57, ebook
And that’s when we find out Wyatt’s demon is the fact that his best friend has recently died. His best friend has recently died and now he’s stuck in a home with, currently, no working wi-fi and cell reception. Wyatt isn’t too sure if he’s better off here.
“If you’re not the hero, does that make you a villain?” — pg 175, ebook
To be honest, there was nothing overly exciting about this book. What kept me hanging on was ultimately how the three POVs looped and weaved together. What ultimately happened was one of my least favorite YA tropes–instalove. (YAY!)
“I loved him. Though we had barely met, there was some power greater than me, greater than all, that bound him to me” — pg 260, ebook.
Ultimately this book fell flat for me. I wanted to love it. But in the end it was to convoluted for me to buy into the plot line, or the love story.
What We Saw by Aaron Hartzler
Release Date: September 22, 2015
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Edelweiss
Rating: (4.5)
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
Kate Weston can piece together most of the bash at John Doone’s house: shots with Stacey Stallard, Ben Cody taking her keys and getting her home early—the feeling that maybe he’s becoming more than just the guy she’s known since they were kids.
But when a picture of Stacey passed out over Deacon Mills’s shoulder appears online the next morning, Kate suspects she doesn’t have all the details. When Stacey levels charges against four of Kate’s classmates, the whole town erupts into controversy. Facts that can’t be ignored begin to surface, and every answer Kate finds leads back to the same question: Where was Ben when a terrible crime was committed?
This story—inspired by real events—from debut novelist Aaron Hartzler takes an unflinching look at silence as a form of complicity. It’s a book about the high stakes of speaking up, and the razor thin line between guilt and innocence that so often gets blurred, one hundred and forty characters at a time. – Goodreads
Review:
This book is a hard one to review, not because it’s a horrible book (it’s not), not because of the subject matter, or the writing or anything like that but because it was so well done. Hartzler used his first fiction book to tackle a tough subject, what happens if you’re at a party and someone is raped. Is staying silent the best thing? Should you question the status quo?
In What We Saw, Kate Weston is a normal teenage girl in a small down. She is trying to figure her life out in Iowa when everything changes. Not only does she get a boyfriend, someone she has known all of her life, but also a girl she knows accuses four boys from the basketball team of rape. Basketball in this town is God. It’s actually bigger than God, and these boys are looked upon as those who can get away with anything. They are literally untouchable.
With an unflinching writing style, Hartzler tackles not only high school, but also family, friendships, and what people do when they disappoint you. Kate was fine with her life. She was content with everything.
For a little while, I was just a girl watching her boyfriend playing backetball –excited and cheering -and wishing things could always be just that simple. —eARC 91%
But the more that people talk about the night of John Doone’s party the more Kate can’t just sit still. Even though her father request that she essentially stays complaisant she can’t. Kate actually becomes a vocal feminist for how wrong this is, particularly when it comes out that there was a video of the night, not just photos. And wait, where was Ben that night? Because he went back to the party right?
I found it fascinating that Hartlzer didn’t take the side of the girl who was raped. What We Saw is unnerving view of life on the outside, being one who wasn’t effected, but actually was effected more than they expected. Hartzler doesn’t take sides, what he does is create this world that the reader feels part of and feels pulled into. I started this book and finished it within 24 hours. Heck, even now I want to know more about what happened. I found it to be that good. This book won’t be leaving me for quite sometime.
The Heir (The Selection #4) by Kiera Cass
Release Date: May 5, 2015
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
Twenty years ago, America Singer entered the Selection and won Prince Maxon’s heart. Now the time has come for Princess Eadlyn to hold a Selection of her own. Eadlyn doesn’t expect her Selection to be anything like her parents’ fairy-tale love story. But as the competition begins, she may discover that finding her own happily ever after isn’t as impossible as she always thought. – Goodreads
Review:
I actually would have read this quickly after the original trilogy; however, the audiobook hold list often leads my fate. The Heir begins about two decades after The Selection and is the story of America’s first born, a daughter, named Eadlyn. Eadlyn is very much the opposite of America. She’s not warm, friendly, and doesn’t really have a thought outside of the box much like America did. America is very concerned about sunning outside, dress making and generally herself. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with this, the fact she is the next person to rule the country it’s semiproblematic when she does not worry about the fate of others.
