Recent Reads

Here are my most recent reads! 

The Female of the Species by Mindy McGinnis

This book was pretty dark. It's about Alex, whose sister was raped and then killed. She then kills her sister's killer, and is never caught her freshman year of high school. It's now senior year, and Alex is volunteering at an animal shelter. She's also about to make her first friend, Peekay, who is a preacher's kid. The story is told from their points of view, and also from Jack's point of view, an athlete that's known Alex her whole life and is just starting to notice her again. Can Alex have normal friendships and relationships, even with her past? 

This book really made me think and is going to be one of those that I never forget about. 

The Young Elites, The Rose Society, and The Midnight Star 

                    

This series is like X-Men meeting mythology. After a fever, certain children are marked. And some of those marked children exhibit powers. Adelina is marked, but doesn't discover she has powers until she's running away from home. She's thrown in prison to be burned at the stake, but is rescued at the last moment by a group of young elites. They want to use her and her powers to overthrow the king, who punishes those who are marked. 

I don't want to talk about the other two books too much because I'll spoil the first. But I loved this series. The second book kept me up all night because I had thirty pages of it left and it was a very, very tense book. The last book was fantastic, and the ending ripped out my little heart in the most beautiful way possible, and then gently placed it on the ground. I'm recommending this series in a book talk I'm doing.

None of the Above by I. W. Gregorio

Kristin Lattimer is voted homecoming queen. After some, intimate time, with her boyfriend, she goes to the gynecologist to see why she's still in so much pain. There, she finds out that she is intersex. Specifically, she was born with gonads which are in her abdomen, doesn't have a uterus, and her vagina is very short. None of the Above goes through Kristin trying to figure out how to define herself, while also navigating all of the bullies and ignorant people in her school. It was painful to read this book at times especially with the bullying, because those things do happen. 

This book was written by a surgeon who literally met a girl like Kristin who didn't find out that she was intersex until she was in her teens. The book really opened my eyes to this issue and made me curious to learn more. There's more than just the issue of defining yourself as a man or a woman, but the issues that come with the world. For example, there have been multiple athletes who have been kicked out of competing because they aren't a 'real woman'. 

I also learned that children who are interest are pushed to have their other genitals removed, even when they are harmless and inside the body. When this happens, these kids immediately go through menopause and have to take hormones for the rest of their lives. Often times, they are pushed to do this by physicians wanting to 'normalize' them. 

I love reading books like this because I truly believe that reading makes you a more empathetic person. You get to walk in someone else's shoes that you never would have before. I now know a sliver of what it must be like to go through this, and can research more. If you want to learn more, click here to read a blog post from the author with tons of other links of information.

The Boy is Back by Meg Cabot 

As it is well known, Meg Cabot is one of my favorite authors. She delivers once again with The Boy is Back. This book is told entirely through emails, text messages, and even a few Ebay ads. I was a little confused going in, wondering if this book had a back story that I hadn't read. This book is a stand alone, and I promise that all your questions will be answered and it makes sense. 

It's about Becky who has a business helping aging people move and relocate. When her ex boyfriend's (who ran away without a word ten years ago after prom) parents are arrested and need to be relocated, Becky is called in to help. She takes the job, and things go from there. 

One of my favorite things besides the story, is that I know Meg Cabot has an obsession with hoarding television shows, and she wrote a character who gets to deal with hoarding. She literally writes whatever she wants and it's just fantastic and I freaking love her. 

What have you been reading lately?