DNF / The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love—she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful.

Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess. Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness—except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. Will is funny and flirtatious and just might be perfect crush material. Maybe more than crush material. And if Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back.

There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker Reid. He’s an awkward Tolkien superfan with a season pass to the Ren Faire, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him. Right?

Published:     11th April 2017
Publisher:  HarperTeen
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Library
Pages Read before DNF: 48   

Why didn't I finish this book?

Being a new release and seeing this book everywhere, I wanted to pick this up.  It sounded like a funny read that would be a good easy ready for the summer time.  For me, this seemed like a book that is more for younger readers or readers who like reading that kind of thing.  I had thought this might be less teen angst and more about the unrequited love conflict type of story.  Being 36, if I had picked this up ten or so years ago I would have loved this book.  Now I think I am looking for a lot more in a story and I just could not get into it. 

DNF / America Pacifica by Anna North

Eighteen-year-old Darcy lives on the island of America Pacifica--one of the last places on earth that is still habitable, after North America has succumbed to a second ice age. Education, food, and basic means of survival are the province of a chosen few, while the majority of the island residents must struggle to stay alive. The rich live in "Manhattanville" mansions made from the last pieces of wood and stone, while the poor cower in the shantytown slums of "Hell City" and "Little Los Angeles," places built out of heaped up trash that is slowly crumbling into the sea. The island is ruled by a mysterious dictator named Tyson, whose regime is plagued by charges of corruption and conspiracy. 

But to Darcy, America Pacifica is simply home--the only one she's ever known. In spite of their poverty she lives contentedly with her mother, who works as a pearl diver. It's only when her mother doesn't come home one night that Darcy begins to learn about her past as a former "Mainlander," and her mother's role in the flight from frozen California to America Pacifica. Darcy embarks on a quest to find her mother, navigating the dark underbelly of the island, learning along the way the disturbing truth of Pacifica's early history, the far-reaching influence of its egomaniacal leader, and the possible plot to murder some of the island's first inhabitants--including her mother.

Published:     1st May 2011
Publisher:  Little Brown
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Library
Pages Read before DNF: 120

Why didn't I finish this book?

This book has been on my TBR list since it was published back in 2011, so over 6 years.  Since joining back up with the library this was one of the first ones I definitely wanted to check out.  I had such high hopes for this one and I am really sad that I just could not get into it.  I read more than what I would normally when I'm not enjoying a book, the main reason being that I really wanted to love this book.  This book had a very slow start, little explanation on the world they were living in and little explanation of Darcy and her mother.  Now, this may have been deliberate and the story gets going in the second half of the book but to be honest by the point I had got to I had just lost interest. 

DNF Review / All The Truth that's in Me by Julie Berry

Four years ago, Judith and her best friend disappeared from their small town of Roswell Station. Two years ago, only Judith returned, permanently mutilated, reviled and ignored by those who were once her friends and family.

Unable to speak, Judith lives like a ghost in her own home, silently pouring out her thoughts to the boy who’s owned her heart as long as she can remember—even if he doesn’t know it—her childhood friend, Lucas.

But when Roswell Station is attacked, long-buried secrets come to light, and Judith is forced to choose: continue to live in silence, or recover her voice, even if it means changing her world, and the lives around her, forever.

This startlingly original novel will shock and disturb you; it will fill you with Judith’s passion and longing; and its mysteries will keep you feverishly turning the pages until the very last.


Published:     26th September 2013
Publisher:  Viking Books
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Library
Pages Read before DNF: 51  

WHY DID I NOT FINISH THIS BOOK?

I really wanted to love this book.  Right at a time when I am really into reading thriller style books, this should have been a great read for me.  However, it wasn't the plot that made me not want to continue reading.  It was the narrative.  This book is written in the first person narrative, using sentences like 'I waited all evening in the willow tree', 'I know you went to town tonight' and 'I bent and drank straight from it'.  Not that this is a bad thing but it is a narrative that I am not used to reading and just could not get used to reading.  Had this been written in the third person narrative this might have been a great read for me.  I am so sad about that.

 

DNF Review / The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney

'DNF' meaning Did Not Finish. 

A warm, funny and acutely perceptive debut novel about four adult siblings and the fate of the shared inheritance that has shaped their choices and their lives.

Every family has its problems. But even among the most troubled, the Plumb family stands out as spectacularly dysfunctional. Years of simmering tensions finally reach a breaking point on an unseasonably cold afternoon in New York City as Melody, Beatrice, and Jack Plumb gather to confront their charismatic and reckless older brother, Leo, freshly released from rehab. Months earlier, an inebriated Leo got behind the wheel of a car with a nineteen-year-old waitress as his passenger. The ensuing accident has endangered the Plumbs joint trust fund, “The Nest,” which they are months away from finally receiving. Meant by their deceased father to be a modest mid-life supplement, the Plumb siblings have watched The Nest’s value soar along with the stock market and have been counting on the money to solve a number of self-inflicted problems.

Melody, a wife and mother in an upscale suburb, has an unwieldy mortgage and looming college tuition for her twin teenage daughters. Jack, an antiques dealer, has secretly borrowed against the beach cottage he shares with his husband, Walker, to keep his store open. And Bea, a once-promising short-story writer, just can’t seem to finish her overdue novel. Can Leo rescue his siblings and, by extension, the people they love? Or will everyone need to reimagine the future they’ve envisioned? Brought together as never before, Leo, Melody, Jack, and Beatrice must grapple with old resentments, present-day truths, and the significant emotional and financial toll of the accident, as well as finally acknowledge the choices they have made in their own lives.

This is a story about the power of family, the possibilities of friendship, the ways we depend upon one another and the ways we let one another down. In this tender, entertaining, and deftly written debut, Sweeney brings a remarkable cast of characters to life to illuminate what money does to relationships, what happens to our ambitions over the course of time, and the fraught yet unbreakable ties we share with those we love.

Published:     22nd March 2016
Publisher:  Ecco
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Library
Rating:   Did Not Finish
Page Reached before DNF:  68

WHY DID I NOT FINISH THIS BOOK?

I always like to give every book I pick up a fighting chance and always aim to get to at least 50 pages in before I decide what to do next.  I just couldn't do it with this one.  Here's the reasons why:

• I could not connect with any of the characters.  None of them particularly stood out for me and I just wasn't interested in following their stories and finding out more;
• I was bored.  The start of this book was very slow paced.  I really wanted something surprising to happen but from the pages that I read nothing had happened by then.  It may be that something happens later that I missed out on; and
• this book was so hyped up that I think this was one of those that I had very high expectations for and just didn't get it. 

That being said the writing in this book was good and I was enjoying that part of it.  I would not hesitate picking up another book written by the same author.