Eadlyn is the first girl to rule her country and yet all she can do is complain about the fact that she’s older than her twin brother by seven minutes and those seven cruel minutes make her the older one that leads. Something she doesn’t want. She doesn’t care about those that live in the country. She doesn’t work. There isn’t one scene in The Heir in which she works. She’s proudly doesn’t work. While she’s not working, her father, Maxon, is proudly changing the country that America and him grew up in.
However, everyone is not so happy with the changes the King and Queen have made. There are many who are actually upset with the lack of caste system and because of this there is a bit of uproar occurring, much like the one that occurred in the original trilogy. Because of this uproar, King Maxon has begun to encourage Eadlyn to begin her own selection process.
To put it nicely Eadlyn fails at the selection process. Whatever she thinks is right, is wrong. Whatever she thinks is wrong, is right. And I get where Eadlyn is coming from. I have those own moments in my life often. It makes her human, but it also makes her seem like an ass to the public and she has no idea what they public hates her (they throw things at her on a parade).
I spent a lot of this novel wishing Cass would have focused on the true love story. I felt I called end game very early in the book and I would have preferred a story focused on them. I think The Heir could have been a better book if it would have stayed focused on them.
Will I read/listen to the next book? OF COURSE I WILL.
A Thousand Pieces of You (Firebird #1) by Claudia Gray
Release Date: November 4, 2014
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Personal//Audio from library
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
Every Day meets Cloud Atlas in this heart-racing, space- and time-bending, epic new trilogy from New York Times bestselling author Claudia Gray.
Marguerite Caine’s physicist parents are known for their radical scientific achievements. Their most astonishing invention: the Firebird, which allows users to jump into parallel universes, some vastly altered from our own. But when Marguerite’s father is murdered, the killer—her parent’s handsome and enigmatic assistant Paul—escapes into another dimension before the law can touch him.
Marguerite can’t let the man who destroyed her family go free, and she races after Paul through different universes, where their lives entangle in increasingly familiar ways. With each encounter she begins to question Paul’s guilt—and her own heart. Soon she discovers the truth behind her father’s death is more sinister than she ever could have imagined.
A Thousand Pieces of You explores a reality where we witness the countless other lives we might lead in an amazingly intricate multiverse, and ask whether, amid infinite possibilities, one love can endure. . – Goodreads
Review:
Real talk: I was in a book rut for about a month. A month of not being able to finish a book is..weird. Particularly for someone who reads…a lot. Because I’ve been sick for the past month finishing a book has not been a priority. Which is weird for me. Because reading is always what I know. This time life was full of sick and starting books but not finishing them because podcasts worked better for me. Basically I was confused. But since I’m on the mend, here I am. However, when I was at ALA this past month, my roommate talked up the book series A Thousand Pieces of You. If I’m being honest it was in part due to the covers. My friend and I adore the covers of this series, but I never got past those covers. You know how to be read piles are…they grow.
Then the book was described to me and I decided to finally read it. Thank you dear friend telling me to read this book. I got out of my book funk! It was so nice to finish a book! I felt powerful!
A Thousand Pieces of You is the story of Marguerite Caine, a girl who’s parents are physicist and known for their radical achievements. Something Marguerite knows she can never achieve, she is far more into the arts than the sciences, and that is something that her parents are totally okay with (which is awesome to see). It was also awesome to see parents being actual parents in a YA novel.
That being said, this is not a typical YA novel, because I found it to be an interesting multi-layered story that took place in many universes. Gray took us from present day USA to a London that is really close to ours, to a Russia that couldn’t be farther apart from present day Russia if we tried. Then we circled and came back to the USA, but again, wasn’t exactly the same. Through use of Marguerite’s parents and their creation of the firebird one is able to jump universes, this leads the reader to not know where they’re going to end up when they flip the page.
