Carmen's bookshelf: all en-US Fri, 21 Jul 2023 08:12:02 -0700 60 Carmen's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Amelia Anne Is Dead and Gone 11737266
Becca has always longed to break free from her small, backwater hometown. But the discovery of an unidentified dead girl on the side of a dirt road sends the town--and Becca--into a tailspin. Unable to make sense of the violence of the outside world creeping into her backyard, Becca finds herself retreating inward, paralyzed from moving forward for the first time in her life.

Short chapters detailing the last days of Amelia Anne Richardson's life are intercut with Becca's own summer as the parallel stories of two young women struggling with self-identity and relationships on the edge twist the reader closer and closer to the truth about Amelia's death.]]>
304 Kat Rosenfield 0525423893 Carmen 0 to-read 3.34 2012 Amelia Anne Is Dead and Gone
author: Kat Rosenfield
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.34
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/07/21
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You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone 35297395
But one thing could wreck their carefully planned futures: a genetic test for Huntington’s, a rare degenerative disease that slowly steals control of the body and mind. It’s turned their Israeli mother into a near stranger and fractured the sisters� own bond in ways they’ll never admit. While Tovah finds comfort in their Jewish religion, Adina rebels against its rules.

When the results come in, one twin tests negative for Huntington’s. The other tests positive.

These opposite outcomes push them farther apart as they wrestle with guilt, betrayal, and the unexpected thrill of first love. How can they repair their relationship, and is it even worth saving?

From debut author Rachel Lynn Solomon comes a luminous, heartbreaking tale of life, death, and the fragile bond between sisters.]]>
384 Rachel Lynn Solomon 1481497731 Carmen 0 to-read 3.81 2018 You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone
author: Rachel Lynn Solomon
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/02/16
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything]]> 52764252 Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe meets Roswell by way of Laurie Halse Anderson in this astonishing, genre-bending novel about a Mexican American teen who discovers profound connections between immigration, folklore, and alien life.

It’s been three years since ICE raids and phone calls from Mexico and an ill-fated walk across the Sonoran. Three years since Sia Martinez’s mom disappeared. Sia wants to move on, but it’s hard in her tiny Arizona town where people refer to her mom’s deportation as “an unfortunate incident.�

Sia knows that her mom must be dead, but every new moon Sia drives into the desert and lights San Anthony and la Guadalupe candles to guide her mom home.

Then one night, under a million stars, Sia’s life and the world as we know it cracks wide open. Because a blue-lit spacecraft crashes in front of Sia’s car…and it’s carrying her mom, who’s very much alive.

As Sia races to save her mom from armed-quite-possibly-alien soldiers, she uncovers secrets as profound as they are dangerous in this stunning and inventive exploration of first love, family, immigration, and our vast, limitless universe.]]>
409 Raquel Vasquez Gilliland 1534448632 Carmen 0 to-read 3.84 2020 Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything
author: Raquel Vasquez Gilliland
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/03/28
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow]]> 50892004 Love & Gelato meets Don’t Date Rosa Santos in this charming, heartfelt story following a Miami girl who unexpectedly finds love—and herself—in a small English town.

For Lila Reyes, a summer in England was never part of the plan. The plan was 1) take over her abuela’s role as head baker at their panadería, 2) move in with her best friend after graduation, and 3) live happily ever after with her boyfriend. But then the Trifecta happened, and everything—including Lila herself—fell apart.

Worried about Lila’s mental health, her parents make a new plan for her: spend three months with family friends in Winchester, England, to relax and reset. But with the lack of sun, a grumpy inn cook, and a small town lacking Miami flavor (both in food and otherwise), what would be a dream trip for some feels more like a nightmare to Lila…until she meets Orion Maxwell.

A teashop clerk with troubles of his own, Orion is determined to help Lila out of her funk, and appoints himself as her personal tour guide. From Winchester’s drama-filled music scene to the sweeping English countryside, it isn’t long before Lila is not only charmed by Orion, but England itself. Soon a new future is beginning to form in Lila’s mind—one that would mean leaving everything she ever planned behind.]]>
320 Laura Taylor Namey 1534471243 Carmen 0 to-read 3.74 2020 A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow
author: Laura Taylor Namey
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/03/10
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[Goldie Vance: The Hotel Whodunit]]> 51048074 Move over, Nancy Drew--there's a new sleuth in town! Inspired by the beloved comic series, Goldie Vance is ready to sleuth her way through never-before-seen mysteries in this original middle-grade series by Lilliam Rivera!

Marigold "Goldie" Vance lives and works at the Crossed Palms Resort Hotel in Florida with a whole slew of characters: her dad, Art, the manager of the joint; Cheryl Lebeaux, the concierge and Goldie's best friend; and Walter Tooey, the hired hotel detective. Her mom, Sylvia, works nearby at the Mermaid Club.

While life at the Crossed Palms is always busy, the resort is currently overrun with Hollywood-types filming the hottest new creature feature, and tensions are at an all-time high. Even Goldie's mom is in on the movie act, doing what she does best: playing a mermaid. Just when Goldie thinks the movie biz couldn't get any more exciting, a diamond-encrusted swimming cap goes missing, and all fingers point to Goldie's mom as the culprit. Can Goldie uncover the true thief before it's too late?

Hope Larson and Brittney William's critically acclaimed Goldie Vance comic series explores never-before-seen mysteries in this thrilling, original middle-grade debut by Lilliam Rivera. Features a full-color comic chapter that's essential to unraveling the mystery.]]>
264 Lilliam Rivera 0316456640 Carmen 0 to-read 3.45 2020 Goldie Vance: The Hotel Whodunit
author: Lilliam Rivera
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/02/07
shelves: to-read
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The Summer of Impossibilities 49948337
One can’t wait. One would rather gnaw off her own arm than hang out with a bunch of strangers just so their moms can drink too much wine and sing Journey two o’clock in the morning. Two are sisters. Three are currently feuding with their mothers.

One almost sets her crush on fire with a flaming marshmallow. Two steal the boat for a midnight joyride that goes horribly, awkwardly wrong. All of them are hiding something.

One falls in love with a boy she thought she despised. Two fall in love with each other. None of them are the same at the end of the summer.]]>
384 Rachael Allen Carmen 0 to-read 3.84 2020 The Summer of Impossibilities
author: Rachael Allen
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/12/26
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17 First Kisses 18599770
Until Claire meets Luke.

But Megan is falling for Luke, too, and if there’s one thing Claire knows for sure, it’s that Megan’s pretty much irresistible.

With true love and best friendship on the line, Claire suddenly has everything to lose. And what she learns—about her crush, her friends, and most of all herself—makes the choices even harder.

In her moving debut, Rachael Allen brilliantly captures the complexities of friendship, the struggles of self-discovery, and the difficulties of trying to find love in high school. Fans of Sarah Ockler, Susane Colasanti, and Stephanie Perkins will fall head over heels for this addictive, heartfelt, and often hilarious modern love story.]]>
352 Rachael Allen 0062281356 Carmen 0 to-read 3.74 2014 17 First Kisses
author: Rachael Allen
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/08/06
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[The Summer of Impossible Things]]> 31348237 432 Rowan Coleman 1785032410 Carmen 0 to-read 3.89 The Summer of Impossible Things
author: Rowan Coleman
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.89
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/08/06
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The Water Bears 42400730 A story about a boy recovering from a bear attack with the help of his friends and maybe, some magic.

All Newt Gomez wants for his thirteenth birthday is a bike. After surviving a bear attack last year, he thinks this isn't an unreasonable request. Instead, his hardworking parents give him a former taco truck to help him get around the wacky island where they live in the Pacific Northwest. And then Newt and his best friend Ethan find a life-sized wooden bear washed up on the shore. Ethan is convinced the bear grants wishes; Newt doesn't know what to think.

Newt also has a big decision ahead: go to middle school on the island, or to the mainland where his warm extended family lives? There, he won't be the only Latinx kid; he doesn't have bad dreams about the attack, and not everyone knows what happened to him. Newt secretly plots to move to his abuela's house, but his truck is stolen with the maybe-magic bear inside. He must confront his fears and adapt to the reality of a world that's often uncertain, but always full of salvageable wonders.]]>
Kim Baker Carmen 0 to-read 0.0 2020 The Water Bears
author: Kim Baker
name: Carmen
average rating: 0.0
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/31
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<![CDATA[Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine]]> 31434883 No one’s ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: she struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding unnecessary human contact, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy.

But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen, the three rescue one another from the lives of isolation that they had been living. Ultimately, it is Raymond’s big heart that will help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one. If she does, she'll learn that she, too, is capable of finding friendship—and even love—after all.

Smart, warm, uplifting, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is the story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey as she realizes. . .

the only way to survive is to open your heart.]]>
336 Gail Honeyman 0735220689 Carmen 5 4.21 2017 Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
author: Gail Honeyman
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2019/07/24
date added: 2019/07/24
shelves:
review:
When I finished the book, I wanted to start right back over again. Love.
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Into the Tall, Tall Grass 42281718 A girl journeys across her family’s land to save her grandmother’s life.

