The Snapper, The Commitments and The Van. Great films, hilarious stories.

I can't read this series fast enough. I can't believe I have to wait 2 months for the next installment!

Really disappointed. I love her Seven Realms series but this just plods along. Giving up.

Jennifer and Cameron are 9, best friends and inseparable. They are outcasts, together, and find strength in each other the way that you can only get strength from your BFF as kid. Jennifer's chubby and alone most of the time as her mom works and goes to nursing school. Cameron's a survivor, with an abusive father that made my blood curdle. One day Cameron is gone and while trying to mend her heart, Jennifer realizes that the only way to survive is by becoming someone else - Jenna.

8 years on Jenna is popular, fit and has a new (seriously awesome) stepdad, as well as a (cute but dickish) boyfriend. But she never forgot Cameron Quick. Which is helpful because he's turned up to wish her a Happy Birthday.

This book really tugged at my heart. Zarr is a wordsmith when it comes to describing and interpreting the feelings of children and adolescents. Jennifer's loneliness was palpable, as was Jenna's anxiety at keeping her carefully constructed world together. When Cameron comes back things start to unravel, a repressed memory she hid away long ago surfaces, and real healing begins.

I definitely felt that the first half of this book was much stronger than the second half and felt a bit unsatisfied about some things (like the lack of addressing her binge eating and how she kept that hidden) but overall a solid 3 stars. :)

I'm glad to see that there are actually some decent dystopian reads out there after the serious over-saturation of the market after The Hunger Games trilogy.

My only beef with this book was the SERIOUS turn of events that happens about 2/3 of the way through that sort of leaves you being like WHAAAA? However, I know that this is going to be a trilogy and 3 books of 3 kids traipsing through the woods to escape the zombies would not a good trilogy make.

This book sort of has it all - crazy dystopian action/survival, the Changed, zombies created by the nuclear/sonic blasts that triggered the end of the world, and SWOON. It's always good to have a bit of swoon when you're running for your life. Ashes is one of those post-apoc/dystopian reads that is terrifying simply because the premise is plausible. It gave me some serious nightmares.

And the end. I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING. :)

I felt compelled to warn others from getting sucked into this ultimately unfulfilling book since the movie trailer is out. ALTHOUGH...Jeremy Irons, Viola Davis AND Emma Thompson? I may have to see it after all.

Greg Gaines likes to fly beneath the radar. He's basically figured out a way to be part of all of the cliques and none of them at once. Why? Do you even need to ask? High school is a MINEFIELD, people. He has one friend, Earl, a short, slightly misanthropic kid who comes from a family of completely misanthropic, socially maladjusted thugs-in-training. Earl and Greg like to make movies. Terrible movies. Movies that sometimes star Greg's cat, Cat Stevens.

One day Greg's well-meaning and slightly interfering mother decides that he needs to spend time with a girl he knew from Rabbinical school because, well, she's got leukaemia. Let me just say that this book is NOT a Cancer Book. It is not the kind of book that wants you to Feel Stuff and it is not the kind of book that will be made into a Hallmark Movie of the Week. This book is, quite frankly, hilarious.

I literally snarfed with laughter throughout this entire book. It's told from Greg's POV, and that kid's stream of consciousness is just full-on crazy. I do believe the term "f*ckburglar" will now be a regular part of my vocabulary.

I don't want to give too much away but seriously y'all, just read this book. The characters are wonderful and sometimes painfully real - especially Earl's family. Mr. McCarthy has to be THE best teacher-character ever put to paper. I will never look at pho the same way again. :)