The Dead Boyfriend by R.L. Stine

Oh, yes, you saw the title, and you know I'm back with more R.L. Stine. I'm actually pretty mad at myself because I realized that this is number five of the Fear Street relaunch and I missed number four! Thank goodness for my Kindle, because I can have it within second and then I'll finish it in hours.

R.L. Stine's Fear Street series is back, and in The Dead Boyfriend, he tells the frightening tale of teenage love - and how it can do terribly, murderously wrong.

Caitlyn has never had a real boyfriend before. When she starts seeing Blade, she throws herself into the relationship with fervor. She ignores her friends who warn her that Blade may be a phony and that she is taking the whole thing too seriously. Caitlyn is smitten. She doesn't care if she loses her friends. All she wants is Blade. When Caitlyn approaches Blade with another girl, she completely loses it. She snaps. Everything goes red. When she comes back to her senses, she realizes that Blade is dead - and she has killed him.

But if Blade is dead, how is he staring at her across a crowded party?




Okay, that's the synopsis from Goodreads, and I fixed it to include the fact that Blade is Blade and not Colin, and Caitlin is Caitlyn. Also, I love the fact that R.L. Stine was like, yes, I'll name him Colin, oh wait, it's going to presses? Okay, Blade it is!

I'm pretty sure my last post summed up my gushing adoration for R.L. Stine and his Fear Street books, so we can sidestep that this time.

Poor little Caitlyn. All she wants is to spend every waking moment with her new boyfriend Blade, and her friends are telling her silly things like, slow down! or, maybe you should get to know this guy before you jump into a relationship with him. No way, says Caitlyn! I love him and he loves me! We're going grocery shopping together! But when she spots him with another girl, Caitlyn kind of loses it and ends up stabbing him multiple times. When Deena Fear {yes, a FEAR, and an absolutely psycho one at that, and I love her with my whole heart} says that she can get Blade to come to Caitlyn {er...and Deena, too}, Caitlyn doesn't know if she wants that. Blade could come back and start pointing fingers or he could, in Deena's daydream, drop Caitlyn forever and be with Deena, because, you know, she saw him first.

As a former teenager, I connect with this on a deep level. I'm being serious. For me in high school, I thought I was going to marry my boyfriend. We got together and three weeks in, I broke up with him because I honest to god thought to myself, is this someone you could see spending the rest of your life with?

Like, what? Bree, sweetheart, get a grip.

But when you're fifteen and the guy is super cute, you do think things like that. {PS, we stayed together all through high school and then broke up my senior year. It's okay, my boyfriend now is way cuter, which is all that matters, right?} This book just takes it to the extreme. Caitlyn goes a bit nuts when she sees Blade with a new girl and {spoiler alert} most of the stabbing isn't her fault. Wait, is it really a spoiler when that doesn't seem to make any sense? I guess?

I understand a lot of the reviews on Goodreads. The ending is a typical R.L. Stine ending: what the heck just happened, and why can't I find out the rest? But I love that. I love those horror movies where the ending is open, but you know that there won't be another one because the director or writer or whoever doesn't do sequels. It opens up your imagination to the endless possibilities of what could happen, and I think that's the best.

A lot of people also said that they would love this book if they were younger or whatever. I gave this book five stars because it made me remember what it was like reading at a younger age. If this was a book by someone else that I had stumbled across in a bookstore? Yeah, I probably wouldn't have rated it so high. But because it's R.L. Stine and I knew what to expect from one of his stories and I knew that I would recapture that whimsical feeling of reading an "older" book when I was much younger than the characters...yeah, that totally deserves five stars in my book.

Is this book a masterpiece set for the Pulitzer Prize? No. But is it a fun, slightly scary distraction from life? Heck yes, and that is something that I DESPERATELY needed this week. So if you pass one of the Fear Street relaunch books in your library and you remember what it was like to go into the bookstore of your choice {Crown Books for me, where I later ended up getting my first job}, bypass the kids' section because you were ~*too cool*~, and then spend hours in front of the young adult books that you knew your parents would frown at {but buy you one anyway because they're awesome like that}, then grab it. Grab it, read it in a few hours, and remember what it's like to be a kid again.