Yolanda Rodríguez-O’Connell has a secret. All the members of her family have a magical gift—all, that is, except for Yolanda. Still, it’s something she can never talk about, or the townsfolk will call her family brujas—witches. When her grandmother, Wela, falls into an unexplained sleep, Yolanda is scared. Her father is off fighting in a faraway war, her mother died long ago, and Yolanda has isolated herself from her best friend and twin sister. If she loses her grandmother, who will she have left?

When a strange grass emerges in the desert behind their house, Wela miraculously wakes, begging Yolanda to take her to the lone pecan tree left on their land. Determined not to lose her, Yolanda sets out on this journey with her sister, her ex-best friend, and a boy who has a crush on her. But what is the mysterious box that her grandmother needs to find? And how will going to the pecan tree make everything all right?]]>
336 Loriel Ryon Carmen 0 to-read 4.05 2020 Into the Tall, Tall Grass
author: Loriel Ryon
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/17
shelves: to-read
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All of Us with Wings 40177227
Seventeen-year-old Xochi is alone in San Francisco, running from her painful past: the mother who abandoned her, the man who betrayed her. Then one day, she meets Pallas, a precocious twelve-year-old who lives with her rock-star family in one of the city’s storybook Victorians. Xochi accepts a position as Pallas’s live-in governess and quickly finds her place in their household, which is relaxed and happy despite the band's larger-than-life fame.

But on the night of the Vernal Equinox, as a concert afterparty rages in the house below, Xochi and Pallas accidentally summon a pair of ancient creatures devoted to avenging the wrongs of Xochi’s adolescence. She would do anything to preserve her new life, but with the creatures determined to exact vengeance on those who’ve hurt her, no one is safe—not the family she’s chosen, nor the one she left behind.]]>
360 Michelle Ruiz Keil Carmen 0 to-read 3.28 2019 All of Us with Wings
author: Michelle Ruiz Keil
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.28
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/17
shelves: to-read
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Dealing in Dreams 35297488 At night, Las Mal Criadas own these streets.

Nalah leads the fiercest all-girl crew in Mega City. That role brings with it violent throw downs and access to the hottest boydega clubs, but the sixteen-year-old grows weary of the life. Her dream is to get off the streets and make a home in the exclusive Mega Towers, in which only a chosen few get to live. To make it to the Mega towers, Nalah must prove her loyalty to the city's benevolent founder and cross the border in a search for a mysterious gang the Ashé Ryders. Led by a reluctant guide, Nalah battles other crews and her own doubts, but the closer she gets to her goal, the more she loses sight of everything—and everyone� she cares about.

Nalah must do the unspeakable to get what she wants—a place to call home. But is a home just where you live? Or who you choose to protect?]]>
336 Lilliam Rivera 1481472143 Carmen 0 to-read 3.41 2019 Dealing in Dreams
author: Lilliam Rivera
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/07/07
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[The Education of Margot Sánchez]]> 26594801 Pretty in Pink comes to the South Bronx in this bold and romantic coming-of-age novel about dysfunctional families, good and bad choices, and finding the courage to question everything you ever thought you wanted—from debut author Lilliam Rivera.


THINGS/PEOPLE MARGOT HATES:

Mami, for destroying my social life
Papi, for allowing Junior to become a Neanderthal
Junior, for becoming a Neanderthal
This supermarket
Everyone else

After “borrowing� her father's credit card to finance a more stylish wardrobe, Margot
Sánchez suddenly finds herself grounded. And by grounded, she means working as an indentured servant in her family’s struggling grocery store to pay off her debts.

With each order of deli meat she slices, Margot can feel her carefully cultivated prep school reputation slipping through her fingers, and she’s willing to do anything to get out of this punishment. Lie, cheat, and maybe even steal�

Margot’s invitation to the ultimate beach party is within reach and she has no intention of letting her family’s drama or Moisés—the admittedly good looking but outspoken boy from the neighborhood—keep her from her goal.]]>
296 Lilliam Rivera 1481472119 Carmen 0 to-read 3.61 2017 The Education of Margot Sánchez
author: Lilliam Rivera
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/07
shelves: to-read
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The Truth Is 36316601 A powerful exploration of love, identity, and self-worth through the eyes of a fierce, questioning Puerto Rican teen.

Fifteen-year-old Verdad doesn't think she has time for love. She's still struggling to process the recent death of her best friend, Blanca; dealing with the high expectations of her hardworking Puerto Rican mother and the absence of her remarried father; and keeping everyone at a distance. But when she meets Danny, a new guy at school--who happens to be trans--all bets are off. Verdad suddenly has to deal with her mother's disapproval of her relationship with Danny as well as her own prejudices and questions about her identity, and Danny himself, who is comfortable in his skin but keeping plenty of other secrets.]]>
272 NoNieqa Ramos Carmen 0 to-read 3.83 2019 The Truth Is
author: NoNieqa Ramos
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/07
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1984 40961427 Nineteen Eighty-Four is a rare work that grows more haunting as its futuristic purgatory becomes more real. Published in 1949, the book offers political satirist George Orwell's nightmarish vision of a totalitarian, bureaucratic world and one poor stiff's attempt to find individuality. The brilliance of the novel is Orwell's prescience of modern life—the ubiquity of television, the distortion of the language—and his ability to construct such a thorough version of hell. Required reading for students since it was published, it ranks among the most terrifying novels ever written.]]> 298 George Orwell Carmen 0 4.24 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1949
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/07/05
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The Resolutions 31332356
From hiking trips, to four-person birthday parties, to never-ending group texts, Jess, Lee, Ryan, and Nora have always been inseparable—and unstoppable. But now, with senior year on the horizon, they’ve been splintering off and growing apart. And so, as always, Jess makes a plan.

Reinstating their usual tradition of making resolutions together on New Year’s Eve, Jess adds a new twist: instead of making their own resolutions, the four friends assign them for each other—dares like kiss someone you know is wrong for you, show your paintings, learn Spanish, say yes to everything.

But not even the best laid plans can take into account the uncertainties of life. As the year unfolds, Jess, Ryan, Nora, and Lee each test the bonds that hold them together. And amid first loves, heart breaks, and life-changing decisions, beginning again is never as simple as it seems.]]>
416 Mia Garcia 0062656821 Carmen 5 3.61 2018 The Resolutions
author: Mia Garcia
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2019/06/30
date added: 2019/06/30
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Mrs. Everything 41592780 Alternate cover for ISBN# 9781501133503

Do we change or does the world change us?

Jo and Bethie Kaufman were born into a world full of promise.

Growing up in 1950s Detroit, they live in a perfect “Dick and Jane� house, where their roles in the family are clearly defined. Jo is the tomboy, the bookish rebel with a passion to make the world more fair; Bethie is the pretty, feminine good girl, a would-be star who enjoys the power her beauty confers and dreams of a traditional life.

But the truth ends up looking different from what the girls imagined. Jo and Bethie survive traumas and tragedies. As their lives unfold against the background of free love and Vietnam, Woodstock and women’s lib, Bethie becomes an adventure-loving wild child who dives headlong into the counterculture and is up for anything (except settling down). Meanwhile, Jo becomes a proper young mother in Connecticut, a witness to the changing world instead of a participant. Neither woman inhabits the world she dreams of, nor has a life that feels authentic or brings her joy. Is it too late for the women to finally stake a claim on happily ever after?]]>
416 Jennifer Weiner Carmen 0 to-read 3.81 2019 Mrs. Everything
author: Jennifer Weiner
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/06/13
shelves: to-read
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She's Come Undone 10863144
Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Stranded in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies.

When she finally orbits into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before she really goes under.

18 hrs 22 min]]>
484 Wally Lamb Carmen 5 4.20 1992 She's Come Undone
author: Wally Lamb
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1992
rating: 5
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date added: 2019/06/13
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The Grief Keeper 34522727
They hitchhike, snagging a ride with an unassuming woman who agrees to drive them to New Jersey, but when Marisol wakes up in D.C. she learns the woman is actually a government agent. Indranie Patel has a proposal for she wants Marisol to be a Grief Keeper, someone who will take another's grief into their body. It's a dangerous experimental study, but if Marisol agrees she and Gabi will be allowed to stay in the United States. If the experiment fails the girls will be sent home, which is a death sentence. Things become more complicated when Marisol meets Rey, the wealthy daughter of a D.C. Senator, and the girl she's helping to heal. Marisol likes Rey's short hair and sarcastic attitude. But she didn't expect the connection from their shared grief to erupt into a powerful love.

Suddenly being forced from the United States isn't just a matter of life and death, but a matter of the heart.]]>
256 Alexandra Villasante 0525514031 Carmen 0 to-read 3.99 2019 The Grief Keeper
author: Alexandra Villasante
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/06/11
shelves: to-read
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The Girl Who Drank the Moon 28110852
One year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary child with extraordinary magic. Xan decides she must raise this enmagicked girl, whom she calls Luna, as her own. To keep young Luna safe from her own unwieldy power, Xan locks her magic deep inside her. When Luna approaches her thirteenth birthday, her magic begins to emerge on schedule--but Xan is far away. Meanwhile, a young man from the Protectorate is determined to free his people by killing the witch. Soon, it is up to Luna to protect those who have protected her--even if it means the end of the loving, safe world she’s always known.]]>
388 Kelly Barnhill 1616205679 Carmen 0 4.11 2016 The Girl Who Drank the Moon
author: Kelly Barnhill
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2019/05/21
date added: 2019/05/21
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Even if the Sky Falls 24218983
Julie is desperate for a change. So she heads to New Orleans with her youth group to rebuild houses and pretend her life isn’t a total mess. But between her super-clingy team leader and her way-too-chipper companions, Julie feels more trapped than ever.

