This month my Bookanistas Review is THE MOON AND MORE by Sarah Dessen. The great Sarah Dessen. The master of contemporary YA. I don’t need to review this book. It was awesome. But I want to add a little something. I want to talk about why Dessen’s novels strike a chord with her legion of readers. Her books are real and relatable. There are no fancy gimmicks to pull you in. You simply start reading and before you’ve realized it’s happened, you’ve dropped into the world of a real person. And you feel their feels. And that’s the key, isn’t it? Dessen makes you feel real things–and you become invested in her words and in her characters.
Read THE MOON AND MORE, but don’t just stop there. Read all of Dessen’s books. You won’t regret it.
Luke is the perfect boyfriend: handsome, kind, fun. He and Emaline have been together all through high school in Colby, the beach town where they both grew up. But now, in the summer before college, Emaline wonders if perfect is good enough.
Enter Theo, a super-ambitious outsider, a New Yorker assisting on a documentary film about a reclusive local artist. Theo’s sophisticated, exciting, and, best of all, he thinks Emaline is much too smart for Colby.
Emaline’s mostly-absentee father, too, thinks Emaline should have a bigger life, and he’s convinced that an Ivy League education is the only route to realizing her potential. Emaline is attracted to the bright future that Theo and her father promise. But she also clings to the deep roots of her loving mother, stepfather, and sisters. Can she ignore the pull of the happily familiar world of Colby?
Emaline wants the moon and more, but how can she balance where she comes from with where she’s going?
Sarah Dessen’s devoted fans will welcome this story of romance, yearning, and, finally, empowerment. It could only happen in the summer.
http://youtu.be/r84SvszclY4
Want to check out what the rest of the Bookanistas are reading? Here you go…
- Kay Upperman is loving JUST ONE YEAR by Gayle Forman
- Christine Fonseca is delighted by BY BLOOD by Tracy Banghart
- Jessica Love is traveling with TIME AFTER TIME by Tamara Ireland Stone
- Nikki Katz is wow’d by THE SPECTACULAR NOW by Tim Tharp
What is your favorite contemporary YA novel? Why do you love it so much? Do you think YA Contemporary is making a revival?
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[…] Kimberly Sabatini is reveling in THE MOON AND MORE by Sarah Dessen […]
Ah, forgot about this one. I’ve read a bunch of Dessen’s, I’ll have to find this one at the library!
It was really good. I wasn’t sure how it was going to play out and I liked the direction she took it across multiple threads.
Sounds like a good one to me! (You are absolute heck on my TBR pile. You know that, don’t you?)
((((hugs)))))