Every Falling Star by Sungju Lee

Good Monday, everyone! I figured I'd start the week off right by reviewing Every Falling Star, one of the most captivating books I've read in quite some time. And it all started with a mistake.

Every Falling Star, the first book to portray contemporary North Korea to a young audience, is the intense memoir of a North Korean boy named Sungju who is forced at age twelve to live on the streets and fend for himself. To survive, Sungju creates a gang and lives by thieving, fighting, begging, and stealing rides on cargo trains. Sungju richly re-creates his scabrous story, depicting what it was like for a boy alone to create a new family with his gang, his “brothers”; to be hungry and to fear arrest, imprisonment, and even execution. This riveting memoir allows young readers to learn about other cultures where freedoms they take for granted do not exist.






When I requested this book from NetGalley, I basically requested the wrong book. I had several tabs open and forgot which ones I wanted, so I just requested the lot of them. When I received my approval, I thought I was going to read a YA fictional love story.

Constantly reminding myself that all the situations written in this book really happened was a mistake. I had to stop multiple times because I was either crying or irrationally angry. How could a government not care about their people like this? How could these boys - literally, boys, they were barely old enough to be called tweens - survive the harsh streets of a country that doesn't look out for their own? They had to fight for everything they wanted, even if it was only a piece of bread. 

Sungju's parents abandoned him at twelve, but not because they wanted to. His father, who we find out is closely tied to the government, moves his family from the fairy tale Pyongyang to Gyeong-Seong, a place of forgotten people. From there, Sungju's father leaves in order to find better work, but doesn't return. His mother heads to her sister's house to find food, but it's quickly learned that she doesn't seem to be coming home, either. Instead of death, Sungju chooses to form a gang with his friend Young-bum. From this point on, Sungju's life becomes one of the streets, a life where he steals what he needs and only watches out for his brothers, the other members of his gang.

I can't even imagine this kind of life, but Sungju seemed to blend seamlessly into it. He continued to make mistakes, but he learned from them and taught others so that they would not suffer the same consequences. At one point, Sungju and his gang are thrown into a type of jail where they witnessed death each morning and heard unspeakable horrors coming from the girls' quarters. 

This was one of those parts I had to take a few minutes for myself.

The good news is that Sungju has a better life now. I don't want to say too much in case people haven't read about him {I actually Googled him halfway through the book because I wanted to make sure that he received everything his heart desires}, but he's doing amazing things with his life now. His is a terrible, sad story, but, like those mistakes he made, he learned from his life and now lives in order to make other lives better. One of the most amazing facts I learned about him, though, is that he's only a year younger than me. Imagine: when I was learning how to do my own laundry and make English muffin pizzas, he was fighting other gangs over food and shelter. It makes you stop and put your life into perspective.

This book choice may have started as a mistake, but it's the best mistake I've made in awhile. I started it on the plane back from Boston, then didn't pick it up again until this week, and I read the last half of it in one night. You want everything to be okay, and you trick yourself into hoping that maybe this is a YA fictional novel, that maybe everyone gets out okay. Warning: not everyone does, and it's heartbreaking. 

Please, read this book. If for nothing else, then this: Sungju was twelve in 1996, only twenty years ago. He only finds a new life in 2001, my high school graduation year These sad stories are still happening in North Korea, and I hope that this book will convince people to rad more about what's happening there. The people there need help, and Sungju is doing what he can do help them. I think that more than anything made a happy ending.

Killshot (Icarus #1) by Aria Michaels

Hey hey everyone! Sorry I've been MIA {haven't we all heard this before?}. I've been searching for a new job and stressing about my current job and dealing with things that seem to just stick around no matter how many times I try to get rid of them, so I haven't really been in the reading mood. But now I've sent out about a thousand and one applications and the current job is still stressful. At least I'm reading!

