driftwood. elizabeth dutton. (254)

i picked up driftwood because emma robert's posted it on our instagram.  and i kind of wish i scrolled through by the picture because i did not enjoy the book.

the premise sounded cool, the daughter of a rock star goes on a road trip planned out for her by her dad upon his death.  i figured it would be as moving as cameron crowe's elizabethtown.  it was not.  it was like a bad lifetime movie.

to start, clem, the daughter was seriously #heiressproblems.  it's hard to be sympathetic to a character when money ain't a problem to them.  i am not saying that money solves everything, but i don't understand this mentality that money makes one immune to real issues.  i mean her biggest issue was that she didn't get excited about life.  really? she was unemployed but lived a life of luxury.  and yes she was lost like all twentysomethings are but she had the means to pursue her dreams because her family could financially support what she wanted to pursue.  her dad wasn't going to help her start a cafe but the ambition fizzled out of her. i couldn't empathize with her, i was too annoyed by her #firstworldproblems.

just like clem, the book lacked depth.  the road trip was a bit of a farce.  i felt like clem didn't gain any insight on her father based from the actual locations but more from the letters, so she probably should have just read them at home.  a random love interest was thrown in to help put the "lessons" she was learning into effect, but it all felt so staged.

but the worse was the ending.  it turned out her father wasn't who he said he was.  he actually killed a man and took on his identity, well name!  it was the most bizarre twist.  granted it was painted as a result of the abuse he dealt with as a child.  the abuse was revealed during the trip in a letter.  it was also foreshadowed by her love interest's story of beating up a guy because he had an abusive dad.  but whatever i still felt it was inexcusable. i mean he killed a man and took on his name and lived a normal life.  can we say psycho killer?!?! i can't believe clem didn't freak out, but actually discovered herself via this ending.  seriously, such a horrible book.

the only plus i can say is that one, it mentioned wasco which is near where i live! and two i learned that when nor cal and so cal meet on the 99, there is a pine tree and palm tree planted to represent the two regions

other than that, my advice to you, do not read this book.

this one summer. jillian tamaki and mariko tamaki (229)

in my usual fashion now due to all of the book pages i follow on facebook, i do not remember where i first heard of this one summer. i do know that emma roberts instagramming it is what inspired me to put in my request.

in an ideal world, i would have enjoyed this book on a beach somewhere.  however, my sister bailed on the labor day plans so i read this at home on the couch.  though in all honesty, i am not a beach person and i would felt bad if i got sand on the cover.  (i would like to add that it would have made a good beach read cos i finished it in about hour.  which makes me worried, but i mean it is all dialogue and pictures.  i always feel like i read graphic novels too quickly but i guess that is their nature.)

before i go on, i want to add one last tidbit that this one summer is written by jillian and mariko tamaki, who are cousins! so sweet right!! thought that was cute little fact.

so first off the artwork is amazing in this graphic novel.  the pictures felt so realistic in the scene that often times i stopped because they felt like a photograph.  it's not that the drawing looked real but felt like a memory. 

this one summer is a coming-of-age story, rose learning that life isn't easy and nothing is as seems in one summer.  every year her family goes to awago beach.  it reminded me of my summers as a kid going to los osos with my uncle boon and his family.  though it wasn't the same because i was not exposed to any of the things that rose encounter.

rose's had a summer buddy, windy, that she hangs out with.  windy was younger than rose and hilarious.  she reminded me of jack black and even looked a little like him.  and just like jack black, windy was very entertaining but borderline annoying.  i did love her hip hop dancing and her adolescent obsession with growing boobs.  oh and windy also had the habit of saying kidding, which rose harps on her about, but i realized that i do the same thing.  

rose and windy's summer adventures include swimming of course and my favorite, one afternoon of playing mash!!!!  loved that.  i want to add that i kept on trying to place them in the 90's which is my childhood but justin bieber was listed for mash, which made this story like circa 2011.  oh well.  they also start watching scary movies like texas chainsaw massacre, jaws, and nightmare on elm street and scare the bejesus out of themselves.  

rose also developed a summer crush on the older boy that works the market where the girls rented videos.  windy dubbed him the dud.  the dud had some drama.  his girlfriend got pregnant and like an asshole, dud was in denial that it was.  rose, in love with him, believed that his girlfriend cheated on him and told windy that the girlfriend was a slut.  rose then goes on a rant about girls not being able to take care of themselves.  it was said to read rose being so naive but this is this one summer where she grows up.  windy, thankfully, had the good sense to call rose out on her sexism!  

in addition to dealing with hormones, rose was also dealing with her parents divorce.  her mother seemed to be suffering from depression and she and rose's father are constantly fighting.  rose, being young, does not understand why her mother was acting that way and sided with her father, treating her mother poorly.