In a moment of daring, she ditches her work clothes for DIY fairy wings and heads straight into the heart of Mid-Summer Mardi Gras, where she locks eyes with Miles, an utterly irresistible guy with a complicated story of his own. And for once, Julie isn’t looking back. She jumps at the chance to see the real New Orleans, and in one surreal night, they dance under the stars, share their most shameful secrets, and fall in love.

But their adventure takes an unexpected turn when an oncoming hurricane changes course. As the storm gains power and Julie is pulled back into chaos she finds pretending everything is fine is no longer an option.]]>
304 Mia Garcia Carmen 0 to-read 3.72 2016 Even if the Sky Falls
author: Mia Garcia
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/05/14
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Outlander (Outlander, #1) 10964
Hurled back in time by forces she cannot understand, Claire is catapulted into the intrigues of lairds and spies that may threaten her life, and shatter her heart. For here James Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior, shows her a love so absolute that Claire becomes a woman torn between fidelity and desire—and between two vastly different men in two irreconcilable lives.]]>
850 Diana Gabaldon 0440242940 Carmen 0 4.25 1991 Outlander (Outlander, #1)
author: Diana Gabaldon
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1991
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/04/26
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The Fortunes of Indigo Skye 1601589 I suddenly see where I'm standing, and that's at the edge of change - really, really big change.

Eighteen-year-old Indigo Skye feels like she has it all - a waitress job she loves, an adorable refrigerator-delivery-guy boyfriend, and a home life that's slightly crazed but rich in love. Until a mysterious man at the restaurant leaves her a 2.5 million-dollar tip, and her life as she knew it is transformed.

At first its amazing: a hot new car, enormous flat-screen TV, and presents for everyone she cares about. She laughs off the warnings that money changes people, that they come to rely on what they have instead of who they are. Because it won't happen...not to her. Or will it? What do you do when you can buy anything your heart desires -- but what your heart desires can't be bought?

This is the story of a girl who gets rich, gets lost, and ultimately finds her way back - if not to where she started, then to where she can start again.

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298 Deb Caletti 1416910077 Carmen 0 3.56 2008 The Fortunes of Indigo Skye
author: Deb Caletti
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/04/25
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<![CDATA[The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared]]> 13624183
It would be the adventure of a lifetime for anyone else, but Allan has a larger-than-life backstory: Not only has he witnessed some of the most important events of the twentieth century, but he has actually played a key role in them. Starting out in munitions as a boy, he somehow finds himself involved in many of the key explosions of the twentieth century and travels the world, sharing meals and more with everyone from Stalin, Churchill, and Truman to Mao, Franco, and de Gaulle. Quirky and utterly unique, " The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared" has charmed readers across the world.]]>
384 Jonas Jonasson 1401324649 Carmen 5 Strange and delightful. 3.78 2009 The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared
author: Jonas Jonasson
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/04/25
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review:
Strange and delightful.
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The House on Mango Street 139253 The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero.

Told in a series of vignettes � sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous–it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become. Few other books in our time have touched so many readers.]]>
110 Sandra Cisneros 0679734775 Carmen 0 3.69 1984 The House on Mango Street
author: Sandra Cisneros
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1984
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/04/21
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A Tree Grows in Brooklyn 14891 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a poignant and moving tale filled with compassion and cruelty, laughter and heartache, crowded with life and people and incident. The story of young, sensitive, and idealistic Francie Nolan and her bittersweet formative years in the slums of Williamsburg has enchanted and inspired millions of readers for more than sixty years. By turns overwhelming, sublime, heartbreaking, and uplifting, the daily experiences of the unforgettable Nolans are raw with honesty and tenderly threaded with family connectedness -- in a work of literary art that brilliantly captures a unique time and place as well as incredibly rich moments of universal experience.]]> 496 Betty Smith 0061120073 Carmen 0 4.29 1943 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
author: Betty Smith
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1943
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/04/21
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<![CDATA[We'll Always Have Summer (Summer #3)]]> 8680278 291 Jenny Han 1416995587 Carmen 0 3.79 2011 We'll Always Have Summer (Summer #3)
author: Jenny Han
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/04/21
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<![CDATA[It's Not Summer Without You (Summer, #2)]]> 6584188 The Summer I Turned Pretty from the New York Times bestselling author of To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (soon to be a major motion picture!), Jenny Han.

Can summer be truly summer without Cousins Beach?

It used to be that Belly counted the days until summer, until she was back at Cousins Beach with Conrad and Jeremiah. But not this year. Not after Susannah got sick again and Conrad stopped caring. Everything that was right and good has fallen apart, leaving Belly wishing summer would never come.

But when Jeremiah calls saying Conrad has disappeared, Belly knows what she must do to make things right again. And it can only happen back at the beach house, the three of them together, the way things used to be. If this summer really and truly is the last summer, it should end the way it started—at Cousins Beach.]]>
275 Jenny Han 1416995552 Carmen 0 3.78 2010 It's Not Summer Without You (Summer, #2)
author: Jenny Han
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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<![CDATA[A Swiftly Tilting Planet (Time Quintet, #3)]]> 77276 278 Madeleine L'Engle 0440401585 Carmen 0 4.09 1978 A Swiftly Tilting Planet (Time Quintet, #3)
author: Madeleine L'Engle
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1978
rating: 0
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The Little Prince 157993
Few stories are as widely read and as universally cherished by children and adults alike as The Little Prince, presented here in a stunning new translation with carefully restored artwork. The definitive edition of a worldwide classic, it will capture the hearts of readers of all ages.]]>
96 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 0152023984 Carmen 0 4.32 1943 The Little Prince
author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1943
rating: 0
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<![CDATA[Leah on the Offbeat (Simonverse, #3)]]> 31180248 Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda—takes center stage in this novel of first love and senior-year angst.

When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon.

So Leah really doesn’t know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high. It’s hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting—especially when she realizes she might love one of them more than she ever intended.]]>
352 Becky Albertalli 0062643800 Carmen 5 3.79 2018 Leah on the Offbeat (Simonverse, #3)
author: Becky Albertalli
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2018
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[A Thousand Pieces of You (Firebird, #1)]]> 17234658
Marguerite refuses to let the man who destroyed her family go free. So she races after Paul through different universes, always leaping into another version of herself. But she also meets alternate versions of the people she knows—including Paul, whose life entangles with hers in increasingly familiar ways. Before long she begins to question Paul's guilt—as well as her own heart. And soon she discovers the truth behind her father's death is far more sinister than she expected.]]>
368 Claudia Gray 0062278967 Carmen 0 to-read 3.90 2014 A Thousand Pieces of You (Firebird, #1)
author: Claudia Gray
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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What Happened to Goodbye 8492856 Who is the real McLean?

Since her parents' bitter divorce, McLean and her dad, a restaurant consultant, have been on the move-four towns in two years. Estranged from her mother and her mother's new family, McLean has followed her dad in leaving the unhappy past behind. And each new place gives her a chance to try out a new persona: from cheerleader to drama diva. But now, for the first time, McLean discovers a desire to stay in one place and just be herself, whoever that is. Perhaps Dave, the guy next door, can help her find out.

Combining Sarah Dessen's trademark graceful writing, great characters, and compelling storytelling, What Happened to Goodbye is irresistible reading.]]>
402 Sarah Dessen 0670012947 Carmen 0 3.95 2011 What Happened to Goodbye
author: Sarah Dessen
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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<![CDATA[Always and Forever, Lara Jean (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #3)]]> 35247769 Lara Jean is having the best senior year.

And there’s still so much to look forward to: a class trip to New York City, prom with her boyfriend Peter, Beach Week after graduation, and her dad’s wedding to Ms. Rothschild. Then she’ll be off to college with Peter, at a school close enough for her to come home and bake chocolate chip cookies on the weekends.

Life couldn’t be more perfect!

At least, that’s what Lara Jean thinks . . . until she gets some unexpected news.

Now the girl who dreads change must rethink all her plans—but when your heart and your head are saying two different things, which one should you listen to?]]>
325 Jenny Han 1481430483 Carmen 0 3.99 2017 Always and Forever, Lara Jean (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #3)
author: Jenny Han
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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Tuck Everlasting 84981 148 Natalie Babbitt 0374480095 Carmen 0 3.90 1975 Tuck Everlasting
author: Natalie Babbitt
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1975
rating: 0
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My Life Next Door 12294652 A gorgeous debut about family, friendship, first romance, and how to be true to one person you love without betraying another

“One thing my mother never knew, and would disapprove of most of all, was that I watched the Garretts. All the time.�

The Garretts are everything the Reeds are not. Loud, numerous, messy, affectionate. And every day from her balcony perch, seventeen-year-old Samantha Reed wishes she was one of them . . . until one summer evening, Jase Garrett climbs her terrace and changes everything. As the two fall fiercely in love, Jase's family makes Samantha one of their own. Then in an instant, the bottom drops out of her world and she is suddenly faced with an impossible decision. Which perfect family will save her? Or is it time she saved herself?