After the death of their parents, seventeen year old Liv Larson and her younger brother are separated by the foster care system. Her grades slip, her friends drift away, and she gives up on her plans for college. The only thing that matters is keeping the promise to get back to her brother. After months of solitude and anti-social behavior, Liv's best friend Riley drags her to their high school's rooftop solar flare party. Despite the beautiful lights dancing in the sky, Liv finds herself captivated by Zander, a mysterious boy with a crooked smile. For a few hours, she allows herself to feel normal again. 

That is until what should have been a small flare erupts into a massive solar storm. Cut off from the rest of the world with no sign of rescue, fear and paranoia begin to take their toll on the group. Battle lines are drawn and their ranks are divided. Soon, those left behind must embark on a perilous journey to save one of their own…but, something sinister awaits them in the shadows and it’s undeniably connected to Liv. 

Can she keep her promise to reunite with her brother? What are Liv and her friends willing to do to survive? Will their bravery and determination be enough to save them all from a rogue military unit, a terrifying virus, and the things that go bump in the night? 

Or was Icarus really the KILLSHOT?

Okay, this book has been out forever now, but I get the awesome chance to review the second book, so I jumped right on this one.

First off, can we talk about the author's name? Aria. ARIA. How beautiful is that? It also conjures up images of a certain badass Stark, so there's never anything wrong with that name.

Now we can get into the book.

Liv has problems, with a capital P. Her parents died, leaving her younger brother Beans and her to be split up into different foster homes. Liv makes a {temporary} home with the Tate's and her foster sister, Riley. She even meets Zander, an adorable and secretive boy that falls just as hard as her. But all that is shot to hell when solar storm Icarus hits, bringing with it a terrifying disease that burns people from the inside. Those that are "lucky" enough to escape that fate turn into "leeches," a zombie-like creature that only bows to an alpha. Lucky for Liv and her friends, they just happen to be traveling with an alpha.

Right off the bat, I loved this book because it took something only seen in science fiction and made it real. Liv and her friends camp out in the basement of their high school, trying to figure out a plan, and it's there that my favorite thing happens: they split up. Some of them don't believe in Liv and her plan, and they think that the best way to survive is to split up. What about this did I love so much? Ms. Michaels split up a couple, a couple that was deep in love, because one side of the pair believed in something more than Liv. Like, what! People that are in relationships have different beliefs and don't just blindly follow each other?! When did this happen? I loved it. I absolutely loved that they picked sides and then went on with their lives, trying their best o survive.

The relationship between Liv and Zander is hot and, more importantly, equal. After Icarus, the two of them change in ways that they could have never imagined, and yet they make it work. They support each other in all things and collaborate on plans. Even when Zander is all, no way, Liv, you can't do that, she's like, shut your beautiful face, Zander, I'm doing it. And he watches her go. Not only is it romantic, but it's real. I love them. And if I read the second book and something bad happens to one of them, I'm retracting my statements about loving Ms. Michaels' name.

Oh god, I'm just kidding. I'm not like that. Her name will forever be gorgeous. I'll just be really, really, REALLY sad. Was that enough really's to convince you guys that I'm not insane? Good.

Mysteries also pop up while the group makes their way through the neighboring towns in search of their families. The army shows up, to help? Maybe? You would think, right? Yeah, I did, too, until it turns around that our government might just be as corrupt as we think it is. 

Okay, now that I've worked myself into a lather, I'm going to get out of here and start the second book. I'll pop in here again next week, maybe even a couple of times, so I'll give you ample warning before I post about the second book. Promise!

Leave Me by Gayle Forman

Hello hello everyone! I hope you're all having a wonderful day, whatever day that may be in your time zone. For me, it's Wednesday, which means I'm halfway through the week and that much closer to another weekend. Sometimes I wish that everyday was a weekend, but then I don't think I'd survive much longer without money. Sigh.

But if you need a little pick me up today, I have it right here with Leave Me by Gayle Forman!

