back to normal colors. have to say i wasn’t really digging the grey.

the perks of being a wallflower – stephen chbosky – 4 stars

this month i spent reading books that i received as birthday gifts in january. this one even had to overcome an initial theft and re-send from amazon, and i’m glad it finally made it into my bookshelf as i’d already been meaning to read it for a while.

i tore through it at a pretty nice clip because not only was it very readable, the kid was so endearing and honest i wanted to make sure everything went okay for him. with the same appeal as any story of the weird kid who ends up with friends even though he’s still sorta weird but at least working on finding his place, parts of it reminded me exactly of that time of my life, and other parts reminded me of what i’m glad i didn’t have to deal with at that time of my life (i don’t think i ever cried in front of anyone, at least, no matter how rough it was). so despite perhaps lacking a larger profound meaning, the story does do a funny and touching job of reminding me it wasn’t just me who was scared and confused at 15.

kissing in manhattan – david schickler – 3 stars

another gift book, this one i hadn’t heard of before i unwrapped it. since it came from a sharp and savvy friend of mine though i gladly undertook it.

either because i’m just in a reading mood lately or because this was a little more addicting than i realized, it almost seemed over before i really got started. at first i was skeptical and it mostly seemed odd more than necessarily clever or gripping; but toward the end when the various short story characters came together in events that intertwined them, i started feeling invested. i think the book appeals more to the web of connected new yorkers and how their lives criss cross eachother, and having never lived there i assume part of the magic of this book was lost on me. so although it might not have been quite well-written or entertaining enough to overcome that hill and seem great to me, certain stories did have really striking premises and overall it was definitely worth the time for the hint at what i might be missing by choosing to live on the left coast.