A dreamy summer read, full of characters who stay with you long after the story is over.]]>
394 Huntley Fitzpatrick 0803736991 Carmen 0 3.97 2012 My Life Next Door
author: Huntley Fitzpatrick
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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<![CDATA[Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging (Confessions of Georgia Nicolson, #1)]]> 402013 There are six things very wrong with my life:

1. I have one of those under-the-skin spots that will never come to a head but lurk in a red way for the next two years.

2. It is on my nose

3. I have a three-year-old sister who may have peed somewhere in my room.

4. In fourteen days the summer hols will be over and then it will be back to Stalag 14 and Oberfuhrer Frau Simpson and her bunch of sadistic teachers.

5. I am very ugly and need to go into an ugly home.

6. I went to a party dressed as a stuffed olive.


In this wildly funny journal of a year in the life of Georgia Nicolson, British author Louise Rennison has perfectly captured the soaring joys and bottomless angst of being a teenager. In the spirit of Bridget Jones's Diary, this fresh, irreverent, and simply hilarious book will leave you laughing out loud. As Georgia would say, it's "Fabbity fab fab!"

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247 Louise Rennison 0060288140 Carmen 5 3.76 1999 Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging (Confessions of Georgia Nicolson, #1)
author: Louise Rennison
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1999
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[Little Women (Little Women, #1)]]> 1934 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780451529305.

Generations of readers young and old, male and female, have fallen in love with the March sisters of Louisa May Alcott’s most popular and enduring novel, Little Women. Here are talented tomboy and author-to-be Jo, tragically frail Beth, beautiful Meg, and romantic, spoiled Amy, united in their devotion to each other and their struggles to survive in New England during the Civil War.

It is no secret that Alcott based Little Women on her own early life. While her father, the freethinking reformer and abolitionist Bronson Alcott, hobnobbed with such eminent male authors as Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne, Louisa supported herself and her sisters with "woman’s work,� including sewing, doing laundry, and acting as a domestic servant. But she soon discovered she could make more money writing. Little Women brought her lasting fame and fortune, and far from being the "girl’s book� her publisher requested, it explores such timeless themes as love and death, war and peace, the conflict between personal ambition and family responsibilities, and the clash of cultures between Europe and America.

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449 Louisa May Alcott Carmen 0 4.16 1868 Little Women (Little Women, #1)
author: Louisa May Alcott
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1868
rating: 0
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Bridge to Terabithia 40940121 The 40th anniversary edition of the classic Newbery Medal-winning title by beloved author Katherine Paterson, with brand-new bonus materials including an author's note by Katherine herself and a foreword by New York Times bestselling author Kate DiCamillo.

Jess Aarons has been practicing all summer so he can be the fastest runner in the fifth grade. And he almost is, until the new girl in school, Leslie Burke, outpaces him. The two become fast friends and spend most days in the woods behind Leslie's house, where they invent an enchanted land called Terabithia. One morning, Leslie goes to Terabithia without Jess and a tragedy occurs. It will take the love of his family and the strength that Leslie has given him for Jess to be able to deal with his grief.

Bridge to Terabithia was also named an ALA Notable Children’s Book and has become a touchstone of children’s literature, as have many of Katherine Paterson’s other novels, including The Great Gilly Hopkins and Jacob Have I Loved.]]>
190 Katherine Paterson Carmen 0 4.18 1977 Bridge to Terabithia
author: Katherine Paterson
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1977
rating: 0
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Along for the Ride 5664985
A job in a clothes boutique introduces Auden to the world of girls: their talk, their friendship, their crushes. She missed out on all that, too busy being the perfect daughter to her demanding mother. Then she meets Eli, an intriguing loner and a fellow insomniac who becomes her guide to the nocturnal world of the town. Together they embark on parallel quests: for Auden, to experience the carefree teenage life she’s been denied; for Eli, to come to terms with the guilt he feels for the death of a friend.

In her signature pitch-perfect style, Sarah Dessen explores the hearts of two lonely people learning to connect.]]>
383 Sarah Dessen 0670011940 Carmen 0 4.04 2009 Along for the Ride
author: Sarah Dessen
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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To Kill a Mockingbird 2657 "Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel - a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film.]]>
323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Carmen 0 4.25 1960 To Kill a Mockingbird
author: Harper Lee
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 0
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<![CDATA[P.S. I Still Love You (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #2)]]> 20698530 Lara Jean didn’t expect to really fall for Peter.

They were just pretending. Until they weren’t. And now Lara Jean has to learn what it's like to be in a real relationship and not just a make-believe one.

But when another boy from her past returns to her life, Lara Jean’s feelings for him suddenly return too. Can a girl be in love with two boys at once?

In this charming and heartfelt sequel to the New York Times bestseller To All the Boys I've Loved Before, Lara Jean is about to find out that falling in love is the easy part.]]>
337 Jenny Han 144242673X Carmen 0 4.01 2015 P.S. I Still Love You (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #2)
author: Jenny Han
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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Lord of the Flies 7624 182 William Golding 0140283331 Carmen 0 3.70 1954 Lord of the Flies
author: William Golding
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1954
rating: 0
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Stargirl (Stargirl, #1) 22232
Leo Borlock follows the unspoken rule at Mica Area High School: don't stand out--under any circumstances! Then Stargirl arrives at Mica High and everything changes--for Leo and for the entire school. After 15 years of home schooling, Stargirl bursts into tenth grade in an explosion of color and a clatter of ukulele music, enchanting the Mica student body.

But the delicate scales of popularity suddenly shift, and Stargirl is shunned for everything that makes her different. Somewhere in the midst of Stargirl's arrival and rise and fall, normal Leo Borlock has tumbled into love with her.

In a celebration of nonconformity, Jerry Spinelli weaves a tense, emotional tale about the fleeting, cruel nature of popularity--and the thrill and inspiration of first love.]]>
186 Jerry Spinelli 0439488400 Carmen 5 3.76 2000 Stargirl (Stargirl, #1)
author: Jerry Spinelli
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2000
rating: 5
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The Sky Is Everywhere 6604794
Join Lennie on this heartbreaking and hilarious journey of profound sorrow and mad love, as she makes colossal mistakes and colossal discoveries, as she traipses through band rooms and forest bedrooms and ultimately right into your heart.

As much a celebration of love as a poignant portrait of loss, Lennie's struggle to sort her own melody out of the noise around her is always honest, often uproarious, and absolutely unforgettable.]]>
288 Jandy Nelson 0803734956 Carmen 0 3.97 2010 The Sky Is Everywhere
author: Jandy Nelson
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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Holes (Holes, #1) 38709
It doesn’t take long for Stanley to realize there’s more than character improvement going on at Camp Green Lake. The boys are digging holes because the warden is looking for something. But what could be buried under a dried-up lake? Stanley tries to dig up the truth in this inventive and darkly humorous tale of crime and punishment—and redemption.]]>
272 Louis Sachar 0439244196 Carmen 0 4.01 1998 Holes (Holes, #1)
author: Louis Sachar
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1998
rating: 0
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Then We Came to the End 97782
The characters in Then We Came To The End cope with a business downturn in the time-honored way: through gossip, secret romance, elaborate pranks, and increasingly frequent coffee breaks. By day they compete for the best office furniture left behind and try to make sense of the mysterious pro-bono ad campaign that is their only remaining "work."]]>
387 Joshua Ferris 0316016381 Carmen 5 3.47 2007 Then We Came to the End
author: Joshua Ferris
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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Wuthering Heights 507157 am Heathcliff! He's always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure... but as my own being." Wuthering Heights is the only novel of Emily Bronte, who died a year after its publication, at the age of thirty. A brooding Yorkshire tale of a love that is stronger than death, it is also a fierce vision of metaphysical passion, in which heaven and hell, nature and society, are powerfully juxtaposed. Unique, mystical, with a timeless appeal, it has become a classic of English literature.]]> 324 Emily Brontë 0553212583 Carmen 4 3.80 1847 Wuthering Heights
author: Emily Brontë
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1847
rating: 4
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All American Boys 25657130 Rashad is absent again today.

That’s the sidewalk graffiti that started it all�

Well, no, actually, a lady tripping over Rashad at the store, making him drop a bag of chips, was what started it all. Because it didn’t matter what Rashad said next—that it was an accident, that he wasn’t stealing—the cop just kept pounding him. Over and over, pummeling him into the pavement. So then Rashad, an ROTC kid with mad art skills, was absent again…and again…stuck in a hospital room. Why? Because it looked like he was stealing. And he was a black kid in baggy clothes. So he must have been stealing.

And that’s how it started.