For every woman who has ever fantasized about driving past her exit on the highway instead of going home to make dinner, for every woman who has ever dreamed of boarding a train to a place where no one needs constant attention--meet Maribeth Klein. A harried working mother who's so busy taking care of her husband and twins, she doesn't even realize she's had a heart attack.

Afterward, surprised to discover that her recuperation seems to be an imposition on those who rely on her, Maribeth does the unthinkable: She packs a bag and leaves. But, as is so often the case, once we get to where we're going, we see our lives from a different perspective. Far from the demands of family and career and with the help of liberating new friendships, Maribeth is finally able to own up to secrets she has been keeping from those she loves and from herself.

With big-hearted characters who stumble and trip, grow and forgive, Leave Me is about facing our fears. 

Honesty time: I've only read one of Gayle Forman's books. I know, I'm a terrible person. She's absolutely everywhere and everyone raves about her books, but I've only gotten around to one. I really liked that one, but I, like so many others, assumed that she only wrote young adult fiction. I was sort of right, because this is her adult fiction debut, and she nails it.

Maribeth is a harried mother of young twins, a wife to a man she suspects doesn't really care anymore, and an employee to her best friend who feels more like a boss than anything nowadays. It's no surprise when she mistakes her heart attack for indigestion, because she does not have time to take care of herself when there are so many others to take care of. Once she checks into the hospital, though, Maribeth realizes that she has to start taking care of herself if she wants to survive. So she leaves, traveling to Pittsburgh to start a new life, even if it's just for a short amount of time. There, she makes new friends and meets a new doctor that could do more than just save her life.

The way that this book is set up makes you really step into Maribeth's shoes. At first, I was so glad when Maribeth left. I was hoping she would leave her house before she even thought about leaving. Her twins are demanding, with one of them a little brat and the other a mommy's boy, and they don't seem to understand that their mother's life was threatened. Then there's Jason, her husband. He helps for a few days, but then expects everything to get back to normal and, when they don't, he becomes mean. I shoved Maribeth out of that house so hard that I'm surprised she didn't stumble to the train station.

But once she's gone, I started to think about what she had done. She had left her children in the care of a father that didn't know what to do. Maribeth had taken care of everything in that house, and Jason was at a loss. It wasn't entirely his fault, because Maribeth is one of those people that doesn't ask for help. Jason didn't know what to do because Maribeth had never told him what to do, which is annoying, but understandable for some couples. 

I think this was the ultimate "stepping away from the fight." You know how you're supposed to take a few minutes to yourself when you're fighting with someone? And then you can see both sides and come to a peaceful resolution? Maribeth just took that to the extreme. She travels nearly four hundred miles to get away from her family and her life, and it takes a little while before she understands the magnitude of her life. She has had a heart attack and she has left her family. She gets so angry when she realizes that Jason never emails her to see where she is or what she's doing, but the reason for that humbles her. I think, in fights, we always want to be the right one, the victim, as it were, and when we realize that some of the fight could be our fault, we suddenly remember that we're human, that we make mistakes, and that's a terrifying idea. Maribeth and Jason don't talk to each other much, due to their busy lives, and living to Pittsburgh, while a huge step, ends up being one of the best things for their relationship.

The characters are written in such a way that you see them in Maribeth's light for most of the book, and then you begin to form your own opinions when they begin speaking back to her. You realize that friends aren't really friends or that someone you thought was a complete jerk is just terrified of everything. Maribeth's Pittsburgh friends, Sunny and Todd, are the best because they accept Maribeth into their little circle without a question. They know that she's hiding things and that she's not who she says she is, but they don't care. They know that she'll tell them everything in due time. Dr. Grant, Maribeth's doctor in Pittsburgh, is a sweet, slightly damaged man that means the world to Maribeth during this time. 

Overall, this is probably one of my favorite books I've read this summer, and I'm glad that I didn't wait on this one. It comes out September 13, so there's a bit of a wait for everyone else, but it'll be worth it when you snap it up on that day!