in the end, after the dud's girlfriend was saved from drowning, by rose's mother.  it was discovered that her mother was depressed due to a miscarriage that had occurred in the lake.  after this discovery, i hoped that her mother would be honest with her family and hopefully things would get better.

the graphic novel ends with rose heading home, none of the story lines are truly resolved other than she and windy mend their friendship.  we don't know if dud and his girlfriend work things out or not.   however, that is how life is, sometimes things go unresolved and we take what lessons we can from it. we move on and it just becomes a memory or a story like "this one summer . . ."    

here is my favorite art and moments:

windy's boob talk.

the walk home when rose gets in trouble for using the word slut.  (note the slut steps.)

when the girls play mash.  i find it funny how we girls pass these games along.

their counting for mash!!!

windy's grandma was hilarious.  and they were virgin drinks!

after a fight with her mom, rose ran out this man told her she should go in due to the lighting.  she was rude to him.  this was his response but great advice for any girl.

flimsy little plastic miracles. ron currie jr. (98)

"flimsy little plastic miracles" is another book i came across via emma robert's instagram. the cover definitely enticed me with its books in a bookshelf. it's actually quite clever because the titles used for the books on the cover are reference to events, people, and themes in the story. the author also used one book to namedrop his debut which was a nice spin on "author of". i also noticed there was a book on the bottom shelf that reminded me of "a million little pieces" which i think was a sly reference given the premise of the novel.

"flimsy little plastic miracles" is a novel within a novel. one needs to get into a charlie kaufman frame of mind for a reading. so the book is a book written by ron currie jr. (which is also the name of the author) and his supposed to be the truth about his faked suicide. confused? you should be. another similarity between the author and hid character is that both their father are dead.

so what happens is that the author in the story, ron currie jr., tried to commit suicide and survived but decided to fake his death. the book that he was working on was published and out of nowhere the book becomes a huge success (partially due to his suicide letter going viral). due to it's success, it was then turned into a movie. (btw: i would have never read that book, you know me and the media hype.) then of course it is discovered he is alive. so he writes the book that we are reading "flimsy little plastic miracles" to come clean.

(this is why i noticed the cover that looked like "a million little pieces" because the author of that book, james frey, turned out to be a liar. his book was supposed to be memoir but it was discovered that he made most of it up. and it was an oprah book so the alot of the public was tricked. i picked it up for $1 but then heard it was a lie so never read it. but imagine the backlash especially from mama oprah!)

so this whole book within a book got me googling but the real ron currie jr. never faked his death. so the book was not true in that sense. but it doesn't mean that it wasn't capital T truth in general. all novels has to have a bit of the author's real life in it and contain some capital T truth because if not people would not be able to relate to characters.

currie addresses this opposite the title page. he starred "true" in true story:

it is true though all novels are based on real events. inspiration has to come from somewhere.

he also has a clever blurb about epigraphs. i personally love them but they have become cliché. in high school, one of my favorite books "girl" by blake nelson quoted "breaking the girl" by the red hot chili peppers. once i read that i knew i would love it and i did. so i started trusting epigraphs. one of my recent favorites is the sandra cisneros quote that junot diaz used in "this is how you lose her". but yeah epigraphs are great if used correctly.

another thing that i loved about this book was the format. there were no chapters. instead each time a new idea or story was presented a new page was started. so some pages were only a paragraph.

the story bounces back and forth between four topics: currie's side of his story, the love of his life, emma (who is also the reason he got caught up in his mess), his dealings with his father's death and singularity (when machines take over because they are more perfect than us).

i don't want to give too much but will
say that ron currie jr. in the story was a coward when it came to love but once he was caught reacted with heart and did the right thing. there was one occurrence in the story that broke my heart. i had no idea that it was going to happen. it made me sad because it shouldn't have happened to that character.

i also have to add that i was weirded out by ron and emma's love. not the violent aspect of it but the fact that they first met when they were in jr. high. i am skeptical when people fall in love so young.

last but not least, singularity was a topic discussed. but it's a future i hope that is never achieved. who wants perfection? life is life because of its mistakes. perfection would mean boredom while our errors and imperfections is what gives life it's color. as we see in "flimsy little plastic miracles", it's the errors in life that helps is grow as a person.

the love song of johnny valentine. teddy wayne (98)

i can't remember where i first read about "the love song of johnny valentine" but the cover definitely caught my eye. you know me and shiny things. also the title reminded me of one of my favorite killers' song "the ballad of michael valentine". however, i quickly lost interest when they referenced justin beiber.

