Six Feet Over It by Jennifer Longo

What begins as the musings of almost sixteen-year-old overworked, severely underpaid, and largely ignored Leigh becomes the beautifully written and narrated story of love- love of family, love of friends, first love, and love of knowing one's purpose in life. 

Leigh's voice is authentic, garners reader sympathy immediately, and gives us insight to everything she observes.  And she observes so much.  She takes care of Kai, her older sister who is in remission from cancer, in any way she can.  She helps her parents by selling grave plots because her dad can't handle it and her mom, for all intents and purposes, is a total flake who is only interested in her painting and getting back to the town they left.  She knows she'd like to be friends with Eleanor, but doesn't know how after losing the only true friend she's ever had.  She helps Dario in any way she can because Dario has helped her to see who she can become if she just lets go and stops overanalyzing everything.

Jennifer Long presents us with a awesome (and awesomely flawed) characters, excellent morbid humor, and a book you won't want to miss. 

We Are the Goldens by Dana Reinhardt

I think what intrigued me most about this story is that it's written as if Nell, the narrator, is talking directly to her sister Layla. Nell's need to be involved in every aspect of Layla's life, and her subsequent confusion over why Layla only ever speaks to her when she needs Nell to cover for her with their parents is beautifully illustrated.  The first-person point of view gives a visceral account of what it's like to be so close to someone for so long and then inexplicably pushed away.  Reinhardt's writing style is superb, as is the voice she has found for sixteen-year-old Nell. 

The difficult part for me, though, is the lack of resolution.  It's not even that I am unhappy with how things turned out; it's that I'm frustrated with the story ending before anything can happen.  It was incredibly frustrating to be pulled in to Nell's thoughts so deeply and then be abruptly tossed out before there is any sort of solid ending.  I know real life doesn't always have a happy ending, and I'm okay with that.  It's hard to reconcile that with, what felt like to me, no ending at all.

Scintillate by Tracy Clark

The description of this book, to me, sounded like an Anne Bishop-style YA fantasy involving a girl who can see auras, and has a remarkable one herself.  Unfortunately, the story doesn't hold up, the characters are weak, and the dialogue is so sugary-sweet that I felt a little nauseated.

What drove me absolutely crazy, though, was the occasional phonetic spelling of Finn's accent- most of which were instances of strong cursing.  If some was going to be included that way, all of it should have been.

 I felt a little cheated after reading the entire story. There's not enough explanation of this special power, or the history behind it, for the length of this book. I don't think it needed to be strung out into a trilogy.

Aspen by Rebekah Crane

Aspen is an amazing story of the strength one person can find inside herself.  It is well written, the characters are strong and easily related to, and for many, the ending will come too soon.  Anyone who has ever felt that she won't be accepted if others knew all her truths (and who among us hasn't?) will love this story as much as I did.  A beautiful narration details incredibly hard moments offset by wry humor, Aspen is one story you should definitely read.