Friday, June 4, 2010

North of Beautiful by Justina Chen Headley

As he continued to stare, I wanted to point to my cheek and remind him, But you were the one who wanted this, remember? You're the one who asked-and I repeat-Why not fix your face?

It's hard not to notice Terra Cooper.

She's tall, blond, and has an enviable body. But with one turn of her cheek, all people notice is her unmistakably "flawed" face. Terra secretly plans to leave her stifling small town in the Northwest and escape to an East Coast college, but gets pushed off-course by her controlling father. When an unexpected collision puts Terra directly in Jacob's path, the handsome but quirky Goth boy immediately challenges her assumptions about herself and her life, and she is forced in yet another direction. With her carefully laid plans disrupted, will Terra be able to find her true path (Barnesandnoble.com)


I put this one on hold at the library, I went out of town, it came in for me, the hold expired, I had to put another hold on it and finaly, I picked it up a few days ago from the library. Wow. I just finished it book and it was so awesome! Totally worth the wait. It was really thought provoking and touching. I found so much truth in it.

Where to start? At the beginning of the book, before I knew anything about the author, or what the book was even about, I thought the MC was Chinese based on things that were written. But, in fact she is a blond Caucasian, so it was really hard for me to get mental images going. I kind of thrive on mental images when I read. But, I read on.

When Jacob's character was introduced, I had a hard time getting into the book again. The MC obviously liked Jacob, but I didn't. He was wearing black lipstick and eyeshadow? And black finger nails? Eww. As the book went on though, I really started to like him. After I got over those initial humps, I didn't want to put the book down!

There was so much going on in this book. The conflicts between Terra's parents, the brothers, the birthmark, Jacob and his mom. The plot was great. I kept waiting for Terra to stick up for herself and to just BE herself but I needed to remember how I was when I was that age and she was more bold than I ever was. One thing that bothered me was her relationship with Eric.

The ending was pretty dang good. There was only one thing lacking, I wanted to know more about what happened to her family. I felt like things were mostly left hanging with her brothers and her parents. I mean, there was enough to where you kind of get the gist but I have to imagine the rest. I guess I will have to break out my imagination! Haven't used it in a while.

Oh--and I am going geocaching...tomorrow!

Overall:5/5

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