I also found Marguerite to be a true, fleshed out character. She was strong, she dealt with two boys, but it was never a true romantic triangle, it was Marguerite being a teen and figuring her shit out. Which is something that many go through.
This is one of those books I was drawn into right away, in part due to the audiobook. The narrator brought this book to life. Becasue the book takes places in various locals: London, Russia, United States, the internal converstations were always in American English, but when in London, she spoke with the proper accent. Something, if I was just reading would not have been the same.
Blood Will Tell (Point Last Seen #2) by April Henry
Release Date: June 16, 2015
Publisher: Henry Holt
Source: Publisher (THANKS!)
Rating: DNF. Page 165
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
When a woman’s body is found in a Portland park, suspicion falls on an awkward kid who lives only a hundred feet away, a teen who collects knives, loves first-person shooter video games, and obsessively doodles violent scenes in his school notebooks. Nick Walker goes from being a member of Portland’s Search and Rescue team to the prime suspect in a murder, his very interest in SAR seen as proof of his fascination with violence. How is this even possible? And can Alexis and Ruby find a way to help clear Nick’s name before it’s too late?
April Henry weaves another page-turning, high stakes mystery in Book 2 of the Point Last Seen series. – Goodreads
Review:
One of my favorite books of 2014, was The Body in the Woods, however Blood Will Tell was not one of my favorites of 2015. Unfortunately the love and appeal of the series that Henry had suck me into this series did not carry through this book for me. Blood Will Tell actually fell extremely flat. From the multiple POVs, to the story line, I unfortunately stopped caring. I was actually planning on finishing it, but I put it down and never remembered to pick it back up. I may pick it up again, but it won’t be anytime soon. I am interested in what happens to Nick, and probably wouldn’t have minded if this whole book was from his point of view, that may have helped the pacing for me.
Denton Little’s Deathdate (Denton Little #1) by Lance Rubin
Release Date: April 15, 2015
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
Source: Audiobook from library
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
Fans of John Green and Matthew Quick: Get ready to die laughing.
“Denton Little’s Deathdate” takes place in a world exactly like our own except that everyone knows the day on which they will die. For Denton, that’s in just two days–the day of his senior prom.
Despite his early deathdate, Denton has always wanted to live a normal life, but his final days are filled with dramatic firsts. First hangover. First sex. First love triangle–as the first sex seems to have happened not with his adoring girlfriend, but with his best friend’s hostile sister. (Though he’s not totally sure–see, first hangover.) His anxiety builds when he discovers a strange purple rash making its way up his body. Is “this” what will kill him? And then a strange man shows up at his funeral, claiming to have known Denton’s long-deceased mother, and warning him to beware of suspicious government characters. . . . Suddenly Denton’s life is filled with mysterious questions and precious little time to find the answers.
Debut author Lance Rubin takes us on a fast, furious, and outrageously funny ride through the last hours of a teenager’s life as he searches for love, meaning, answers, and (just maybe) a way to live on. – Goodreads
Review:
I’m not sure why I put this on hold at the library but I believe if I would have read the blurb I probably would not have put it on hold. The whole “fans of John Green” generally puts me off. Sad but true. And there was nothing wrong with this particular book; however, it is very clearly not an Ashley novel. It is an interesting concept though, what would you do if you knew what day you were going to die? Would that change anything?
As an audiobook this was fascinating because so many parts are painfully awkward and actually listening to them was painful, which made the book and the soon to be death…real. While I did enjoy Denton’s friendships, particularly with his BFF Paolo, I just was not overly drawn into the story. From the purple mark that was covering Denton and his friends, to the fact I ended the book with more questions than answers. That being said, the friendship between Denton and Paolo was so painfully real that I would love to have more of them.
