A Little Something Different – Sandy Hall

Genre: Contemporary, Young Adult

My Rating:

The creative writing teacher, the delivery guy, the local Starbucks baristas, his best friend, her roommate, and the squirrel in the park all have one thing in common—they believe that Gabe and Lea should get together. Lea and Gabe are in the same creative writing class. They get the same pop culture references, order the same Chinese food, and hang out in the same places. Unfortunately, Lea is reserved, Gabe has issues, and despite their initial mutual crush, it looks like they are never going to work things out.  But somehow even when nothing is going on, something is happening between them, and everyone can see it. Their creative writing teacher pushes them together. The baristas at Starbucks watch their relationship like a TV show. Their bus driver tells his wife about them. The waitress at the diner automatically seats them together. Even the squirrel who lives on the college green believes in their relationship.

Surely Gabe and Lea will figure out that they are meant to be together....

This book completely met my expectations in many ways, but it was also completely different to what I expected. I expected that you’d get some of the main characters viewpoints mixed in with the various onlookers to their blossoming relationship, but you didn’t. I expected various viewpoints, I didn’t expect to witness Lea and Gabe’s romance from the perspective of a bench or a squirrel. I expected the book to be slow and the romance slow to happen, but I didn’t expect it to be quite so slow and frustrating.

I loved this book despite the things that I didn’t like. I may have felt that it was a bit pretentious the various viewpoints, with the squirrel and the bench viewpoint. It did feel like I was reading someone's homework for Creative Writing where they were demonstrating their excellent ability to write from various perspectives about the same events and demonstrate how perspective can alter your perception of a scene, or something equally intellectual sounding. Yes, that book is a bit like that, it’s different though. I think the fact that the actual thing you are getting various perspectives on is a couple and their blossoming romance helps to make the pretentious side of things such a none issue. If this book wasn’t a contemporary romance I would have found it irritating, but because of what it is and how it’s written and what it’s about you don’t care, because it just comes across as sweet. That is the sign of a good author. An author who may have realised how this book could come across and combatted that issue by writing about something so many love to read about, life and love.

As a whole, this was a fun and enjoyable read. The characters were likable enough that I could ignore the flaws. I liked watching the romance from everyone's varying perspectives and was as eager as everyone else to see something happen. It was fun and filled an enjoyable couple of afternoons.

I just saw Jamie at The Perpetual Page Turner doing this, and remember a while back Addison over at Of Spectacles and Books also did it, as did Amanda, and I remember when I saw her post then that I wanted to try this at some point. So, since it seems to be a thing everyone is getting in on, and since I’ve been gone for a little while this is a perfect way to catch up.

If we were having coffee… I would tell you about how I read A Little Something Different and absolutely loved it and try and force it upon you in anyway possible. It would be brought up repeatedly in conversation until you realised that, actually, this is a book you have wanted to read all along. Because that’s what I do with my friends, force them to read books I like, buying them as gifts at birthdays and holidays because you must read things always.

If we were having coffee… I would tell you how embarrassed I am at my current TV viewing habits, I now watch Eastenders and X-Factor! X-Factor was bad enough TV viewing because none of the judges really know what they’re talking about, they’re only in it for the money, but yet it’s mandatory viewing each weekend, I even record it in case I’m out. Eastenders though, that is a big embarrassment, I’ve never really been a soap watcher, there was a phase of me watching Hollyoaks when I was at uni, but I also watched Jeremy Kyle at uni, so I don’t feel that can really reflect accurately upon me as a person. Eastenders has Danny Dyer in being hilarious and I’ve started rooting for Shirley and booing at Sharon and I’m getting really into it, it’s weird.

If we were having coffee… I’d tell you my poor TV viewing habits can be redeemed by the fact I am also watching The Leftovers and Legends on TV, so I am not a complete TV embarrassment, just a small one. I would also tell you all about these TV shows to get you to watch them, because as well as being a book pusher, I’m a TV show pusher as well.