but when i saw it on emma robert's instagram, i decided to give it a chance. and though emma was spot on for "where'd you go bernedette?. she was way off based on this one. but maybe her celeb-status, resulted in it being a good laugh for her.

the novel is the tale of 11 year-old, johnny valentine who is a pop sensation was discovered via youtube and has great hair plus a fake romance with a famous latina tween actress (see: justin beiber). his mother is his manager, she loves to party, screws guys in the tour crew and i guess has a coke habit (see: lindsay lohan's mom). johnny's dad went AWOL when he was a kid, but what might be him pops up on random message boards (see: deadbeat dads that want in on the action.)

the book is the supposed to be a coming of age story. johnny's maturity comes via his search for his father. however, just like johnny lacked any depth, so did this novel. as a 30-year-old woman, i really shouldn't identify with 11-year-old boys, but this character was too shallow, naive and just plain stupid for anyone to sympathize for, let alone identify with.

i really have no idea how i finished it. i was intrigued about his father's message board posts because i was sure it was a child molester posting. but that story line wasn't enough to make this book interesting. johnny's life was so sad and boring, the most exciting parts of his days included passing levels on a video game and masturbating. maybe that was the point? to prove how depressing celeb's lives really are? but who wants to read about insanely rich first world problems? also it didn't provide any provocative insight on the music industry. thanks to behind the music, reality tv shows and entertainment magazines/tabloids, we know how the music industry is just screwing everyone over. they have also shown us how shitty celebrities are.

i guess i also kept on reading because the cover touted the author as the winner of some award. and the writing wasn't bad, it was just that context wasn't good. i mean he did have some random interesting insight and the hipster in me loved the latchkeys. but other than that the book was lame and i'm not sure how i finished. i'm actually getting annoyed that i wasted time reading it. it was so bad, i am going to stop here because i don't want to waste anymore time on this book.

where'd you go bernadette? maria semple. (97)

of course with a cute cover like that, "where'd you go bernadette?" caught my eye while browsing amazon. however, i didn't give it much thought until i saw it on emma roberts' instagram:

really emma roberts?!?! i haven't seen any of her tween movies but loved her in "it's kind of a funny story" and "celeste and jesse forever". and i know it sounds silly but girl is literary. she is always posting pics of books she is reading so i started to follow her instagram. and yes i plan on reading the books she posts. (ps she also has really good fashion sense, i purchased a pair of rhinestone cat ears because she posted similar headbands on instagram. i know i need help.)

but seriously i have nothing to be embarrassed about because this first book i read because of emma roberts was amazing!

to start the book was written by maria semple who wrote for "arrested development". and of course, anything associated with the show has to be brillant. i am not sure how important of a writer semple is/was (i'm a fan but not a fanatic). but i could totally see bernadette as a character on the show. bernadette would be an architect michael hired to redesign the homes.

anyway back to the story. so the title best summarizes the story. bernadette fox has disappeared and her daughter bee branch (real name: balakrishna, because she was born with a heart condition and was blue when she was born) is determined to find her. the book is actually a book written by bee and is a complication of emails, letters, and other paperwork bee hopes lead her to her mom..

there are a bunch of subplots that lead up to bernadette's disappearance. first, is the family trip to antarctica that bernadette and her husband, elgin branch, promised bee based on her grades. due to this, there is the virtual indian assistant that bernadette hired to help with organizing the trip; bernadette is a recluse (the story explains why, it's quite sad and broke my heart when i found out). there is bernadette's feud with the gnats (what she falls the moms at her daughter's
school), especially audrey griffin, who is one of those self-righteous my child can do no wrong that i absolutely hated at first. last there is soo-lin, audrey's BFF and elgin's assistant, and who by the end i hated though she was quite pitiful. all of their lives crash into one another and results in bernadette's disappearance. (i don't want to give too much away because i want you to read it!)

all in all, bernadette is such a delightful character, she is a bit of mess but that is part of her charm. i really want to be her best friend. she seemed like a great person to get coffee with and talk shit about what is wrong with the world. se goes on these random rants which annoyed her husband but i found hilarious. she is also this amazing architect that was green and a dumpster diver before it was cool! her best piece was "the twenty mile house" in which she had a plot of land and the house and the furnishings were made up of items that were found within a twenty mile radius and all the materials had to be source locally. what a cool idea! she won a genius award for it!

also she wasn't the only genius of the family. her husband worked for microsoft and had this super famous TED talk. his project is a robot and i won't give you details because the TED talk was one of my favorite parts.

i can't express how much i enjoyed this book. so many great pop cultural references in it too. it will have you smiling and laughing to yourself. if there is one book you read this year because of this blog, this is it! i absolutely loved and am sure you will too!