The Cemetery Boys by Heather Brewer
Release Date: April 15, 2015
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Audiobook from library
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
Part Hitchcock, part Hinton, this first-ever stand-alone novel from Heather Brewer, New York Times bestselling author of the acclaimed Chronicles of Vladimir Tod series, uses classic horror elements to tell a darkly funny coming-of-age story about the dangerous power of belief and the cost of blind loyalty.
When Stephen’s dad says they’re moving, Stephen knows it’s pointless to argue. They’re broke from paying Mom’s hospital bills, and now the only option left is to live with Stephen’s grandmother in Spencer, a backward small town that’s like something out of The Twilight Zone. Population: 814.
Stephen’s summer starts looking up when he meets punk girl Cara and her charismatic twin brother, Devon. With Cara, he feels safe and understood—and yeah, okay, she’s totally hot. In Devon and his group, he sees a chance at making real friends. Only, as the summer presses on, and harmless nights hanging out in the cemetery take a darker turn, Stephen starts to suspect that Devon is less a friend than a leader. And he might be leading them to a very sinister end. . . . – Goodreads
Review:
The Cemetery Boys is my first Heather Brewer novel and unfortunately while I believe every book has a reader, I am not this books reader. I am also in a mood where I don’t like any book. But that is my own thing I’m dealing with. The Cemetery Boys is the story of Stephen, a boy who just had to move to a random, small town that no one lives in (really, population is 814..or now 816.) Stephen makes it very clear that it is a backwards town and he feels very uncomfortable there, which I understood because reading about the town made me extremely uncomfortable.
But that uncomfortable town, and Stephen’s backstory explain why Stephen makes a lot of the choices that he chooses. He really is just trying to survive, even if that is making obvious poor life choices. He’s still a teenagers and teenagers make poor life choices. Hell, adults make poor life choices. It’s a good book and extremely relate-able, it just didn’t work for me.
The One (The Selection #3) by Kiera Cass
Release Date: May 6, 2014
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Audio from Library
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
The time has come for one winner to be crowned.
When she was chosen to compete in the Selection, America never dreamed she would find herself anywhere close to the crown—or to Prince Maxon’s heart. But as the end of the competition approaches, and the threats outside the palace walls grow more vicious, America realizes just how much she stands to lose—and how hard she’ll have to fight for the future she wants. – Goodreads
Review:
The One starts off with a bang. Literally a bang from a rebel attack. What’s interesting is how much America wants Maxon the person, not Maxon the prince. Not realizing that, you know, they are one in the same. Maxon still makes me laugh by calling America out on her bullshit. It’s also heartbreaking to see how Maxon’s father, the King, continues to be a major asshole.
The One is very firmly a last novel in the series. What I found interesting was how much extra in the world building aspect occurred. We learned more about the country’s history and how the country became the country that America lives in. There is also action in this novel. From rebel attacks to gun fights, Cass wrote them all. Of course she also wrote about love.
At 25%, finally, finally America figures out she loves Maxon. Not a little bit. But finally jumps in and feels herself covered in his love. Then of course, he becomes closed off because his life is changing. What continues to be annoying is the fact neither one of them will say that they love each other. Each refuses to be the first person and because of this there is a lot of awkward gazes. He demands that she says that she loves him, she refuses until he gets rid of the other girls, he refuses to get rid of the other girls until she says she loves him.
Meanwhile, on the Aspen front, he is still annoyed that America is changing and constantly judging her while also “assisting” her. And although she now loves Maxon, she is still thankful to have a friend in Aspen. As a reader, it’s also painful to see that America hasn’t been honest with Maxon about Aspen, which one knows will probably come back to bite her. However, what did change however, was the friendship between the group of girls. Slowly as the game is crumbling, the girls bond together and actually become friends. It was nice to see the women become friends, and not consistently tearing each other down.
Family dynamics are also strong throughout The One. From Maxon’s family, including the asshole King, and the nice Queen to America’s family who in their own way are assholes. But in their own way, all families are assholes, it is what makes your family yours. Plus, family hide secrets from each other, and the family’s in The One are no different. It was refreshing to see.