Where Is She Now?

Wow, I feel like it's been months since I've last seen this blog, but it's only be a few weeks. I have a few reviews lined up that will roll out this week, but I figured I should probably update this thing so you people don't think it's just a chicken typing out the reviews. Although, that's something I'm going to look for in the future {hastily googles typing chicken}.

This whole summer has gone by in a blur. A hot, sweltering, disgustingly sweaty blur. That's one main reason I've been staying away from my computer lately. Moving two inches to the left would cause my entire body to melt, so I've been doing my best to stay in the pool or in front of a fan. Thankfully, the weather has finally broken {for, like, two days}, so I'm getting everything I need done this weekend. I don't think it's supposed to be like the inside of an active volcano this week, but who knows. Southern California does like to surprise its residents.

The first night at Fenway for Pearl Jam.

Speaking of sweat {I know, right}, I spent most of last week in Boston. The boy got tickets to Pearl Jam at Fenway {sorry Yankee loving Bree from a thousand years ago} and we've always wanted to visit Boston, so it was a no brainer. It was all kinds of humid there and my hair was a puddle of sweat the moment we stepped out of the hotel, but it was awesome. Something about Boston brings out the American pride in me. We went to Cheers, which was surreal and so delicious. Like, I watched Cheers relentlessly as a kid because I convinced myself that I would grow up and marry Sam Malone. This was obviously before I understood that television shows were not real.

The oh so beautiful Cheers sign outside of the downstairs bar/restaurant

Then my boyfriend was a good sport and we drove to Salem to see the witch museum and to walk around the downtown area, which reminded us of a strange witchy Disneyland. Salem held a special draw for me, because I was that weird kid in elementary school that was slightly obsessed with the Salem Witch Trials, and I'm also in the midst of writing a book that deals with aforementioned trials. It's been floating around in my head {and my computer} for a few years now, and being in Boston only pushed me more into writing it. It's gone through some major revisions, more of which I'll talk about as the story develops.

The tour was kind of weird, but I was just excited to be there.

We also drove to New Jersey to watch the Bayern Munich-Real Madrid game, which was a dream come true. I've been wanting to go see a Bayern game for years and when the opportunity arose, we snatched up tickets. It really served to remind me why I don't like going to sporting events in America, but we had a good time, even though Bayern did lose.

My boys

The only downer of the trip came on Monday. Two things really did it, but we're going to start with the less depressing. We flew Delta. In case that means nothing to you, let me elaborate: Delta had some kind of power outage in Atlanta on Monday morning and that affected a bajillion flights, including ours. But we didn't know that until we stepped into the airport. So they got us on another flight, seven and a half hours later. We landed in Salt Lake City around midnight, where we had to make sure our luggage was moved to the correct flight and find someone who would get us the hotel room that we had been promised back in Boston. Well, we found our luggage. The hotel room, however...not so lucky. Our flight left at six in the morning, so the boy and I figured that sleeping in the airport wouldn't be too bad. It wasn't...until two in the morning, when we found out that our six a.m. flight had been cancelled. Fast forward to three a.m., after a temper tantrum by both the boy and me, several unhelpful employees, and three ridiculous flights that didn't leave for sixteen hours, and then someone finally got us on an Alaska Airlines flight at six in the morning. Twenty hours after we first arrived at the Boston airport, we arrived home, tired, gross, without luggage, but home. We finally got our luggage this week and we've vowed never to fly Delta again.

That was only frustrating. I'm sure what I'm about to share only added to our bad moods.

On Saturday night, my boyfriend told me that Bryan Clauson, one of my favorite drivers, was injured badly in an accident. He had to be airlifted to the hospital. Me being me, I thought, he'll be fine; he's Bryan Clauson. I was ready to smile and laugh when reports would come out to tell everyone that he woke up Sunday morning, shook it off, and got back into his car. Unfortunately, I was the one to have to share with my boyfriend on Monday morning that Bryan died.

