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Slider

Pete Hautman

Slider is a witty story of a teen who loves to eat and he’s good at it too. 14-year-old David checks stats on all his favourite food competitors and their competitions. He finds out a half-eaten hot dog, eaten by one of his idols, is being sold online but he needs a credit card to purchase it. Through “borrowing” a credit card and setting up an automated bidding system he ends up the not so proud owner of a preserved old hot dog.

He has many bouts of bad luck throughout the plot and slowly gets into debt with his friends. He begins to train in eating and attempts competitions himself with slider burgers, pizza, and many other foods. David struggles to make plans to get the money back, some more realistic than others. All the same, no matter the quality of his plan he vows to earn the money back or his life will be ruined by spending so much. Food competitions aren’t always as they seem: there are rule changes, sabotage and sometimes the prize isn’t what you had expected. Making friends in some of his competitions at some points help him to up his ante and find new and gross food eating techniques.

David is also assigned to take care of his brother Mal who has autism and only speaks one word, “okay”. Mal doesn’t talk much or eat a variety but his feats in learning help push David for his brother’s sake. Things may not always be right but are sometimes the right things to do; this is a lesson David learns through experience and later presents closer to the end of the story.

Overall, Slider is a hilarious read that will make you laugh out loud and maybe look at burgers a little differently. It is a must-read for those who love comedy and are looking for a fun light read. – Zoe P.

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Top Ten

Katie Cotugno

This novel was written in the form of a single top ten list, the top ten moments of high school for Ryan and Gabby. They tell their side of the story for all ten moments and slowly piece together their friendship as a whole. Gabby is a socially awkward, shy, and a slight outcast. She has anxiety and hates parties no matter how many she goes to. Ryan is a hockey player and jock who likes to party with the many friends in his popular circle. Nothing can break these two best friends apart. No matter how much they resent each other and no matter how different they are, they are friends forever.

This book was written very nicely with sweet lovable characters. However, it was hard to follow with the timelines of the chapters because one moment of the ten takes place in their senior year and the next in freshman year 3 years earlier so you have to pay attention and remember what has happened already before that year and what comes later. Also, you are only told about ten moments of their friendship, but then you don’t get a full backstory nor a full view of how their day to day friendship was. I would definitely recommend Top Ten but beware of the timeline jumping back and forth. Also, because of them only discussing ten moments of four years of friendship, it’s hard to connect Gabby and Ryan’s stories together. You don’t even hear about how they first met in detail until quite far into the book but it ends up coming out like ten short stories of these characters of these two friends that are polar-opposites. A bit different than other books I’ve read, but good for fans of cute love stories. – Zoe P.

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Girl Online: Going Solo

Zoe Sugg

This is the third installment in the Girl Online trilogy by Zoe Sugg, continuing the story of Penny. Penny is introverted and shy but she slowly brings herself out of her comfort zone to build up her confidence and find herself in the messy world of being a teen. Still heartbroken, Penny and her rekindled friendship with Megan leads her to meet new friends, new boys and causes some commotion as always. Through photography, a private school musical of West Side Story, and a meet up with her friend Leah she brings together everyone and everything she cares about. This book represents finding yourself and building up the confidence to survive on your own.

A much slower storyline than the previous two books in the Girl Online series but after a large portion of the book it begins to get better. The main difference in this book is Noah, one of the previous main characters, has basically disappeared from the face of the earth and becomes more of a ghost character. In Girl Online: Going Solo, Penny must find her way on her own while struggling to help out everyone around her with their own issues. She is faced with a huge wedding in Ireland and it may not be the getaway she hoped it would be, and her escape route may have just turned into a hidden trap. No matter what happens to Penny she always finds a way to make the best of the situation in the hopes that everything will come together in the end. But happily ever after isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be.

Well written but a definite change from Girl Online and Girl Online On Tour. Zoe Sugg as always does an amazing job of showing that life is far from perfect but that those quirks in life build you and create who you are. – Zoe P.

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Turtles All The Way Down

John Green

Sixteen-year-old Aza never intended to pursue the mystery of fugitive billionaire Russell Pickett, but there is a hundred-thousand-dollar reward at stake and her Best and Most Fearless Friend, Daisy, is eager to investigate. Together, they navigate the short distance and broad divides that separate them from Russell Pickett’s son, Davis.

Aza is trying. She is trying to be a good daughter, a good friend, a good student, and maybe even a good detective, while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts.

In his long-awaited return, John Green, the acclaimed, award-winning author of Looking for Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, shares Aza’s story with shattering, unflinching clarity in this brilliant novel of love, resilience, and the power of lifelong friendship.

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Eleanor & Park

Rainbow Rowell

Eleanor and Park is a story about two people — a girl named Eleanor who is a little chubbier than the rest of the girls at her school and dresses funny as if she’s searching for attention. Park is a normal kid who has normal classes and a normal family, so the last thing he wants is Eleanor, the chubby girl who stares at him, to ruin this. Park and Eleanor go to school on the same bus, and start to bond over comics and music. Eleanor and Park learn things about each other that they never knew and tackle things like abuse and self recognition together. A story about how even two of the most separate and opposites of people can become close if they keep an open mind.