And that’s what Quinn, a white kid, saw. He saw his best friend’s older brother beating the daylights out of a classmate. At first Quinn doesn’t tell a soul…He’s not even sure he understands it. And does it matter? The whole thing was caught on camera, anyway. But when the school—and nation—start to divide on what happens, blame spreads like wildfire fed by ugly words like “racism� and “police brutality.� Quinn realizes he’s got to understand it, because, bystander or not, he’s a part of history. He just has to figure out what side of history that will be.

Rashad and Quinn—one black, one white, both American—face the unspeakable truth that racism and prejudice didn’t die after the civil rights movement. There’s a future at stake, a future where no one else will have to be absent because of police brutality. They just have to risk everything to change the world.

Cuz that’s how it can end.]]>
316 Jason Reynolds 1481463330 Carmen 5 4.29 2015 All American Boys
author: Jason Reynolds
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2015
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[When Dimple Met Rishi (Dimple and Rishi, #1)]]> 28458598 right now, they wouldn’t have paid for her to attend a summer program for aspiring web developers…right?

Rishi Patel is a hopeless romantic. So when his parents tell him that his future wife will be attending the same summer program—wherein he’ll have to woo her—he’s totally on board. Because as silly as it sounds to most people in his life, Rishi wants to be arranged, believes in the power of tradition, stability, and being a part of something much bigger than himself.

The Shahs and Patels didn’t mean to start turning the wheels on this “suggested arrangement� so early in their children’s lives, but when they noticed them both gravitating toward the same summer program, they figured, Why not?

Dimple and Rishi may think they have each other figured out. But when opposites clash, love works hard to prove itself in the most unexpected ways.]]>
380 Sandhya Menon 1481478680 Carmen 5 3.68 2017 When Dimple Met Rishi (Dimple and Rishi, #1)
author: Sandhya Menon
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2017
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[Natalie Tan's Book of Luck & Fortune]]> 42051103
The neighborhood seer reads the restaurant's fortune in the leaves: Natalie must cook three recipes from her grandmother's cookbook to aid her struggling neighbors before the restaurant will succeed. Unfortunately, Natalie has no desire to help them try to turn things around--she resents the local shopkeepers for leaving her alone to take care of her agoraphobic mother when she was growing up. But with the support of a surprising new friend and a budding romance, Natalie starts to realize that maybe her neighbors really have been there for her all along.]]>
304 Roselle Lim 1984803255 Carmen 0 to-read 3.45 2019 Natalie Tan's Book of Luck & Fortune
author: Roselle Lim
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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Lot 40749395 Stories of a young man finding his place among family and community in Houston, from a powerful, emerging American voice.

In the city of Houston—a sprawling, diverse microcosm of America—the son of a black mother and a Latino father is coming of age. He's working at his family's restaurant, weathering his brother's blows, resenting his older sister's absence. And discovering he likes boys.

This boy and his family experience the tumult of living in the margins, the heartbreak of ghosts, and the braveries of the human heart. The stories of others living and thriving and dying across Houston's myriad neighborhoods are woven throughout to reveal a young woman's affair detonating across an apartment complex, a rag-tag baseball team, a group of young hustlers, the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, a local drug dealer who takes a Guatemalan teen under his wing, and a reluctant chupacabra.

Bryan Washington's brilliant, viscerally drawn world leaps off the page with energy, wit, and the infinite longing of people searching for home. With soulful insight into what makes a community, a family, and a life, Lot is about love in all its unsparing and unsteady forms.

Lockwood --
Alief --
610 North, 610 West --
Shepherd --
Wayside --
Bayou --
Lot --
South Congress --
Navigation --
Peggy Park --
Fannin --
Waugh --
Elgin]]>
240 Bryan Washington 0525533672 Carmen 0 to-read 3.75 2019 Lot
author: Bryan Washington
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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The Night Circus 9361589
But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.]]>
506 Erin Morgenstern Carmen 5 Brilliant. 4.00 2011 The Night Circus
author: Erin Morgenstern
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2011
rating: 5
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date added: 2019/03/14
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Brilliant.
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Superman: Dawnbreaker 29749094
His power is beyond imagining.

Clark Kent has always been faster, stronger--better--than everyone around him. But he wasn't raised to show off, and drawing attention to himself could be dangerous. Plus, it's not like he's earned his powers . . . yet.

But power comes with a price.

Lately it's difficult to hold back and keep his heroics in the shadows. When Clark follows the sound of a girl crying, he comes across Gloria Alvarez and discovers a dark secret lurking in Smallville. Turns out, Clark's not the only one hiding something. Teaming up with his best friend, Lana Lang, he throws himself into the pursuit of the truth. What evil lies below the surface of his small town? And what will it cost Clark to learn about his past as he steps into the light to become the future Man of Steel? Because before he can save the world, he must save Smallville.]]>
288 Matt de la Peña 0141386878 Carmen 0 to-read 3.51 2019 Superman: Dawnbreaker
author: Matt de la Peña
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/03/12
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Two Boys Kissing 17237214 New York Times bestselling author David Levithan tells the based-on-true-events story of Harry and Craig, two 17-year-olds who are about to take part in a 32-hour marathon of kissing to set a new Guinness World Record—all of which is narrated by a Greek Chorus of the generation of gay men lost to AIDS.

While the two increasingly dehydrated and sleep-deprived boys are locking lips, they become a focal point in the lives of other teen boys dealing with languishing long-term relationships, coming out, navigating gender identity, and falling deeper into the digital rabbit hole of gay hookup sites—all while the kissing former couple tries to figure out their own feelings for each other.]]>
200 David Levithan 0307931900 Carmen 4 4.07 2013 Two Boys Kissing
author: David Levithan
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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Okay for Now 9165406 Midwesterner Gary D. Schmidt won Newbery Honor awards for Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boys and The Wednesday Wars, two coming-of-age novels about unlikely friends finding a bond. Okay For Now, his latest novel, explores another seemingly improbable alliance, this one between new outsider in town Doug Swieteck and Lil Spicer, the savvy spitfire daughter of his deli owner boss. With her challenging assistance, Doug discovers new sides of himself. Along the way, he also readjusts his relationship with his abusive father, his school peers, and his older brother, a newly returned war victim of Vietnam.

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360 Gary D. Schmidt 0547152604 Carmen 5 4.23 2011 Okay for Now
author: Gary D. Schmidt
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2011
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian]]> 693208
Heartbreaking, funny, and beautifully written, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which is based on the author's own experiences, coupled with poignant drawings by Ellen Forney that reflect the character's art, chronicles the contemporary adolescence of one Native American boy as he attempts to break away from the life he was destined to live.

With a foreward by Markus Zusak & interviews with Sherman Alexie and Ellen Forney
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230 Sherman Alexie 0316013684 Carmen 0 4.05 2007 The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
author: Sherman Alexie
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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The Secret Life of Bees 37435 The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted black "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily decides to spring them both free. They escape to Tiburon, South Carolina--a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. Taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters, Lily is introduced to their mesmerizing world of bees and honey, and the Black Madonna. This is a remarkable novel about divine female power, a story women will share and pass on to their daughters for years to come.]]> 302 Sue Monk Kidd 0142001740 Carmen 0 4.10 2001 The Secret Life of Bees
author: Sue Monk Kidd
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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Bird by Bird 12543 A newer edition of this title can be found here.

"Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he'd had three months to write. [It] was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said. 'Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.'"

With this basic instruction always in mind, Anne Lamott returns to offer us a new gift: a step-by-step guide on how to write and on how to manage the writer's life. From "Getting Started,' with "Short Assignments," through "Shitty First Drafts," "Character," "Plot," "Dialogue." all the way from "False Starts" to "How Do You Know When You're Done?" Lamott encourages, instructs, and inspires. She discusses "Writers Block," "Writing Groups," and "Publication." Bracingly honest, she is also one of the funniest people alive.

If you have ever wondered what it takes to be a writer, what it means to be a writer, what the contents of your school lunches said about what your parents were really like, this book is for you. From faith, love, and grace to pain, jealousy, and fear, Lamott insists that you keep your eyes open, and then shows you how to survive. And always, from the life of the artist she turns to the art of life.

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238 Anne Lamott Carmen 5 4.24 1994 Bird by Bird
author: Anne Lamott
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at: 2019/02/13
date added: 2019/02/13
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Our Year of Maybe 30340865
But Peter’s life post-transplant isn’t what either of them expected. Though he once had feelings for Sophie too, he’s now drawn to Chase, the guitarist in a band that happens to be looking for a keyboardist. And while neglected parts of Sophie’s world are calling to her—dance opportunities, new friends, a sister and niece she barely knows—she longs for a now-distant Peter more than ever, growing increasingly bitter he doesn’t seem to feel the same connection.

Peter fears he’ll forever be indebted to her. Sophie isn’t sure who she is without him. Then one blurry, heartbreaking night twists their relationship into something neither of them recognizes, leading them to question their past, their future, and whether their friendship is even worth fighting for.]]>
384 Rachel Lynn Solomon 1481497766 Carmen 5 3.69 2019 Our Year of Maybe
author: Rachel Lynn Solomon
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2019
rating: 5
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date added: 2019/02/12
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<![CDATA[To All the Boys I've Loved Before (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #1)]]> 15749186
But one day Lara Jean discovers that somehow her secret box of letters has been mailed, causing all her crushes from her past to confront her about the letters: her first kiss, the boy from summer camp, even her sister's ex-boyfriend, Josh.