Throughout this series, Cass is able to convey a range of emotions between friends and family that even if I don’t enjoy what’s going on, I understand and am thankful for her ability to convey those emotions.
The Elite (The Selection #2) by Kiera Cass
Release Date: April 23, 2013
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Audio from library
Rating: (2.5)
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
The selection began with 35 girls. Now, with the group narrowed down to the Elite, the competition to win Prince Maxon’s love is fiercer than ever. The closer America gets to the crown, the more she struggles to figure out where her heart truly lies. Each moment she spends with Maxon is like a fairy tale, filled with breathless, glittering romance. But whenever she sees her first love, Aspen, standing guard, she’s swept up in longing for the life they’d planned to share.
America is desperate for more time. But while she’s torn between her two futures, the rest of the Elite know exactly what they want—and America’s chance to choose is about to slip away – Goodreads
Review:
I feel like this could have been a solid middle book. It really had the chance to be. But America spent most of The Elite being overly wishywashy about what part of the love triangle she wants to be part of. Do we want Prince Maxon? Do we want Aspen? Do we want to be a Princess? Do we want to be with a guard? She knows from the very beginning of the book that she has to make a choice and she still doesn’t make one for the whole book.
I get it. It’s not easy to make a life choice. I respect that. But she early on decides that she’s going to choose Maxon. That’s it. Maxon has her heart. Oh wait. Not so fast, then she decides that it’s actually Aspen that she wants. It’s totally Aspen she wants. America is very insecure in the fact that Prince Maxon may love her. Because she doesn’t believe it anytime she sees him with another girl she questions why he would love her and not one of the more popular girls.
It quickly got old. What The Selection showed us was that America is a good person. From protecting her friends, to seeing her maids as people, it is made clear that America is different from the “rest” of the girls. She’s a different type of girl, which Maxon adores. What American seems to want is a completely different world and she doesn’t see how Maxon could be part of that world.
I guess my problem with The Elite is the fact that while full of action, I never once believed the love story between America and Maxon or America and Aspen. Since this series is so heavily based in the romance genre I just expected…more. The action was fairly active and the rebels were constantly threatening to tear down the walls of the palace, but I still wanted..something.
Will I be finishing this series? Of course I will be. I need to know how it ends!
The Selection (The Selection #1) by Kiera Cass
Release Date: April 24, 2012
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Personal Copy
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
For thirty-five girls, the Selection is the chance of a lifetime. The opportunity to escape the life laid out for them since birth. To be swept up in a world of glittering gowns and priceless jewels. To live in a palace and compete for the heart of gorgeous Prince Maxon.
But for America Singer, being Selected is a nightmare. It means turning her back on her secret love with Aspen, who is a caste below her. Leaving her home to enter a fierce competition for a crown she doesn’t want. Living in a palace that is constantly threatened by violent rebel attacks.
Then America meets Prince Maxon. Gradually, she starts to question all the plans she’s made for herself–and realizes that the life she’s always dreamed of may not compare to a future she never imagined. – Goodreads
Review:
After not one but two of my BFFs told me “ASHLEY READ THIS SERIES THIS IS A SERIES FOR YOU.” I have decided to give it a shot. Thanks library for your audiobook.
The Selection starts out easy enough. America Singer, lives in a caste system and has a chance to get out of the lower caste system. Of course America doesn’t want out of the system, she enjoys her life, her family, and the boy that she’s in love with, Aspen. A line that sets the feeling of the world she lives in is:
I hope you marry for love, and not a number.
That stayed with me throughout listening to The Selection and how much the caste system stayed with them. There seems to be two types of people in this world. Those who want to be chosen and those who just want to live without being part of the party. While America signs up (because of her mom), she has no interest in marrying the Prince. She just wants to be with Aspen, even though part of her knows that will never happen. Of course, it’s no surprise to the reader that America is chosen for the competition. America obviously does not care. She isn’t even putting that much effort into it, she’s actually just being herself, which is actually working in her favor when it comes to the public.
