Title: A Separate Peace
Author: John Knowles
Genre: Classics; Young Adult; Academic; Literature
Goodreads Rating: 3.56/5 stars
Pages: 208 (Paperback)
Publisher: Scribner
Published: 2003 (Original publication: 1959)
Summary: Set at a boys boarding school in New England during the early years of World War II, A Separate Peace is a harrowing and luminous parable of the dark side of adolescence. Gene is a lonely, introverted intellectual. Phineas is a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. What happens between the two friends one summer, like the war itself, banishes the innocence of these boys and their world.
The short and mysterious summary for this story instantly grabbed my attention. And the fact that it is based during WWII, falls into my goal of wanting to continue to expand my awareness, as a reader and a human being, of the literature that addresses WWII.
Title: The Lovely Bones
Author: Alice Sebold
Genre: Fiction; Mystery; Young Adult; Contemporary; Fantasy
Goodreads Rating: 3.77/5 stars
Pages: 328 (Paperback)
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Published: April 20, 2004 (Original publication: 2002)
Summary: On her way home from school on a snowy December day in 1973, 14-year-old Susie Salmon ("like the fish") is lured into a makeshift underground den in a cornfield and brutally raped and murdered, the latest victim of a serial killer--the man she knew as her neighbor, Mr. Harvey.
I'm still baffled as to how The Lovely Bones is considered to be a Young Adult novel, considering the heavy and disturbing topic and content; further confusion was added when I realized that most bookstores and libraries shelve The Lovely Bones as an adult novel. The heavy and disturbing content is what kept me from picking this book up as a kid, even when my best friend - at the time - had been gushing about both the book and the film adaptation. So, I am glad that I'm finally getting around to this book. I'll probably even check out the movie after I read the book.
Title: The Story of a New Name
Author: Elena Ferrante
Series: Neapolitan Novels #2
Genre: Fiction; Cultural - Italy; Historical; European Literature; Italian Literature
Goodreads Rating: 4.37/5 stars
Pages: 471 (Paperback)
Publisher: Europa Editions
Published: September 3, 2013 (Original publication: 2012)
Summary: The second book, following last year’s My Brilliant Friend, featuring the two friends Lila and Elena. The two protagonists are now in their twenties. Marriage appears to have imprisoned Lila. Meanwhile, Elena continues her journey of self-discovery. The two young women share a complex and evolving bond that brings them close at times, and drives them apart at others. Each vacillates between hurtful disregard and profound love for the other. With this complicated and meticulously portrayed friendship at the center of their emotional lives, the two girls mature into women, paying the cruel price that this passage exacts.
I'm currently reading and loving Ferrante's first book in the Neapolitan Novels series, My Brilliant Friend, so I figured I'd go ahead and pick up the second book. I want to get through as much of the series as I can before HBO's TV series adaptation of My Brilliant Friend airs. HBO is aiming for a 2018 premier date for the highly-anticipated drama series.
Title: A Midsummer Night's Dream
Author: William Shakespeare
Genre: Classics; Plays; Fiction; Drama; Fantasy
Goodreads Rating: 3.94/5 stars
Pages: 280 (Paperback)
Publisher: Barnes Noble Shakespeare
Published: July 26, 2007 (Original publication: 1595)
Summary: In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare stages the workings of love. Theseus and Hippolyta, about to marry, are figures from mythology. In the woods outside Theseus’s Athens, two young men and two young women sort themselves out into couples—but not before they form first one love triangle, and then another.
Also in the woods, the king and queen of fairyland, Oberon and Titania, battle over custody of an orphan boy; Oberon uses magic to make Titania fall in love with a weaver named Bottom, whose head is temporarily transformed into that of a donkey by a hobgoblin or “puck,” Robin Goodfellow. Finally, Bottom and his companions ineptly stage the tragedy of “Pyramus and Thisbe.”