As she learns to deal with her past loves face to face, Lara Jean discovers that something good may come out of these letters after all.]]>
355 Jenny Han 1442426713 Carmen 0 4.04 2014 To All the Boys I've Loved Before (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #1)
author: Jenny Han
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2014/07/22
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The Bridges of Madison County 83674 182 Robert James Waller 0446364495 Carmen 0 3.67 1992 The Bridges of Madison County
author: Robert James Waller
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1992
rating: 0
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date added: 2014/07/22
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<![CDATA[This Is Graceanne's Book: A Novel]]> 340751 304 P.L. Whitney 0312272782 Carmen 5 3.78 1999 This Is Graceanne's Book: A Novel
author: P.L. Whitney
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/07/18
shelves:
review:
Beautiful, moving, and haunting. So haunting that more than a decade after reading, I still think about this novel frequently. It's not an easy read, but that's because it's so heartbreakingly real. Highly recommend.
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<![CDATA[Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)]]> 1 652 J.K. Rowling Carmen 5 4.57 2005 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.57
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/04/30
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<![CDATA[Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead]]> 13588356 Researcher and thought leader Dr. Brené Brown offers a powerful new vision that encourages us to dare greatly: to embrace vulnerability and imperfection, to live wholeheartedly, and to courageously engage in our lives.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; . . . who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.� —Theodore Roosevelt

Every day we experience the uncertainty, risks, and emotional exposure that define what it means to be vulnerable, or to dare greatly. Whether the arena is a new relationship, an important meeting, our creative process, or a difficult family conversation, we must find the courage to walk into vulnerability and engage with our whole hearts.

In Daring Greatly, Dr. Brown challenges everything we think we know about vulnerability. Based on twelve years of research, she argues that vulnerability is not weakness, but rather our clearest path to courage, engagement, and meaningful connection. The book that Dr. Brown’s many fans have been waiting for, Daring Greatly will spark a new spirit of truth—and trust—in our organizations, families, schools, and communities.]]>
287 Brené Brown 1592407331 Carmen 5 4.29 2012 Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead
author: Brené Brown
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2012
rating: 5
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date added: 2014/03/23
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<![CDATA[A Storm of Swords 2: Blood and Gold (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3, Part 2 of 2)]]> 147915
Robb Stark may be King in the North, but he must bend to the will of the old tyrant Walder Frey if he is to hold his crown. And while his youngest sister, Arya, has escaped the clutches of the depraved Cersei Lannister and her son, the capricious boy-king Joffrey, Sansa Stark remains their captive.

Meanwhile, across the ocean, Daenerys Stormborn, the last heir of the Dragon King, delivers death to the slave-trading cities of Astapor and Yunkai as she approaches Westeros with vengeance in her heart.]]>
639 George R.R. Martin 0007119550 Carmen 5 4.54 2000 A Storm of Swords 2: Blood and Gold (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3, Part 2 of 2)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.54
book published: 2000
rating: 5
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date added: 2014/03/23
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<![CDATA[A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)]]> 10572
It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles.

Here is the second volume in George R.R. Martin magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R.R. Martin stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.]]>
1009 George R.R. Martin 0553381695 Carmen 5 4.42 1998 A Clash of Kings  (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)]]> 13496
Sweeping from a harsh land of cold to a summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, A Game of Thrones tells a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; a child is lost in the twilight between life and death; and a determined woman undertakes a treacherous journey to protect all she holds dear. Amid plots and counter-plots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, allies and enemies, the fate of the Starks hangs perilously in the balance, as each side endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.]]>
835 George R.R. Martin 0553588486 Carmen 5 4.44 1996 A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.44
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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date added: 2014/03/23
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Fingerprints of You 12987191
On the verge of revisiting her mother’s mistakes, Lemon struggles to cope with the idea of herself as a young unmarried mother, as well as the fact that she’s never met her own father. Determined to have at least one big adventure before she has the baby, Lemon sets off on a cross-country road trip, intending not only to meet her father, but to figure out who she wants to be.]]>
272 Kristen-Paige Madonia 1442429208 Carmen 4 3.72 2012 Fingerprints of You
author: Kristen-Paige Madonia
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2012/08/23
date added: 2013/06/22
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I read the opening chapter of F.O.Y. on Kristen-Paige's web site (), and it was phenomenal. The rest of the book is equally as lovely. A wonderful coming-of-age story!
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Persuasion 2156 249 Jane Austen 0192802631 Carmen 5 4.15 1817 Persuasion
author: Jane Austen
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1817
rating: 5
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The Pilgrimage 4004 The Pilgrimage recounts the spectacular trials of Paulo Coelho and his mysterious mentor, Petrus, as they journey across Spain in search of a miraculous sword.

The Pilgrimage paved the way to Paulo Coelho's international bestselling novel The Alchemist. In many ways, these two volumes are companions—to truly comprehend one, you must read the other.

Step inside this captivating account of Paulo Coelho's pilgrimage along the road to Santiago. This fascinating parable explores the need to find one's own path. In the end, we discover that the extraordinary is always found in the ordinary and simple ways of everyday people. Part adventure story, part guide to self-discovery, this compelling tale delivers the perfect combination of enchantment and insight.]]>
226 Paulo Coelho 0722534876 Carmen 0 to-read 3.70 1987 The Pilgrimage
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1987
rating: 0
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The Picture of Dorian Gray 5297
In this celebrated work Wilde forged a devastating portrait of the effects of evil and debauchery on a young aesthete in late-19th-century England. Combining elements of the Gothic horror novel and decadent French fiction, the book centers on a striking premise: As Dorian Gray sinks into a life of crime and gross sensuality, his body retains perfect youth and vigor while his recently painted portrait grows day by day into a hideous record of evil, which he must keep hidden from the world. For over a century, this mesmerizing tale of horror and suspense has enjoyed wide popularity. It ranks as one of Wilde's most important creations and among the classic achievements of its kind.]]>
272 Oscar Wilde Carmen 5 4.13 1890 The Picture of Dorian Gray
author: Oscar Wilde
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1890
rating: 5
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The Fifth Mountain 4005 The Fifth Mountain. A stunning novel in the tradition of the highly acclaimed The Alchemist, this is Coelho's daring retelling of the prophet Elijah. During the chaos of the ninth century B.C., Jezebel, wife to Israel's ruler, orders the execution of all prophets who refuse to worship the pagan god Baal. The young prophet Elijah, commanded by an angel of God to flee Israel, seeks safety in the land of Zarephath, where he unexpectedly finds true love with a young widow. But this new-found rapture is to be cut short, and Elijah sees all of his hopes and dreams irrevocably erased. What follows is sure to be viewed as Coelho's literary milestone: the quietly moving account of a man touched by the hand of God who must triumph over his frustrations in a soul-shattering trial of faith. Inspired by a circumstance that forever altered Coelho's own life, The Fifth Mountain is a testament to the truth that tragedy in life should not be considered a punishment but a challenge of the spirit. Gorgeous in its narrative and unforgettable in its prose, The Fifth Mountain teaches without being sanctimonious. This is a timeless story for the ages, a tale of the past that resonates powerfully for today's readers.]]> 244 Paulo Coelho 0722536542 Carmen 0 to-read 3.65 1996 The Fifth Mountain
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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The Alchemist 865 197 Paulo Coelho 0061122416 Carmen 5 3.85 1988 The Alchemist
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1988
rating: 5
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Slammed (Slammed, #1) 15803858 Alternate cover editions of ISBN 9781476715902 can be found here and here.

Layken's father died suddenly, leaving her to gather every ounce of strength to be a pillar for her family, in order to prevent their world from falling apart. Now her life is taking another unexpected turn...

Layken's mother gets a job which leads to an unwanted move across the country. However, a new home means new neighbours... and Layken's new neighbour is the very attractive Will Cooper.

Will has an intriguing passion for slam poetry, and a matching passion for life. The two feel an irresistible attraction but are rocked to the core when a shocking revelation brings their romance to a screeching halt. Layken and Will must find a way to fight the forces that threaten to tear them apart...or learn to live without each other.]]>
317 Colleen Hoover Carmen 0 to-read 4.18 2012 Slammed (Slammed, #1)
author: Colleen Hoover
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/11/14
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The Sea of Tranquility 15818969 I live in a world without magic or miracles. A place where there are no clairvoyants or shapeshifters, no angels or superhuman boys to save you. A place where people die and music disintegrates and things suck. I am pressed so hard against the earth by the weight of reality that some days I wonder how I am still able to lift my feet to walk.

Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.

Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.

Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.

The Sea of Tranquility is a rich, intense, and brilliantly imagined story about a lonely boy, an emotionally fragile girl, and the miracle of second chances.]]>
380 Katja Millay Carmen 0 to-read 4.52 2012 The Sea of Tranquility
author: Katja Millay
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.52
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/11/14
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<![CDATA[Another Insane Devotion: On The Love of Cats and Persons]]> 13587152

From “a genuine American Dostoevsky� (The Washington Post) comes a dazzling, funny, bittersweet exploration of the mysteries of relationship, both human and animal.

