Review: Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys

Posted on February 11, 2016 by Jackie Lea Sommers

salt to the sea I’m not sure whether to say that the paragraph below this is a spoiler or not. It’s not a traditional book spoiler– it’s the historical event this book is based on. But if you want to go into this book completely blind, best to skip it.

Last summer, when Ruta Sepetys was in St. Paul, I had the chance to hear her speak passionately about a bit of nearly-lost history: a ship called the Wilhelm Gustloff that was carrying WWII refugees to safety was torpedoed by the Soviets, and about 9,000 of the 10,000 passengers died. Most of them were children and youth. The Nazis tried to cover it up, so even though more people died than in the sinkings of the Titanic and Lusitania combined, many people don’t know about this tragedy.

Till now.

Ruta Sepetys brings it to life in Salt to the Sea, and it’s wonderful. There is a slow build throughout the story with the climactic event taking up a surprisingly small part of the story. The characters are well-drawn, there are plenty of secrets, and there’s a sweet romance too.

I did think the book wrapped up fast, but that was fine by me. I stayed up late to finish this one, and I was pretty emotionally ragged by the end. Also, it’s been a while since I read Sepetys’s debut Between Shades of Gray, so it took me a looooong time to catch a connection between the two books that was in pretty plain sight. Once I did, it delighted me.

This is one of those books where knowing the historical truth behind the story does nothing to diminish it. It only amplifies, and you hold on for the ride.

Review: Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

Posted on December 28, 2015 by Jackie Lea Sommers

Brown Girl Dreaming is a memoir in verse by Jacqueline Woodson, and it’s a treasure. Even if you haven’t read any other Jackie Woodson books, this one is still not to be missed. It’s a beautiful story about her childhood as an African American in the sixties and seventies.

My favorite parts were watching the author develop her love for stories and realizing the power of story and how to wield it. So lovely. It made me reflect on my own childhood as I was learning the same things.

Read it. You’ll be richer for it.

Review: Bone Gap by Laura Ruby

Posted on December 6, 2015 by Jackie Lea Sommers

There’s been a lot of buzz about Bone Gap by Laura Ruby, and so I finally purchased the book and read it. It was great.

Bone Gap is the name of the small town where the O’Sullivan boys live on their own, their father dead and their mother having run off. Sean is the big, strong, brilliant one, and Finn is the “spacey” but beautiful one. Roza is the lovely Polish girl who appeared out of nowhere and disappeared from their lives just as fast. The story is mostly told from Finn’s and Roza’s perspectives.

What’s missing from that description is Petey. Priscilla “Petey” is the beekeeper girl that Finn falls for, and she’s my absolute favorite part of this novel, maybe for reasons I can’t quite explain. I’ll try anyway.

Petey is unusual. She’s not traditionally beautiful. She’s brave and feisty and strong and weak. I love her for all those reasons, and so does Finn, and it’s adorable.

Roza is incredible. Total badass Polish heroine.

Sean is strong and broken. I loved him. He frustrated me too.

Finn is lovely, precious, amazing, boyish in the best way. I want to put him in my pocket.

Bone Gap is classified as magical realism. It may or may not surprise you that I loved the realism and could have done without the magical element, though it seems that it works for most readers.

Read this. You will love it.

Review: The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh

Posted on June 5, 2015 by Jackie Lea Sommers

This book.

This book.

THIS. BOOK.

This is my favorite book I’ve read so far this year. I require you all read it.

What’s it about? Here’s the official description:

Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi’s wit and will get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.

She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and break the cycle once and for all.

As you may have perceived, it’s a re-telling of “1001 Nights.”

I’m still having a book hangover from this story, and I finished it days ago. The characters are what did it for me. Shazi is bright, sharp as a tack, incredible. I loved her to pieces. Sometimes she acts thoroughly like the 16-year-old she is– and sometimes so very, very much older (she is, after all, a wife, which we don’t see that often in YA). Khalid is … breathtaking. A tortured soul, a young man full of respect for his wife and with the weight of the kingdom on his shoulders. He has skyrocketed to being one of my absolute favorite book boyfriends.

I’ll leave you with this gem.

“What are you doing to me, you plague of a girl?” he whispered.

“If I’m a plague, then you should keep your distance, unless you plan on being destroyed.” The weapons still in her grasp, she shoved against his chest.

“No.” His hands dropped to her waist. “Destroy me.”

Review: The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay

Posted on July 17, 2013 by Jackie Lea Sommers

Extra points for an awesome cover!

I had read some advance reviews of The Sea of Tranquility, and they were SO good that I pre-ordered this book months before it came out. I also bought it on Audible. I listened to the first half while exercising and tanning (both in preparation for Des’s wedding), and at the halfway point, I decided, This needs to happen RIGHT. NOW. So I stayed up till 2 am finishing up my paper copy.

I very much enjoyed this book, though I’m not quite willing to add it to my list of favorites. I also was very fascinated by Josh Bennett, yet he’s not going to make it onto my list of literary boyfriends. Should you read this book? Yes, no hesitations there.

It’s about Nastya, a girl who stopped speaking after she was randomly attacked, and about Josh, a boy whose entire family has died. They are both incredible characters, so deep and rich and FUNNY and real (gosh, this is making me want to go re-read it already!). This is their story.

Millay’s writing is this no-holds-barred, slap-you-across-the-face kind of wonderful, and the book’s content doesn’t hold back either. If you’ll be offended by underage drinking, drugs, and sex, then this book is not for you– although I would definitely not call this book gritty. Not in the usual sense– where teenaged hoodlums are living lives of crime on the street. These are normal ol’ kids in the ‘burbs– except that they have seen terrible things.

Loved the characters. Loved the writing. Loved the story. It’s fascinating that the book addresses that girls each have “one unforgivable offense” for boys– because this book kind of broached mine— and that alone is why I am not throwing a parade in honor of The Sea of Tranquility.

Read it. You’ll like it.

JACKIE LEA SOMMERS

Author & Advocate

Tag Archives: ya book review