Turtles All The Way Down by John Green

 

Perfection.

John Green is just amazing.  He GETS teenagers.  My daughter has been telling me to read this book for several years, and finally this weekend I just said, "Well, bring it downstairs for me!" and I dove in.

Aza Holmes is a teenager with OCD, a best friend name Daisy who writes Star Wars Fan Fiction, a widowed mother who is worried sick about her, and SO. MANY. THOUGHTS.

The way Green describes Aza's anxiety about germs, the way her thoughts take over, is overwhelming and scary and eye-opening and just TRUE.  The way Green presents her friendship with Daisy as one where they each just totally understand and put up with each other yet still get seriously annoyed with each other too is also TRUE.  Young love must be a part, but is not the whole part, of a JG novel and throw in a missing billionaire and his troubled son and you got yourself a John Hughes film written by John Green.

Way too many quotable moments here - so much wisdom for life.  I read this one so fast I didn't even stop to take notes, I just got totally sucked in.  Plus, I fell in love with Harold.  ;-)  Tua, not so much. 

I loved Daisy's nickname for Aza.  I felt for the loss of her dad and for Davis.  I really felt for Aza's anxiety and how she knew she was "crazy" but still could not talk herself out of the crazy behaviors, and how she hated that those behaviors were affecting her life.  I loved the ending and the peek at the future.  But mostly I just loved reading this one.  My daughter was so right.

And now I want to add John Green to my Completist Challenge.  Two down, about 10 to go!!!  (I have read The Fault in Our Stars.  I have also seen Paper Towns, the movie, but that can't count as a book, right?  #tbiab #ifykyk)

The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert

 

First of all, AMAZING cover.  Just look at all those clues and hints and winks and nods!  

Second of all, am I the only one that kept reading the author's name as Melissa Gilbert?  Yes? Ok.

This is DEFINITELY NOT Little House on the Prairie.  More like, Scary house in the deep dark woods.

Ok, so on to the story!  Which one you ask?  Well, once upon a time, a woman became famous for writing some pretty dark fairy tales.  Until suddenly it became almost impossible to find a copy of those fairy tales, and the author pretty much lived her life reclusively on her big dark estate, Hazel Wood.  And no one knew why.

Including her granddaughter, Alice, who never sees her grandmother.  Alice just tries to live her nomadic life with her single mom unobtrusively and not to get involved with the rabid fandom created by the mystery that is her grandmother.

Until Alice's mom disappears.  So Alice and her new fairy tale obsessed bff Ellery go off to find her, and in doing so wind up finding out so much more.

Honestly, to say much more than that would require spoilers.  This whole story had an eerie, sad vibe to it, and gets pretty dark and supernatural.  I liked it, I love a good supernatural spin.  Some plotlines really did not work for me, especially at the end, but I see where the author was going with it all.  This is what I would categorize as YA fantasy bordering on horror, but not Stephen King type horror.  Teresa, you would like this one!  Mom's book club, give this a miss.

Unless you like dark fairy tales, Evil Spinners, worlds beyond the veil....and are very very brave.