When his favorite cat Biscuit goes missing, Peter Trachtenberg sets out to find her. The journey takes him 700 miles and many years into his past-- into the history of his relationships with cats and the history of his relationship with his wife F., who may herself be on the verge of disappearing. What ensues is a work that recalls travel narratives from The Incredible Journey to W. G. Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn. Trachtenberg ponders the mysteries of feline intelligence (why do cats score worse on some tests than pigeons?), the origins of their domestication, and why they are harder to write about than dogs. He also looks at what loving a cat can teach us about loving a human being, another insane devotion that takes us farther than we ever dreamed of going.

"This is Peter’s best book and if you don’t know what that means just imagine your sweetest, most perverse storytelling friend asks to meet because he has a confession to make. When you arrive he informs you that he loves his cat more than life itself, or exactly that much and then he opens his shirt and shows you the cat tattoo and then he begins to tell you of his love and in a puff hours vanish and it’s absolutely riveting. -- Eileen Myles, author of Inferno and Cool for You

"Through short sections of intelligent, often humorous prose, former and potential girlfriends and past pets are conjured in hopes of understanding how people can fall in and out of love. Trachtenberg explores his relationship with his wife from early dates to the day before completion of this manuscript, in an effort to deduce how they ended up in their present predicament. Trachtenberg also weaves in accounts of the ancient domesticated cat, famous literary felines, and artistic allegories...Trachtenberg’s journey proves entertaining and enlightening." -- Publishers Weekly]]>
304 Peter Trachtenberg 0738215260 Carmen 5 3.45 2012 Another Insane Devotion: On The Love of Cats and Persons
author: Peter Trachtenberg
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2012/10/02
date added: 2012/10/04
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As Trachtenberg journeys home to find his beloved cat Biscuit, he takes us on a separate, lyrical journey through crumbling homesteads and lost pets until we arrive at the heart of his story--a marriage that is as beautiful as it is unsteady. In this raw space, Trachtenberg’s memoir shines best, proving itself a brave exploration of attachment, commitment, and the vulnerable interactions that make us human.
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<![CDATA[The Secret Life of Prince Charming]]> 4031193 Maybe it was wrong, or maybe impossible, but I wanted the truth to be one thing. One solid thing.

Quinn is surrounded by women who have had their hearts broken. Between her mother, her aunt, and her grandmother, Quinn hears nothing but cautionary tales. She tries to be an optimist -- after all, she's the dependable one, the girl who never makes foolish choices. But when she is abruptly and unceremoniously dumped, Quinn starts to think maybe there really are no good men.

It doesn't help that she's gingerly handling a renewed relationship with her formerly absent father. He's a little bit of a lot of things: charming, selfish, eccentric, lazy...but he's her dad, and Quinn's just happy to have him around again. Until she realizes how horribly he's treated the many women in his life, how he's stolen more than just their hearts. Determined to, for once, take action in her life, Quinn joins forces with the half sister she's never met and the little sister she'll do anything to protect. Together, they set out to right her father's wrongs...and in doing so, begin to uncover what they're really looking for: the truth.

Once again, Deb Caletti has created a motley crew of lovably flawed characters who bond over the shared experiences of fear, love, pain, and joy -- in other words, real life.

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322 Deb Caletti 1416959408 Carmen 5 3.72 2009 The Secret Life of Prince Charming
author: Deb Caletti
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/09/20
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The Six Rules of Maybe 6598461 336 Deb Caletti 1416979697 Carmen 5 3.66 2010 The Six Rules of Maybe
author: Deb Caletti
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2010
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/09/20
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Before I Die 1314332
Tessa has just months to live. Fighting back against hospital visits, endless tests, drugs with excruciating side-effects, Tessa compiles a list. It’s her To Do Before I Die list. And number one is Sex. Released from the constraints of â€normalâ€� life, Tessa tastes new experiences to make her feel alive while her failing body struggles to keep up. Tessa’s feelings, her relationships with her father and brother, her estranged mother, her best friend, and her new boyfriend, all are painfully crystallised in the precious weeks before Tessa’s time finally runs out.]]>
336 Jenny Downham 0385613466 Carmen 5 3.84 2007 Before I Die
author: Jenny Downham
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/09/20
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The Fault in Our Stars 11870085
Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars is award-winning author John Green's most ambitious and heartbreaking work yet, brilliantly exploring the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.]]>
313 John Green Carmen 5 4.13 2012 The Fault in Our Stars
author: John Green
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/08/28
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Original, brilliant (as John Green always is), and engaging.
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The Dog Stars 13330553
But when a random transmission beams through the radio of his 1956 Cessna, the voice ignites a hope deep inside him that a better life exists outside their tightly controlled perimeter. Risking everything, he flies past his point of no return and follows its static-broken trail, only to find something that is both better and worse than anything he could ever hope for.]]>
10 Peter Heller 0449013111 Carmen 0 to-read 3.95 2012 The Dog Stars
author: Peter Heller
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/08/07
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Out of Reach 13482565
Rachel has always idolized her older brother Micah. He struggles with addiction, but she tells herself that he’s in control. And she almost believes it. Until the night that Micah doesn’t come home.
Rachel’s terrified—and she can’t help but feel responsible. She should have listened when Micah tried to confide in her. And she only feels more guilt when she receives an anonymous note telling her that Micah is nearby and in danger.

With nothing more to go on than hope and a slim lead, Rachel and Micah’s best friend, Tyler, begin the search. Along the way, Rachel will be forced to confront her own dark secrets, her growing attraction to Tyler…and the possibility that Micah may never come home.]]>
256 Carrie Arcos 1442440538 Carmen 0 to-read 3.57 2012 Out of Reach
author: Carrie Arcos
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/08/06
shelves: to-read
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Virtuosity 10668038 better?

Carmen knows that kissing Jeremy can't end well, but she just can't stay away. Nobody else understands her--and riles her up--like he does. Still, she can't trust him with her biggest secret: She is so desperate to win she takes anti-anxiety drugs to perform, and what started as an easy fix has become a hungry addiction. Carmen is sick of not feeling anything on stage and even more sick of always doing what she’s told, doing what's expected.

Sometimes, being on top just means you have a long way to fall....]]>
294 Jessica Martinez 1442420529 Carmen 0 to-read 3.78 2011 Virtuosity
author: Jessica Martinez
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/08/05
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Where It Began 11724858 A teen's world comes crashing down in this compulsively readable YA debut that's as literary as it is commercial.

Gabby Gardiner wakes up in a hospital bed looking like a cautionary ad for drunk driving and without a single memory of the accident that landed her there. But what she can recall, in frank and sardonic detail, is the year leading up to the crash.

As Gabby describes her transformation from Invisible Girl to Trendy Girl Who Dates Billy Nash (aka Most Desirable Boy Ever), she is left wondering: Why is Billy suddenly distancing himself from her? What do her classmates know that Gabby does not? Who exactly was in the car that night? And why has Gabby been left to take the fall?

As she peels back the layers of her life, Gabby begins to realize that her climb up the status ladder has been as intoxicating as it has been morally complex...and that nothing about her life is what she has imagined it to be.]]>
369 Ann Redisch Stampler 1442423218 Carmen 0 to-read 3.41 2012 Where It Began
author: Ann Redisch Stampler
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/08/02
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[Love Walked In (Love Walked In, #1)]]> 115076
When Martin Grace enters the hip Philadelphia coffee shop Cornelia Brown manages, her life changes forever. But little does she know that her newfound love is only the harbinger of greater changes to come. Meanwhile, across town, Clare Hobbs—eleven years old and abandoned by her erratic mother—goes looking for her lost father. She crosses paths with Cornelia while meeting with him at the café, and the two women form an improbable friendship that carries them through the unpredictable currents of love and life.]]>
307 Marisa de los Santos 0452287898 Carmen 0 to-read 3.71 2005 Love Walked In (Love Walked In, #1)
author: Marisa de los Santos
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/08/02
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood]]> 6431026 Popularity is the best revenge.

In the final weeks of eighth grade, Lauren Wood made a choice. She betrayed her best friend, Helen, in a manner so publicly humiliating that Helen had to move to a new town just to save face. Ditching Helen was worth it, though, because Lauren started high school as one of the It Girls--and now, at the start of her senior year, she's the cheerleading captain, the quarterback's girlfriend, and the undisputed queen bee. Lauren has everything she's ever wanted, and she has forgotten all about her ex-best friend.

But Helen could never forget Lauren. After three years of obsessing, she's moving back to her old town. She has a new name and a new look, but she hasn’t dropped her old grudges. She has a detailed plan to bring down her former BFF by taking away everything that's ever been important to Lauren—starting with her boyfriend.

Watch out, Lauren Wood. Things are about to get bitchy.

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261 Eileen Cook 1416974334 Carmen 4 3.73 2009 Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood
author: Eileen Cook
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/08/01
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<![CDATA[Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void]]> 7237456 The best-selling author of Stiff and Bonk explores the irresistibly strange universe of space travel and life without gravity.

