Author: laalana

Why We Fly by Kimberly Jones and Gilly Segal

Why we fly is a book about these two cheerleaders. One cheerleader named Elenor had a terrible accident and got a very bad concussion and was out for the rest of the season. Her best friend Chanel went to cheer camp over the summer while Elenor was stuck in PT all summer. When Eleanor was in PT her eye catches Franklin High’s record-breaking quarterback. While Chanel is gone the boy and Eleanor hang out every day. They drive to PT together and even flirt on and off. Chanel and Eleanor are best friends so when Eleanor gets named team captain Chanel kinda steps back and focuses on herself. Then we meet Cody, He is on the news for taking a knee at the game. Inspired by Cody and a lot of the other comments on the team, Eleanor decides to let the whole cheer team take a knee during the National Anthem at the game which gets them kicked off the field. The only person who gets suspended is the only person of color on the team which is Chanel. That gets a lot of hate and that affects her life after high school and Eleanor feels responsible and terrible for how everything went down. 

This book is such an inspiring book, it shows a side of Eleanor and a side of Chanel and I never got confused about whose world I was in. I really hope people read this book with a clear mind. The ending was surprising but overall it was an amazing book. Even if you have no clue what cheerleading is or have an idea about cheerleading but have never played, you can still read this book because there’s a bigger picture to it.

Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu

In the book Moxie, the protagonist Viv Carter creates the first edition of MOXIE. She is tired of the boys at her school thinking they can say whatever and do whatever they want to the girls at the school. The girls that supported moxie drew a star or a heart on their hand to show that they are with it. In the book, they do a lot of protests, one was they wore a bathrobe to school to show the unfair dress code the girls have and the boys don’t really have one. Some boys also support the moxie movement but this one boy Seth that Viv starts a romance with fully supports and helps her with the cause. The more motivated the girls get with this movement the more the school administrators try to stop them. One girl decides to step up and tell the school that the principal wouldn’t listen to her when she told him that one of the boys on the football team raped her, the moxie girls decided to risk it all with a school-wide walkout. 

This is a very good book, it’s a coming-of-age feminist story. It has a very powerful message to girls and boys today. It shows that no matter what happens the truth always comes out and that sometimes the dress code or whatever it is, it’s not fair to the women. This book covers heavier topics than some people can handle, and so if there is any possibility that it might trigger something from your past I wouldn’t read it but it is a really empowering book about the school system and sexual assault, it doesn’t really go in detail with some of it which it’s good but it gives you enough information to give you a good idea on what is going on 

The Opposite of Here By Tara Altebrando

The Opposite of here is about this girl named Natalie who loses her boyfriend in a terrible accident so her parents book a cruise for her birthday and she brings her 3 best friends. While she is on the ship her friends tell her to let loose and have some fun. Natalie wanders off and meets this new guy and then he disappears on her, she is worried about him because the ship orders a “routine” headcount. Natalie does a lot of searching to figure out what happened to the guy, she even meets his twin brother. The guy’s brother tells Natalie to give it up and do not contact the other brother at all. In the end, it takes a huge twist, like I did not see any of that coming. 

I really liked this book, She is a really great writer for mystery books. I have loved all the books she has written. The books are really suspenseful, especially this one. I had no clue what was going to happen next. This book is definitely a page-turner. If you like suspenseful books that actually occur in the summertime with a group of friends you would really love this book.

YA Grows Up

This article talks about how these “YA” books are published, why they are so appealing, what the distinction is, and who crossover books are for. There is a huge debate between what is a young adult book and what is an adult book. The publishers just seek which will make more profit. Many adults still read the books that are marked as young adult books, there is always a fine line between which is which. The young adult books are not about what age the main character is, it’s about the emotions and if teenagers today can relate to those emotions.

I feel like young adult books should as the writer said have an age group, there’s a difference between a 20-year-old and a 40-year-old. if a young adult book is relating to teenage problems why would the protagonist be 4o years old? Also, I’m not too fond of the way the article states that whatever audience gets more buyers that’s the way the publishers go. There are still problems with young adult and adult books and how to categorize each of them.

Works Cited:

Hershberger, Katy. “YA Grows up: More Older Teen Protagonists Are Stepping into Adulthood.” School Library Journal, vol. 67, no. 4, Apr. 2021, p. 32. EBSCOhost, discovery.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=cd0a4caa-52b2-3040-a8f4-3b6ea6bfd92a.

The Camelot Betrayal By Kiersten White

“Every knot, every spell, every piece of magic had a cost” pg 26

The Camelot Betrayal is the second book in this series and it’s about Queen Guinevere and King Arthur. No magic is allowed in Camelot until Arthur makes an exception when he allows Guinevere to be his Queen. Only certain people know that Guinevere is a witch and they want to keep it that way. Now that Mordred is gone, Guinevere makes sure the kingdom is safe by putting magic down so no magic creatures can come through. Guinevere faces all these obstacles, one being she can’t seem to find her place in Camelot. She is starting to lose who she was before she was Guinevere. Guinevere takes up a quest to go save Branigan’s love Isolde, when Guinevere is doing so, all these things happen and result in making more of a mess than what was supposed to happen. This changes the whole course of the book and brings it to a surprising end.

I really liked the first book in this series so I decided to read the second one and I was not disappointed. This book is a great read, even if you didn’t read the first book I feel like you would still get a good understanding of this book which I think is really amazing. This book is sometimes boring and you feel like you don’t want to finish it but trust me when I say you are gonna wanna finish it.

This book would be good for people who are interested in books about not feeling like you belong with the aspect of magic in it as well.

The Leaving by Tara Altebrando

The Leaving is about these 6 kids that got taken just to randomly show up 11 years later without any memory of the 11 years they were gone. The biggest question of all is what happened to the 6th kid that never turned up. The book is all about these kids trying to figure out what happened to them during the 11 years and why didn’t the last kid come home with them. Lucas and Scarlett two of the 5 that came back start looking for the clues to figure out who they were. The little boy that did not come home, his sister Avery is determined to find out what happened to him and why he didn’t return with the others.

I really loved this book, there were some boring parts and some parts that were confusing but overall I could not put this book down when I read it. The chapters are Scarlett, Avery, and Lucas, this is a great layout because it shows us those 3 kids’ thoughts through all this. Scarletts chapters were my favorite because they showed the spirling of her memories trying to come back.

You would really like this book if you are into mysteries about the trauma and identity that comes with losing your memory you will really like this book. Also, if you like books that solve the underlying mystery and don’t just talk about it and then skip over it to the bigger mystery this book would be for you.