We were both kind of shell-shocked.

Neither of us knew Bryan Clauson personally. He'd driven at Perris, our hometown track, several times, but I had been too terrified to go up to him. Being honest right now, the main reason I had latched onto him was because he was so scary looking. I constantly made jokes to my boyfriend that if anyone pissed Bryan Clauson off, they better sleep with one eye open. Then I watched him race and realized that he was just as scary behind the wheel, and I was in awe. He may have been six years younger than me, but he was larger than life in my eyes. I couldn't possibly talk to him. I wasted so many opportunities to go up to him and tell him that he was my favorite, that he was amazing to watch on the dirt, because I was too scared. But it's not even that that's making me tear up right now. He leaves behind a gorgeous fiancée and two super adorable puppies. He was chasing two hundred races this year and he was kicking ass at each one he showed up to. He was 27 years old. Like...no. This was someone who brought so much joy into so many people's lives, and it's not fair. And don't be one of those people to tell me that life is unfair, because, yes, I know that, but this is so unfair that it's just wrong.

Every race, my anxiety is multiplied a thousand fold for the boy and his driver, Any little thing could go wrong, and I find myself asking whatever is listening to keep them safe. We all know what this sport can do. And yet we're all still out there because we love it. If you take anything away from this blog post, let it be this: google Bryan Clauson. Read about him. Look at what he did with his life. Look at the impact he's still having, from sprint cars to NASCAR to Indy. He was so much more than just a driver. There is never going to be another like him.

Now, on that note, have a great Monday, and look forward to a few posts this week. I promise, I'm trying to get better to get organized, but it's been a mess around here for so long. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

Hi hi hi! It's been so long! How are you? Did you do anything fun this summer? Oh, really? How awesome! {I could continue this conversation for hours.}

Really, all I've been doing is my best to stay out of the heat, and that hasn't gone too well. We had a couple of days where it looked like it would be a miserable summer, and then it cleared up, and then it was like, just kidding, here's a few more hundred degree days, have a good time!

Mother Nature, right?

Anyway, one way I've been staying semi-cool is by reading, and I'm so sorry that I left this book until the very last minutes {it comes out tomorrow}.

“Are you happy with your life?” Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious. Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits. Before a man Jason’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.”

In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable--something impossible.

Is it this world or the other that’s the dream? And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could’ve imagined—one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe. 

To say that this book was a trip would be entirely accurate. It was confusing {in the best way!} and had me guessing until the very end. There were some moments where I had to read the last few pages again because I couldn't remember who I was with and where we were. 

Oh man, this is going to be so difficult to avoid spoilers.

Jason Dessen is happy enough with his lot in life: a beautiful, loving wife that gave up her art career to raise their child; a son that hasn't yet reached those terrible teenage years of disowning his parents; and he's teaching what he loves at a good college. Then he's kidnapped, thrown inside a box, and wakes up in a world that knows him, but he certainly doesn't know it.

Thus begins the crazy tornado of confusion that is Jason Dessen's life. The people around him in this new world love him, revere him, because he has invented something that could change the entire world. The only problem is, this Jason doesn't know what the hell that Jason has done, and when this Jason tries to find his way back to his own life, the people that once respected him begin to hunt him down.

I can't even pinpoint one single thing that I love in this book. The mystery is intriguing, because you wonder {spoiler-y}, if my spouse had been replaced with someone that looked, acted, sounded, and essentially was exactly like him, would I be able to tell the difference? Then the book takes a turn for the worse and suddenly, Jason finds his life far too crowded. He thinks that he might have to do the unfathomable, and some others already beat him to it. It's insane to sit there and think what you would do if put in Jason's situation, and then wonder if something like this might already be happening. Basically, this book makes your brain hurt in ways that it didn't know it could hurt, and that's the mark of a great book.

I especially enjoyed reading about Jason trying to get back to HIS Chicago. You never really think about the things in your town that make it yours. I figured that if I had to make it home, I'd lay down placemarkers and street names, and bada bing, there's my home. But that's not the case in this book. One wrong turn, one negative emotion, could ruin "home" forever. 