Space is a world devoid of the things we need to live and thrive: air, gravity, hot showers, fresh produce, privacy, beer. Space exploration is in some ways an exploration of what it means to be human. How much can a person give up? How much weirdness can they take? What happens to you when you can’t walk for a year? have sex? smell flowers? What happens if you vomit in your helmet during a space walk? Is it possible for the human body to survive a bailout at 17,000 miles per hour?

To answer these questions, space agencies set up all manner of quizzical and startlingly bizarre space simulations. As Mary Roach discovers, it’s possible to preview space without ever leaving Earth. From the space shuttle training toilet to a crash test of NASA’s new space capsule (cadaver filling in for astronaut), Roach takes us on a surreally entertaining trip into the science of life in space and space on Earth.]]>
334 Mary Roach 0393068471 Carmen 0 to-read 3.93 2010 Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void
author: Mary Roach
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/07/30
shelves: to-read
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<![CDATA[Growing Girls: The Mother of All Adventures]]> 375228
A good mother, writes Jeanne Marie Laskas in her latest report from Sweetwater Farm, would have bought a house in the suburbs with a cul-de-sac for her kids to ride bikes around instead of a ramshackle house in the middle of nowhere with a rooster. With the wryly observed self-doubt all mothers and mothers-to-be will instantly recognize, Laskas offers a poignant and laugh-out-loud-funny meditation on that greatest–and most impossible–of all life’s motherhood.

What is it, she muses, that’s so exhausting about being a mom? You’d think raising two little girls would be a breeze compared to dealing with the barely controlled anarchy of “attack� roosters, feuding neighbors, and a scheme to turn sheep into lawn mowers on the fifty-acre farm she runs with her bemused husband Alex. But, as any mother knows, you’d be wrong.

From struggling with the issues of race and identity as she raises two children adopted from China to taking her daughters to the mall for their first manicures, Jeanne Marie captures those magic moments that make motherhood the most important and rewarding job in the world–even if it’s never been done right. For, as she concludes in one of her three a.m. worry sessions, feeling like a bad mother is the only way to know you’re doing your job.

Whether confronting Sasha’s language delay, reflecting on Anna’s devotion to a creepy backwards-running chicken, feeling outclassed by the fabulous homeroom moms, or describing the rich, secret language each family shares, these candid observations from the front lines of parenthood are filled with love and laughter–and radiant with the tough, tender, and timeless wisdom only raising kids can teach us.]]>
288 Jeanne Marie Laskas 055380264X Carmen 3 3.90 2005 Growing Girls: The Mother of All Adventures
author: Jeanne Marie Laskas
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2012/07/30
shelves:
review:

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<![CDATA[Lost in the Cosmos: The Last Self-Help Book]]> 77959 272 Walker Percy 0312253990 Carmen 0 to-read 4.06 1983 Lost in the Cosmos: The Last Self-Help Book
author: Walker Percy
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1983
rating: 0
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date added: 2012/07/30
shelves: to-read
review:

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Unbreak My Heart 13060734
Enter her parents� plan to spend the summer on their sailboat. Normally the idea of being stuck on a tiny boat with her parents and little sister would make Clem break out in hives, but floating away sounds pretty good right now.

Then she meets James at one of their first stops along the river. He and his dad are sailing for the summer and he’s just the distraction Clem needs. Can he break down Clem’s walls and heal her broken heart?

Told in alternating chapters that chronicle the year that broke Clem’s heart and the summer that healed it, Unbreak My Heart is a wonderful dual love story that fans of Sarah Dessen, Deb Caletti, and Susane Colasanti will flock to.]]>
232 Melissa C. Walker 1599905280 Carmen 5 3.81 2012 Unbreak My Heart
author: Melissa C. Walker
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2012/07/28
date added: 2012/07/28
shelves:
review:
Original, sweet, at times heartbreaking, and utterly realistic.
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Geek Love 13872 Geek Love is the story of the Binewskis, a carny family whose mater- and paterfamilias set out � with the help of amphetamine, arsenic, and radioisotopes � to breed their own exhibit of human oddities. There's Arturo the Aquaboy, who has flippers for limbs and a megalomaniac ambition worthy of Genghis Khan . . . Iphy and Elly, the lissome Siamese twins . . . albino hunchback Oly, and the outwardly normal Chick, whose mysterious gifts make him the family's most precious � and dangerous � asset.

As the Binewskis take their act across the backwaters of the U.S., inspiring fanatical devotion and murderous revulsion; as its members conduct their own Machiavellian version of sibling rivalry, Geek Love throws its sulfurous light on our notions of the freakish and the normal, the beautiful and the ugly, the holy and the obscene. Family values will never be the same.]]>
348 Katherine Dunn 0375713344 Carmen 0 to-read 3.96 1989 Geek Love
author: Katherine Dunn
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1989
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/26
shelves: to-read
review:

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Where the Sidewalk Ends 30119 Come in... for where the sidewalk ends, Shel Silverstein's world begins.

Shel Silverstein, the New York Times bestselling author of The Giving Tree, A Light in the Attic, Falling Up, and Every Thing On It, has created a poetry collection that is outrageously funny and deeply profound.

You'll meet a boy who turns into a TV set, and a girl who eats a whale. The Unicorn and the Bloath live there, and so does Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout who will not take the garbage out. It is a place where you wash your shadow and plant diamond gardens, a place where shoes fly, sisters are auctioned off, and crocodiles go to the dentist.

Shel Silverstein's masterful collection of poems and drawings stretches the bounds of imagination and will be cherished by readers of all ages.]]>
176 Shel Silverstein 0060513039 Carmen 5 4.34 1974 Where the Sidewalk Ends
author: Shel Silverstein
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1974
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/07/26
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review:

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<![CDATA[The Cat in the Hat (Cat in the Hat, #1)]]> 233093 Have a ball with Dr. Seuss and the Cat in the Hat in this classic picture book...but don't forget to clean up your mess!

Then he said That is that.
And then he was gone
With a tip of his hat.


A dreary day turns into a wild romp when this beloved story introduces readers to the Cat in the Hat and his troublemaking friends, Thing 1 and Thing 2 � And don't forget Fish! A favorite among kids, parents and teachers, this story uses simple words and basic rhyme to encourage and delight beginning readers.

Originally created by Dr. Seuss himself, Beginner Books are fun, funny, and easy to read. These unjacketed hardcover early readers encourage children to read all on their own, using simple words and illustrations. Smaller than the classic large format Seuss picture books like The Lorax and Oh, The Places You'll Go!, these portable packages are perfect for practicing readers ages 3-7, and lucky parents too!]]>
61 Dr. Seuss 039480001X Carmen 5 4.19 1957 The Cat in the Hat (Cat in the Hat, #1)
author: Dr. Seuss
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1957
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/07/26
shelves:
review:

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Madame Bovary 2175 329 Gustave Flaubert 0192840398 Carmen 5 3.70 1856 Madame Bovary
author: Gustave Flaubert
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1856
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/07/26
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The Complete Novels 14905 --back cover

Emma / Lady Susan / Mansfield Park / Northanger Abbey / Persuasion / Pride and Prejudice / Sense and Sensibility]]>
1344 Jane Austen 0140259449 Carmen 5 4.57 1981 The Complete Novels
author: Jane Austen
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.57
book published: 1981
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/07/26
shelves:
review:

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Middlemarch 19089 "People are almost always better than their neighbours think they are"

George Eliot’s most ambitious novel is a masterly evocation of diverse lives and changing fortunes in a provincial community. Peopling its landscape are Dorothea Brooke, a young idealist whose search for intellectual fulfillment leads her into a disastrous marriage to the pedantic scholar Casaubon; the charming but tactless Dr Lydgate, whose pioneering medical methods, combined with an imprudent marriage to the spendthrift beauty Rosamond, threaten to undermine his career; and the religious hypocrite Bulstrode, hiding scandalous crimes from his past. As their stories interweave, George Eliot creates a richly nuanced and moving drama, hailed by Virginia Woolf as "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people".]]>
912 George Eliot 0451529170 Carmen 5 4.00 1872 Middlemarch
author: George Eliot
name: Carmen
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1872
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/07/26
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Go Ask Alice 46799
Read her diary.

Enter her world.

You will never forget her.


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213 Beatrice Sparks 1416914633 Carmen 5 3.75 1971 Go Ask Alice
author: Beatrice Sparks
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1971
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/07/26
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review:

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<![CDATA[Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)]]> 10335308
Perhaps you want to know what Mindy thinks makes a great best friend (someone who will fill your prescription in the middle of the night), or what makes a great guy (one who is aware of all elderly people in any room at any time and acts accordingly), or what is the perfect amount of fame (so famous you can never get convicted of murder in a court of law), or how to maintain a trim figure (you will not find that information in these pages). If so, you've come to the right book, mostly!

In Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. Mindy Kaling really is just a Girl Next Door - not so much literally anywhere in the continental United States, but definitely if you live in India or Sri Lanka.]]>
222 Mindy Kaling 0307886263 Carmen 0 to-read 3.86 2011 Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)
author: Mindy Kaling
name: Carmen
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/25
shelves: to-read
review:

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