Looking for Alaska by John Green

Miles has never been popular- actually, he doesn't even have friends at his public high school. This makes it easy for him to decide to go to Culver Creek Boarding School. There, Miles hopes to begin anew and find some of the adventure that eluded him back home. His parents are not too sure about sending him off to boarding school but end up agreeing to let Miles go. At his new school, Miles soon makes friends with his new roommate, Chip (aka the Colonel), and Alaska, a beautiful (Miles calls her hot) enigma of a girl, and others. The small group of friends bond over smoking, drinking, and playing pranks on the Weekday Warriors, rich kids who go home to their wealthy families on the weekends.

Miles, who gets nicknamed Pudge because he's skinny, finds himself falling for Alaska, who has a boyfriend. The problem, besides the fact that she has a boyfriend, is that Alaska is pretty messed up. She happy one minute, upset and yelling the next. Miles cannot figure her out. Alaska just wants to be buddies, but Miles keeps looking too much into her behavior to see if she might like him back. When tragedy strikes, Miles and his friends must learn to come to terms with the shocking loss and figure out what they mean to each other or risk losing each other as friends. Major themes in the story are love, friendship, loss, and forgiveness.

This book is a quick read, but because it does take a very serious turn, I do not recommend it for a light summer vacation book- unless you are tired of summery books and are ready for something more substantial. The story does not quite make it to a romance, but the elements are there. Friendship is the more important theme here. It is well written, and the author knows how to keep his reader hooked. You will find yourself reading "just one more chapter" a couple of times before turning your lights out at night. I recommend this book for both guys and girls.

Book; 14+; ISBN 9780142412213; New York: Speak (from Penguin Group), 2005

Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague by Geraldine Brooks

Today, we know the plague was carried by fleas hitching rides on rats. Back in the day, nobody knew what caused the plague, a highly contagious disease that could wipe out entire towns. When townspeople showed signs of the plague, some would freak out and run to another town, not knowing they carried the plague with them to infect even more people. This is the climate in which Anna Frith, an 18 year old widow with two kids, lived in from 1865 – 1866. When her town’s people come down with the plague, some want to run away, but the town vicar, who Anna works for as a maid, convinces most of the townspeople to stay. The town locks down into a year of forced isolation. Nobody can leave, and nobody is allowed in. Of course, as the plague spreads, some still run off—some to join a group of flagellants, people who believed that the plague was sent by God to make people atone for their sins and that if they whipped themselves into enough pain, God would forgive them. As the year of isolation goes on, the townspeople suffer greatly and begin to look to each other for someone to blame. Is there a witch in their presence? Or did someone bring God’s wrath down upon everyone for his own sin? Anna, the vicar, and his wife are only a few of the townspeople who manage to cling to their humanity. Will they survive the year? Will the plague go away?

This book is based on an account of a true town that shut itself off from the world. Brooks does a great job of making even the mundane events of daily life readable and interesting, and the book is littered with one shocking event after another. Brooks keeps her readers emotionally involved, and you will be almost afraid to turn the page to see who else has died of the plague or violated the town's agreement to quaranting themselves.

Book; 13+; ISBN 9780142001431; New York: Penguin Books, 2002