While America is dreading the thought of this game show spectacle and arranged marriage, Prince Maxon is fine with it. His parents met this way and they are perfectly happy. What I enjoyed was Prince Maxon calling America out on her bullshit, particularly when she doesn’t even try. I mean, day two the Prince asks if she has feelings for him. DAY TWO. I am all for love at first sight, and believe in it when it comes to me and a particular banjo playing hipster musician, but that is not the point.
What I found interesting was the dynamic between all the girls, and of course the dynamic between the Prince and America. The Prince, of course, knows just about nothing about the life in his country. The fact people have gone hungry is a shock to him. A legit shock. While I found use of particular tropes overrated, I did enjoy that the Prince and America seemed to organically fall in love. It wasn’t forced, there was a friendship, there was even jealousy. Although it has been used before, it was still nice to read.
The two of them are always there for each other, what America doesn’t expect is people from her past to appear at the castle and rock that friendship her life to the core. This book is nothing special and that is probably why I enjoyed it. It does have its problematic moments, and I believe if I would have read it instead of listening to it as an audiobook I probably would have quit. The narrator was A++ which helped me not quit.
Things We Know by Heart by Jessi Kirby
Release Date: April 21, 2015
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Edelewiss
Rating:
Buy It: Amazon | IndieBound
When Quinn Sullivan meets the recipient of her boyfriend’s donated heart, the two form an unexpected connection.
After Quinn loses her boyfriend, Trent, in an accident their junior year, she reaches out to the recipients of his donated organs in hopes of picking up the pieces of her now-unrecognizable life. She hears back from some of them, but the person who received Trent’s heart has remained silent. The essence of a person, she has always believed, is in the heart. If she finds Trent’s, then maybe she can have peace once and for all.
Risking everything in order to finally lay her memories to rest, Quinn goes outside the system to track down nineteen-year-old Colton Thomas—a guy whose life has been forever changed by this priceless gift. But what starts as an accidental run-in quickly develops into more, sparking an undeniable attraction. She doesn’t want to give in to it—especially since he has no idea how they’re connected—but their time together has made Quinn feel alive again. No matter how hard she’s falling for Colton, each beat of his heart reminds her of all she’s lost…and all that remains at stake.– Goodreads
Review:
Things We Know By Heart is the story of Quinn a girl living a simple life that is forever changed when her boyfriend dies. When he dies, his parents decided to donate his organs and Quinn finds closure with that. She reaches out to the people and slowly she begins to find closure and feels like there is a chance that she will be able to move on.
Everyone but one moves out, Trent’s heart. She doesn’t know why he won’t reach out to her but what she does know is she effected, almost offended by the fact that they won’t write back. She slowly uses the internet to find out more about who got his heart and finds out that he lives close to her. While Quinn sets herself to meet him, just once to feel better, for closure. What she didn’t know was that their lives would stay intertwined far longer than she expected them to.
She slowly falls in love with Colton. She forgets how many days it’s been since Trent died, she starts to live again, and she’s lost and confused. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She was supposed to be with with Trent forever, or at least in those throws of guilt, right? But life didn’t work that way for her. In his own way Colton saves her from herself. I will be the first to admit that I hate saying that. I hate saying that, but he does! Just like she saves Colton from himself. He is dealing with the aftermath of heart surgery, and while he doesn’t tell her everything about his own past, she is keeping things from him, also.
There is a falling out between the two, I mean she is keeping a big secret from him. She’s keeping the fact that he has her dead boyfriend’s heart. He deserves to know that!!! And he of course does find out, during a painful moment for both of them. What I enjoyed though was that Kirby made it work. While many would have made it be cliched and drawn out, I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the characters, and the “background” characters also. Quinn’s family was amazing and full of so much love for Quinn.
I loved and adored Kirby’s previous release, Golden, it was one of my favorite books of 2013. Things We Know By Heart is a different type of a book. A quieter novel. I also enjoyed seeing that Kirby’s writing has continued to grow from where she started.
yAdult Review 