The Barnes and Noble editions of Shakespeare's work are my favorite, because they offer up a happy medium between Shakespeare's language and modern language. That happy medium allows the reader to thoroughly understand the play, while making sure to not detract from the atmosphere and the culture of the time period. I'm excited to finally be able to reread A Midsummer Night's Dream, and to determine if it's still my favorite Shakespearean play.
Title: The You I've Never Known
Author: Ellen Hopkins
Genre: Realistic Fiction; Young Adult
Goodreads Rating: 3.92/5 stars
Pages: 608 (Hardcover)
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Published: January 24, 2017
Summary: For as long as she can remember, it’s been just Ariel and Dad. Ariel’s mom disappeared when she was a baby. Dad says home is wherever the two of them are, but Ariel is now seventeen and after years of new apartments, new schools, and new faces, all she wants is to put down some roots. Complicating things are Monica and Gabe, both of whom have stirred a different kind of desire.
Maya’s a teenager who’s run from an abusive mother right into the arms of an older man she thinks she can trust. But now she’s isolated with a baby on the way, and life’s getting more complicated than Maya ever could have imagined.
Ariel and Maya’s lives collide unexpectedly when Ariel’s mother shows up out of the blue with wild accusations: Ariel wasn’t abandoned. Her father kidnapped her fourteen years ago.
What is Ariel supposed to believe? Is it possible Dad’s woven her entire history into a tapestry of lies? How can she choose between the mother she’s been taught to mistrust and the father who has taken care of her all these years?
In bestselling author Ellen Hopkins’s deft hands, Ariel’s emotionally charged journey to find out the truth of who she really is balances beautifully with Maya’s story of loss and redemption. This is a memorable portrait of two young women trying to make sense of their lives and coming face to face with themselves—for both the last and the very first time.
Maya’s a teenager who’s run from an abusive mother right into the arms of an older man she thinks she can trust. But now she’s isolated with a baby on the way, and life’s getting more complicated than Maya ever could have imagined.
Ariel and Maya’s lives collide unexpectedly when Ariel’s mother shows up out of the blue with wild accusations: Ariel wasn’t abandoned. Her father kidnapped her fourteen years ago.
What is Ariel supposed to believe? Is it possible Dad’s woven her entire history into a tapestry of lies? How can she choose between the mother she’s been taught to mistrust and the father who has taken care of her all these years?
In bestselling author Ellen Hopkins’s deft hands, Ariel’s emotionally charged journey to find out the truth of who she really is balances beautifully with Maya’s story of loss and redemption. This is a memorable portrait of two young women trying to make sense of their lives and coming face to face with themselves—for both the last and the very first time.
Hopkins' latest book was published earlier this year, and it's already receiving a storm of mixed reviews. I devoured a good amount of Hopkins' books when I was in high school, so it's been a few years since I've read anything by her, even though I've been wanting to reread my favorites by her. I'm interested in seeing if I still love her work.
Title: Homegoing
Author: Yaa Gyasi
Genre: Historical; Fiction; Cultural-Africa; Literary Fiction
Goodreads Rating: 4.4/5 stars
Pages: 320 (Paperback)
Publisher: Vintage Books
Published: May 2, 2017 (Original publication: June 7, 2016)
Summary: Ghana, eighteenth century: two half sisters are born into different villages, each unaware of the other. One will marry an Englishman and lead a life of comfort in the palatial rooms of the Cape Coast Castle. The other will be captured in a raid on her village, imprisoned in the very same castle, and sold into slavery.
Homegoing follows the parallel paths of these sisters and their descendants through eight generations: from the Gold Coast to the plantations of Mississippi, from the American Civil War to Jazz Age Harlem. Yaa Gyasi's extraordinary novel illuminates slavery's troubled legacy both for those who were taken and those who stayed--and shows how the memory of captivity has been inscribed on the soul of our nation.
Homegoing is one of my most anticipated reads from the past year. The only reason I didn't scoop this book up as soon as it was published in 2016 is because I prefer paperbacks to hardbacks. I'm beyond excited to dive into Gyasi's debut novel!
Let me know if you spotted any favorites or any books that you've been looking forward to reading.
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