Not gonna lie, I thought Dave was a little sketchy at first (though of course he immediately changed my mind). Kind of mild for a Dessen book, but it's pretty cool to find a story where I agree with almost all the protagonist's decisions.

Violet's decision was really stupid, but I can kind of see how she'd get caught up in the moment with her new friend's bad influence. Sisterly solidarity always gets me in the best way! Calla's Duncan was my favorite of the boys; I really wish 

they could have ended up together.

 

I don't usually like zombie stories, but this one had a memorable cast, great writing, and very strong ties to Lewis Carroll's original.

Despite the dystopian setting, the details and plot were refreshingly different. SpoilerThe boy as the hostage? Yes. And oh my gosh, I adore Logan, the ever-resourceful logician/tactician.

Classic Riordan snark and irony at its finest. I just wish we'd gotten more Percy/Annabeth POV, though of course Nico (and his partner) are adorable.

A lot of tropes, but they were poignant (if not fresh) and contributed to the overall plot. Vivid, sympathetic, complex characters; gorgeous setting; even the dialogue was well done, and I’m particularly picky about this last one. The ending was terrific and made perfect logical sense. 

Overall, this book was touching and bright, but at no point did I shed tears or even feel utterly immersed — which is why I didn’t give it a full five stars.

The boyish banter was fun(ny) and cute, and the "Billy D's dad" puzzle with Dane; it added to the plot development/amplitude.

Thought-provoking without overtly challenging readers to reevaluate the system, which in my opinion was a more effective approach. Definitely worth the time I spent reading it.

My first Tana French book was Into the Woods, which I read early in my freshman year of high school. (It probably would've been more age-appropriate if I had read The Secret Place then and Into the Woods now, but I digress.)

In all honesty, I liked Into the Woods better — perhaps part of it is that I liked that book so much when I first read it, but it seems that it had more sympathetic characters, a more suspenseful mystery, less obvious developments.

Which is not to say that I didn't like The Secret Place! The backdrop is pretty much exactly my elementary-school fantasy of boarding school, and the narrative epitomizes "There's something dangerous about the boredom of teenage girls" — the edgier (so to speak) side of female adolescence, being young and underestimated and self-diagnosed as invincible.

The beginning was maybe a little heavy, but it's hard to keep from falling in love with Ander and to cry over Brooks - what that poor boy went through! Definitely not your average teenage dystopia crap.