If we were having coffee… I would get serious as well and tell you that I’m really beginning to not enjoy my job. It’s never been something I loved, but I didn’t mind being there each day. I knew what my job involved and I did it, but there have been changes at work in the past couple of months. People have left, some have been or will be replaced, but one on our team hasn’t been, so our work load has increased. I don’t mind the extra work, that’s not the issue, the issue is that there doesn’t seem to be any appreciation that we are having to do more work, there is no offer of any extra benefits or a pay rise, we just have to do it because it’s a job that has to be done and we’re the only ones able to. It’s the fact that others teams in our department are struggling, just like we are, but as they’re struggling we’re being asked to train in their jobs and help them do their work, whilst I’m left wondering where’s the assistance for us, we’re struggling too why isn’t this going both ways? We’re being asked to help with others peoples jobs, but I know when it gets to the end of the month the managers will be asking why we’re behind in our work for the month and all we’ll be able to say is that we’ve been asked to do other jobs, we can’t be in three places at once. Sorry, this has been a bit of a rant and I could go on longer, but you get the idea, right? Work is getting me down because I feel underappreciated.

If we were having coffee… I’d tell you I don’t know what I want to be doing in life and it’s scary. I’m 23 and I have a degree but I don’t think I want a career where I will be continually climbing the ladder trying to get higher and get more money and responsibility. I want to work somewhere I clock in on a morning, do my job, have a couple of people I can chat with and have a laugh with whilst doing it, then clock out at the end of the day and not think about it again until I’m back the next day. I know that’s very uninspiring, I have myself a degree which I am doing nothing with, but that’s my choice isn’t it? When I tell people that though, they’re surprised, shouldn’t I be in a graduate position managing people and earning £30000 a year plus benefits? The idea of doing something like that terrifies me and makes me a bit sick, I don’t understand why there is this expectation for people to get educated and get a career. There’s more to life than money and a job, but sometimes I feel like I’m not even getting that right.

If we were having coffee… I’d tell you I’m scared my blog might not last the year. Since I went away on holiday and then with my internet going down I’ve had a month off from blogging and I’m finding it hard to get back into the swing of things. With things annoying me at work I’ve certainly been less motivated to blog, and with the internet being down I’ve obviously been no where near my computer in about three or four weeks, so all in all it’s been a bad month of blogging with September being a none blogging month essentially.I know once I start getting back into some kind of blogging routine I should be fine, but I’m not known for persevering with things so I do sometimes worry one day I’ll stop blogging because I feel a bit unmotivated and then just never come back.

If we were having coffee… I’d tell you I’m scared of growing up. I know I’m only 23 so it’s not like I’m a real adult or anything, I mean I still live at home with my mom, not very grown up is it? Last week one of my friends was talking about the future and about moving out and she was talking to me about how her and her boyfriend were saving for a house and she was thinking about mortgages and real grown up things and it terrified me. I can’t afford to move out, I’m saving to, but I know with the job I have now I earn no where near enough money to qualify for any kind of decent mortgage and that scares me. I’m scared that I’m even thinking about mortgages and having to get a better paying job to support myself, because I don’t want to be that person. I’m only thinking of getting a better job so I have more money. Money to buy a house with, because that’s what is expected, but I don’t even know what I want to do in life. I might want to travel, because I’ve never been anywhere really. I want to experience things before I have to be tied down to paying a mortgage and owning a hose, but I can’t save to travel and move out at the same time because of money. And that’s worse, everything is coming down to money at the moment, and I hate that and don’t know how to get out of that frame of mind.

If we were having coffee… I would tell you how I hate being so serious and just want to have a little fun. I’d tell you how I sometimes feel like I’ve skipped a few years, I didn’t embrace being a teenager and my early twenties enough and don’t feel like I’ve experienced all the things you meant to have at this point in my life. I’d tell you how I want to let my hair down and have fun but I feel like I forgot how. I’d also tell you that I enjoy being me, and like sitting in my pyjamas being lazy after work, but it sometimes feel like I should be doing more with my life, but I’m happy so I shouldn’t beat myself up.

If we were having coffee… I’d ask you how things are with you, because after that therapeutic rant you should get the chance to air your problems too. How are things with you? Have you read a good book recently? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.

I know I said my internet went down last Sunday and that it would be up Wednesday, but it wasn’t. It’s back now, but those proposed posts I would write haven’t happened.

