23/04/2014

Eleanor & Park - Rainbow Rowell

Eleanor & Park - Rainbow Rowell



Author:


Rainbow Rowell

Published:


2013

Blurb On The Back:



Two misfits.


One extraordinary love.

Eleanor... Red hair, wrong clothes. Standing behind him until he turns his head. Lying beside him until he wakes up. Making everyone else seem drabber and flatter and never good enough...Eleanor.

Park... He knows she'll love a song before he plays it for her. He laughs at her jokes before she ever gets to the punch line. There's a place on his chest, just below his throat, that makes her want to keep promises...Park.

Set over the course of one school year, this is the story of two star-crossed sixteen-year-olds—smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try.



Review:


I read this as part of my 2014 Goodreads.com Reading Challenge.

I was recommended Rainbow Rowells novels after reading a couple of other YA books. I had started out with Fangirl (already reviewed) and had enjoyed it, however, I had put this book on the back burner in order to read a couple of memoirs and books that would be considered age appropriate for my decrepit 30 year old mind. 

I'm glad I did as it left me refreshed and ready for the whimsy of young love that comes from this book. It provides a classic set-up of two outsiders coming together to make sense of a world that is uniquely unfair to them. 

Eleanor is a wonderfully rounded character who has everything thrown at her and maintains her relative sanity by keeping everyone and everything at arms length. Park is a guy who enjoys wearing eye-liner and not driving a stick shift car (Being from the UK I cannot understand why you wouldn't drive a manual car as it is the norm over here.)

Their friendship and eventual courtship over 80's rock and comics is nicely paced and keeps the reader interested. The antagonist in the father figures of the young couple are perfectly pitched, abusive and self-absorbed in Eleanors case and overly masculine and old fashioned in Parks.

I really enjoyed the book and the ending left me wanting more. I'm starting to feel that the term Young Adult Fiction should be scrapped as so much of this genre spans all ages. In my reading I am discovering that if I conformed to what my age says I should I would miss out on a treasure trove of brilliant writing. Authors like Rainbow Rowell, John Green and Meg Cabot. To be honest that would be a damn shame.

Please tell me what you think of the book, the genre, me etc I'd Appreciate the feedback

9 out of 10 

Peace Deejay.

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