I personally thought this book was enjoyable but it had an awkward elevation by the middle. It started as if they hated each other and all of a sudden they unrealistically became crazy about each other. I didn’t enjoy that because it wasn’t very relatable; it was a good way to show how people sometimes can just click, but to me, it felt like it was forced and not a normal transition. There were some parts I really loved and some I just couldn’t handle. I have mixed feelings about this book but at the end of the day it was not bad. I had a good time reading it and I loved reading about Eleanor’s life because it made me realize that you don’t always know what’s happening in peoples lives and why they act they way that they do or dress in the way they do. It taught me to never be judgmental because nothing good comes from judgment. – Fatima S.

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The Knowing

Sharon Cameron

Samara is one of the Knowing, and the Knowing do not forget. Hidden deep in the comfort and splendor of her underground city, a refuge from the menace of a coming Earth, Samara learns what she should have never known and creates a memory so terrible she cannot live with it. She flees to Canaan, the lost city of her ancestors, to forget.

Beckett has flown through the stars to find a dream: Canaan, the most infamous social experiment of Earth’s antiquity. They find each other in the ruins of the lost city, and uncover so much more than he has ever bargained for — a challenge to all he has ever believed in or sworn to. When planets collide and memories clash, can Samara and Beckett save two worlds, and remember love in a place that has forgotten it?

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The Agony of Bun O’Keefe

Heather Smith

The year is 1986, in Newfoundland, and fourteen-year-old Bun O’Keefe has lived a solitary life in an unsafe, unsanitary house with her Mother who is a compulsive hoarder. Bun has had little contact with the outside world. What Bun has learned about life comes from the random books and old VHS tapes that she finds in the boxes and bags her mother brings home. Bun and her mother rarely talk, so when Bun’s mother tells Bun to leave one day, she does.

Hitchhiking out of town, Bun ends up on the streets of St. John’s, Newfoundland. Fortunately, the first person she meets is Busker Boy, a street musician who senses her naivety and takes her in. Together they live in a house with an eclectic cast of characters: Chef, a hotel dishwasher with culinary dreams; Cher, a drag queen with a tragic past; Big Eyes, a Catholic school girl desperately trying to reinvent herself; and The Landlord, a man who Bun is told to avoid at all cost. Through her experiences with her new roommates, and their sometimes tragic revelations, Bun learns that the world extends beyond the walls of her mother’s house and discovers the joy of being part of a new family — a family of friends who care.

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Invisibility

Andrea Cremer and David Levithan

No one has ever seen what Stephan looks like, and that includes himself. Stephan has been invisible his whole life because of a curse he knows nothing about. He was invisible when he was born, and he is still invisible now at the age of 16. His mother took care of him when his father left them when Stephan was just an infant. It wasn’t until Stephan’s mother died from the toll of taking care of Stephan, that he felt totally lost and helpless. The topic of why he was invisible was never brought up and he now has even more questions than before, with no one to answer them. No one knew he was there. No one could know he was there. He got used to living this life, with everyone totally oblivious that he existed.

As Stephan was sneaking in the elevator to go up to his apartment as he does every day, somebody new to the building notices him. Her name is Elizabeth, and she has no idea that he is visible only to her. Both of their worlds are flipped upside down as they find out more about this other world. A world that involves cursecasters, spellcasters, and spellseekers. Terrifying truths are revealed as these two award-winning authors keep readers guessing and developing theories after every page they turn.

This book takes you on a journey involving many questions that include misfortunes and lifelong grudges. I would recommend ‘Invisibility’ to anyone interested in fantasy and action books, along with some romance. . – Juliana M.

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Noteworthy - Riley RedgateNoteworthy

Riley Redgate

 

A cappella just got a makeover.

Jordan Sun is embarking on her junior year at the Kensington-Blaine Boarding School for the Performing Arts, hopeful that this will be her time: the year she finally gets cast in the school musical. But when her low Alto 2 voice gets her shut out for the third straight year—threatening her future at Kensington-Blaine and jeopardizing her college applications—she’s forced to consider nontraditional options.

In Jordan’s case, really nontraditional. A spot has opened up in the Sharpshooters, Kensington’s elite a cappella octet. Worshipped…revered…all male. Desperate to prove herself, Jordan auditions in her most convincing drag, and it turns out that Jordan Sun, Tenor 1, is exactly what the Sharps are looking for.

Jordan finds herself enmeshed in a precarious juggling act: making friends, alienating friends, crushing on a guy, crushing on a girl, and navigating decades-old rivalries. With her secret growing heavier every day, Jordan pushes beyond gender norms to confront what it means to be a girl (and a guy) in a male-dominated society, and—most importantly—what it means to be herself.

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