The past week has been a bit rubbish, both at home and at work. I have had no internet, which has made me extra irritable, and work has been appalling, which has made me a down right bitch. I promise I will write posts, my blog must go on, but I will try and be realistic about what I can do.

I have been reading plenty in the past week though, so I will hopefully be able to write up a few quick reviews, since I think mini reviews may be the way forward. I don’t think they’ll even be reviews, maybe quick thoughts on books? I don’t know, I’m figuring it out.

I figure I’m going to take the weekend to figure out what I want to do since I’ve essentially had a month off from blogging to I need to get myself back into the swing of things, but I’ll be posting Monday and Tuesday and attempting to be a good blogger again.

Hi guys. My internet is down so I won't be posting for a few days. Supposedly a technician will be round Wednesday to fix it so I'll write a couple of posts to get up by then but otherwise I'm going to be gone for a while longer so see you in October I guess?

Where She Went - Gayle Forman

Genre: Young Adult, Romance, Contemporary

My Rating:

It's been three years since the devastating accident . . . three years since Mia walked out of Adam's life forever.

Now living on opposite coasts, Mia is Juilliard's rising star and Adam is LA tabloid fodder, thanks to his new rock star status and celebrity girlfriend. When Adam gets stuck in New York by himself, chance brings the couple together again, for one last night. As they explore the city that has become Mia's home, Adam and Mia revisit the past and open their hearts to the future-and each other.

Told from Adam's point of view in the spare, lyrical prose that defined If I Stay, Where She Went explores the devastation of grief, the promise of new hope, and the flame of rekindled romance.

First of all, I need to say that whilst I liked If I Stay, and I did, I wasn't shouting about it from the rooftops because I felt like there was something missing, a feeling I often get from books where there has been a lot of hype. If I Stay was like a book hurdle I had to get past. I wanted to read the book because the trailer made the film look awesome, and I enjoyed reading the book, but it put me off watching the film, so it’s a multitude of contradictions on that one, some weird logic occurred in my brain. Anyway, it meant I was wary of reading Where She Went because that book could go either way for me and I am not in the habit of reading books I’m not sure I’ll like. I only ended up buying it because it was on offer for 99p on kindle and I was like, why not, I’ll probably want to read it. I’m glad I bought it.

It was warm in New Orleans so we’d normally spend three or four hours in the hotel in the afternoon before going out to eat and one of the days I was bored and didn’t fancy watching Netflix so picked up my kindle to look for something to read and I cam across this book. I figured why not? I am glad for that afternoon because I enjoyed this book so much more than If I Stay. Maybe it was because I already knew the characters, maybe it was because it wasn’t set around such a high stress situation or maybe it was simply because it was told from another characters perspective. Whatever it was I adored it.

Adam is such an easy character to like, even when he is being ‘a guy’ and acting irrational and paranoid, or one he is acting like a douche, you still like him regardless. This may partly because I remember how wonderful he was in If I Stay, but I think it’s more because Forman has written him so perfectly that he seems real. You can relate to his heartache and can understand where his entire attitude has come from because we have all been there at some point. Been irrational and bitchy and acted like a bit of a knob because you’re heartbroken and so you take your emotions out on all the wrong people because the actual person you want to talk to isn’t around for you to talk to anymore.

This book is all about Adam, there aren’t really any other characters, it’s Adam and Mia all the way, and that was nice, but I do kind of wish we got more about Adam’s life. You saw the past, you heard the names of other characters, but they weren’t featured. I wish there was more about the band and Bryn had more than a starring role because I felt for that girl. Forman didn’t flesh her our into an actual person, she was a name and a role, and I wanted more than that from the people featuring in Adam’s life.

Sure, this book is a complete wrap up of the open and unfinished ending of If I Stay, it didn’t feel like a full book in many ways, more a novella of sorts I guess, but it also felt completely separate. And this book is not a ground-breaking book, it wasn’t as poignant as If I Stay was but I think that’s why I liked it more. I could relate to and that is what makes it so enjoyable. It’s a definite recommended read to anyway that enjoys a good contemporary novel and the way it was written it makes me want to read Forman’s other books, which I don’t own, but I’ll get on it.

Anyone else read this, am I the only one that enjoyed it more than If I Stay? I hope not. Well tell me any thoughts and comments below because I always love to hear from you guys.