Argh! I'm trying so hard not to give anything away, but it's so difficult. Lucky for you, like I said earlier, this book comes out tomorrow, so I would definitely recommend it go on your TBR list. 

The Memory Book by Lara Avery

You know those weeks where you think you did something and then you just go on about your life like that thing is done? Yeah, that's what this post is. I convinced myself that I had written this review last week, and then, poof! I didn't. But I really wanted to, because this book is amazing and I want to cry just thinking about it, and the best part is you don't have to wait because it comes out today!

They tell me that my memory will never be the same, that I'll start forgetting things. At first just a little, and then a lot. So I'm writing to remember.

Sammie was always a girl with a plan: graduate at the top of her class and get out of her small town as soon as humanly possible. Nothing will stand in her way--not even a rare genetic disorder the doctors say will slowly start to steal her memories and then her health. What she needs is a new plan.

So the Memory Book is born: Sammie's notes to her future self, a document of moments great and small. It's where she'll record every perfect detail of her first date with longtime crush, Stuart--a brilliant young writer who is home for the summer. And where she'll admit how much she's missed her childhood best friend, Cooper, and even take some of the blame for the fight that ended their friendship.

Through a mix of heartfelt journal entries, mementos, and guest posts from friends and family, readers will fall in love with Sammie, a brave and remarkable girl who learns to live and love life fully, even though it's not the life she planned. 

NetGalley sent me an email about this book because I had read Lara Avery's other amazing book, A Million Miles Away. That one had been a tearjerker, and I don't know why I was expecting any different with this one.

Sammie tells us straight off what's wrong with her: she has a rare disease that affects her brain and that will kill her sooner rather than later. Due to this, she has decided to live her life the best way that she can. That means going to parties with her debate partner that she has kept at a distance, telling her crush how much she likes him, and doing stupid childish things with her childhood best friend Cooper. Sammie write this book to help her remember what she has done, because she thinks that this will help her beat the disease that is determined to take her life.

There were too many fun and laughable moments in this book for it to be really sad. I mean, she starts off the book with a quiz for future Sammie, and tells her that the person writing this journal "fell asleep briefly while you were writing and dreamed you were making out with James Monroe, the fifth president and arbiter of the Monroe Doctrine." 

How can you not love her? 

Sammie really put her all into living life and watching her do so made me smile. She knew she had this disease that would ravage her health and her brain, but she didn't dwell on it. She went on with her life and tried new things, connecting with people that she hadn't talked to in years. I think the best part of the book, for me, was seeing something that super smart Sammie didn't see until the end. It's painfully obvious to the reader, and watching Sammie miss it makes her that much more real. You want to hug her and tell her it's going to be okay, but that would be near impossible because Sammie is tough. She doesn't need anyone to tell her it's going to be okay, because she knows it isn't.

Cooper was fabulous. A little stoner boy that had been struggling through school, he latches back onto Sammie when he finds out about her disease. But he never treats her like she's some invalid. He treats her like Sammie, which is different than everyone else when they find out. He only wants to hang out with her and make her happy, because he doesn't know how much time she has left. He seems to telepathically understand what Sammie wants and he does it for her, no questions asked. My favorite bits were when he took over Sammie's journal and wrote the memories that she missed. He was also the reason I started hysterically bawling like a baby. 

The other cast of characters - Mrs. T {the guidance counselor}, Stuart Shah {the crush}, Maddie {the debate partner} - turn this from a book into real life. They keep Sammie moving forward and learning more about herself than she would have if she had been intent on curing her disease. They cheer her on and sometimes hold her back. They teach her as much as she teaches them. 

It's gorgeous, okay? This whole book is so much wonderful wrapped between the cover. Lara Avery is a goddess and everything she writes is beautiful and tearful and I want to read everything she will ever write. 

Now I'm going to go calm myself down with a little Game of Thrones.