Review: Secrets of My Hollywood Life by Jen Calonita

Tags: YA, Hollywood, undercover

Meet Kaitlin Burke. Oh, wait, you already know everything about her: phenomenal star on the soap opera Family Affairs, best friend with her costar Sky Mackenzie, and voted hottest teen star by practically every magazine out there....Or do you?

Life is not well in Kaitlin's privileged world. Sky, with whom she has never gotten along, is spreading nasty rumors about Kaitlin's prissy personality to the tabloids (descriptions that better suit herself, quite frankly). Her career-crazy parents and pushy publicist seem to be trying to drown her in a ton of work and feature appearances on talk shows. Her only respite is with her best friend Liz, the "normal" daughter of a powerful lawyer, who attends the normal high school of Clark.

Desperate to know what it's like to be a regular teenager, Kaitlin goes undercover as the nerdy Rachel Rogers, British import, at Clark. The experience is so much more than she expected, however. There are annoying Sky-like girls there as well--but "Rachel" makes friends, too, and meets an incredibly cute guy, Austin, who seems to like her for who she really is: a nerdy, Star Wars-obsessed math prodigy.

But Kaitlin is teetering on the edge of her double life. How will she deal with it when it all comes crashing down on top of her?

SECRETS OF MY HOLLYWOOD LIFE has been touted as "what it's really like to be a celebrity 'It' girl" (Us Weekly), but having had no experience in the Hollywood world, I don't know whether that is true or not. What I do know is that it's always nice to have a down-to-earth, unjaded girl for a protagonist, even if Kaitlin's character doesn't really ring to me. Same with the other characters. They're likable...but only to an extent, the same way you'd like, say, your assigned chem lab partner whom you never get to know really well. Still, the book is a fun romp through the L.A. glam life, perfect for those who are tired of looking at it from the self-satisfied top.

Similar Authors

Meg Cabot

Kate Brian

Melissa Senate (Theodora Twist)

Ally Carter (Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy)

Rating: 3/5

Review: Becoming Chloe by Catherine Ryan Hyde

Tag: YA, road trip, beauty, self-discovery, homosexuality, abuse

17-year-old Jordy--a runaway after coming out to his homophobic parents--didn't know it was going to change his life when he saves a beautiful blond girl from rape. Suddenly he's stuck taking care of Chloe--which is not her real name but is preferred over her real one--who is strangely childlike although incredibly smart and determined at times. Jordy's got problems of his own, too, but he can't help feeling that he must protect Chloe, that something terrible has happened to her and that she is using her childlike disposition to mask her past.

An unfortunate string of events leads to Jordy and Chloe heading on a road trip across America, so that Chloe can hopefully learn that it's a beautiful world out there, not just full of abuse and neglect. They see beauty, but they also encounter some terrible things as well...but in the end, isn't that what it's all about? The world is both good and bad, and it's only by becoming part of it that you can truly live life.

Catherine Ryan Hyde is an amazingly talented writer. From the start, I was pulled into Jordy and Chloe's predicament, and despite the perpetual air of mystery that hung around the duo, I was able to get to know them very well. Chloe reminds me a lot of Stargirl, only with a dark past that we never get to know. Leaving Chloe's past a mystery may be frustrating, but it strengthens the message of this here-and-now book, which is to live life in the moment and not allow your past to dictate your future. For anyone looking for an uplifting road-trip story that will linger with you for a while, Becoming Chloe is THE number one choice.

You'll like this if you also like...
Jerry Spinelli (Stargirl)
Wendelin van Draanen (Flipped)
David Levithan (Boy Meets Boy)

Rating: 4/5

Review: Unwind by Neal Shusterman

Tags: YA, dystopia, sci-fi, abortion issues, religion

In an alternate (or future) United States, the Heartland War between pro-life or pro-choice parties has been fought, and one of the compromises that the people have come up with is unwinding: any teen between 13 and 18 can be signed over by their parents to the government, to be "unwound" into parts for other people's bodies. It's not death, they say, because you remain in divided parts. But is it really living?

Connor is a troublesome teen whose parents are having him unwound. Risa is an orphanage at the overcrowded state home that is planning to cut costs by having a number of kids unwound. And Lev is a tithe--born and raised to fulfill his role of being an Unwind, and thus giving back to his god and the community.

The three teens are thrown together in a desperate adventure to save their own lives--and, eventually, the lives of thousands of other Unwinds. But the journey they must make is a dangerous one, one that can fall apart at any second through betrayal or bad luck. How much can they possibly do to undermine the system that threatens to dismantle them?

Unwind takes on a variety of challenging topics that to this day still have no clear answer: abortion, how to deal with unwanted pregnancies, religion, and the existence of souls. Thankfully, it provides no cut-and-dry answer to these issues, and instead presents them in a thrilling and approachable novel. While I was not particularly impressed by Shusterman's writing style (too much telling and not enough showing), the characters--especially Connor and Risa, but even some of the secondary characters--come across as strong, unique, and appealing. They are good protagonists for readers to follow in this book that will most certainly leave an impression on you.

You'll like this if you also like...
Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games)
Michael Grant (Gone)
Margaret Peterson Haddix

Rating: 3.5/5

Featuring Bloggers like YOU!

So I've been thinking. (I do that too often sometimes.) It's really hard to start a blog, and to gain a loyal following. Much like it's really hard to first break into the publishing world. You're expected to be brilliant, and witty, and funny, and original, and creative... all while being 110 percent appealing. It's only when you've become an established name and presence that you can kind of, well, slack off a bit, and come out with bits of mediocre work occasionally.

Around the YA blogosphere, there are a few bloggers whom everyone knows and everyone follows. These are the lucky few who have insider access to what's being published and when, contacts with exciting authors, and, of course, numerous contests to pique interest.

But what about the rest of us? What about those of us who cannot afford a contest every week, but who still produce great content on their blogs, content that often, sadly, remains unseen by most of the world?

Introducing the latest on my blog: Featuring Bloggers. Where, once every couple of weeks (depending on how free I am), I showcase/interview bloggers who are either just starting out and have great potential, or who write well and deserve to get a little more attention. This isn't a contest; rather, it is based on communication. Leaving comments on one another's work, writing great reviews that actually make me read every word of it... All are ways to catch my attention and thus have the potential to be showcased on my blog.

So how about it?! What do you guys think about this idea? Just start leaving comments (not all of them have to be brilliantly scintillating; God only knows how not up to par I am in my writing sometimes). Just be yourself. I'm always up for promoting the new and the good.