Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler

Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler 

Series:Y por eso rompimos #1-8
Publisher: Little Brown Books For Young Readers
Illustrated by: Maira Kalman
Format: Paperback
Pages:354
Source: Gifted.

I'm telling you why we broke up, Ed. I'm writing it in this letter, the whole truth of why it happened.

Min Green and Ed Slaterton are breaking up, so Min is writing Ed a letter and giving him a box. Inside the box is why they broke up. Two bottle caps, a movie ticket, a folded note, a box of matches, a protractor, books, a toy truck, a pair of ugly earrings, a comb from a motel room, and every other item collected over the course of a giddy, intimate, heartbreaking relationship. Item after item is illustrated and accounted for, and then the box, like a girlfriend, will be dumped.

I had such high hopes for this book. Maybe that has something to do with why I did not enjoy it. It took me forever to get through it even though it isn't even that long. The writing was weird and dragged for almost the entire book and it felt like nothing even really happened throughout the whole novel.

I couldn't stand the characters. They all felt extremely fake and over the top to me. The way Min handled the breakup and everything that came after seems extremely petty and childish even though she's supposed to be in high school. Ed seemed like he was just there to be the bad guy and Al I can barely even remember.

The only thing I really enjoyed about this book was the illustrations and the fact that it was written as a letter telling what happened in the past leading up to why these two teenagers broke up. If it hadn't been so angsty maybe I could have loved the book a little more.

The Strange Case of Finley Jayne by Kady Cross

The Strange Case of Finley Jayne by Kady Cross
Series:The Steampunk Chronicles, #0.5
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Format: Paperback (included in the first book)
Pages:86
Source: Purchased.

Finley Jayne knows she's not 'normal'. Normal girls don't lose time, or have something inside them that makes them capable of remarkably violent things. Her behavior has already cost her one job, so when she's offered the lofty position of companion to Phoebe, a debutante recently engaged to Lord Vincent, she accepts, despite having no experience. Lord Vincent is a man of science with his automatons and inventions, but Finley is suspicious of his motives where Phoebe is concerned. She will do anything to protect her new friend, but what she discovers is even more monstrous than anything she could have imagined.

There really isn't much I can say for this novella besides the fact that it got me interested in reading the rest of the series. It was extremely slow in the beginning to the point where I wanted to put it down and quit but the further I got through it the more I wanted to read.

Despite the beginning I am actually looking forward to seeing where the story leads and I just hope where it picks up in the first novel it doesn't go back to being slow paced. I hope there's a lot more steampunk elements in the first novel because I absolutely love steampunk stories.

Once it picked up however I was drawn into the plot of the story. I didn't expect anything to happen and I was pleasantly surprised by everything that did. The characters were pretty interesting as well and I can't wait to see how they develop as the story goes on.