Just Listen by Sarah Dessen

Hola, blog readers!  I have, once again, drifted into absentee bloggerism.  I do this sometimes. 

Sometimes I just get tired or busy or tired and busy or tired of being at the computer in my spare time when I'm at it all the time for work.  Sometimes I become a good reader and read books with reckless abandon to the exclusion of the blogging.  I'd like to think this has been one of those times.  Also, I've been, you know, tired....and busy.

The laws of random reading for the decision-impaired nearly landed me in a reading funk about a month ago.  The randomizer picked and I dutifully began and discarded a couple of books, which is good in the grand scheme of "I have ever so many books and must get rid of some, but also I read at a glacial pace" things, but not so great because after a few in a row, you're like, "Uh oh, do I just not like books right now?  Any books?"  Happily, just as I was reaching my saturation point with not liking books, the randomizer awarded me Just Listen by Sarah Dessen.  I won't say I'm a crazed Sarah Dessen fangirl - honestly I found Dreamland to be kind of a disappointment as far as YA issue novels go, but I had a fantastic experience with The Truth About Forever, so I was happy when Just Listen's number came up.

When I got to my own face, I found myself starting at it, so bright, with dark all around it, like it was someone I didn't recognize.  Like a word on a page that you've printed and read a million times, that suddenly looks strange or wrong, foreign, and you feel scared for a second, like you've lost something, even if you're not sure what it is.

Annabel Greene is the girl who has everything, or at least she plays one on TV.  When the commercial she features in starts popping up on TV screens, Annabel feels like she couldn't be less like the smiling girl in the pictures who is having the perfect high school experience.  Instead, something happened during the summer that she can't talk about, that is the talk of the school, that has sent all her best friends packing to avoid becoming a social pariah like Annabel.  Things are no better at home where her mother is struggling with depression, her middle sister is recovering from anorexia, and Annabel has no choice but to maintain the facade to keep her precarious family's boat from rocking.

Instead of letting the truth out, Annabel is limping through her senior year friendless and sick with worry.  That is, of course, until she meets the guy.  Owen Armstrong's not exactly a social butterfly either.  He's got kind of a frightening reputation for anger and a habit of always using his headphones to block out the world, but it turns out broody, honest to a fault Owen is the only one who can rescue Annabel from her own act and help her tell the truth, even to herself.

There is definitely something special about a Sarah Dessen book.  It's not that I relate terribly much to her trying-to-be-perfect teenage main characters or expect that an unexpected guy will always come to the rescue when life goes south.  However, Dessen does a great job of turning a "perfect" untouchable girl into a normal person with normal problems whose life isn't as great as it seems.  Annabel's life, in ways, is perfectly typical, filled with sisters who are rivals; loving, if distracted, parents; and a childhood friend or two who got dropped along the way.  It's that true-to-life high school experience that really helps Dessen's characters jump off the page and become truly lovable.

The romance that brings an unlikely couple together is satisfying, but more importantly serves as a way to draw out Annabel's character and her coming of age story.  Admittedly, Dessen books have a bit of a formula to them, but I think it's a great formula, and when Annabel finally comes to terms with her secrets, I was crying right along with her. Just Listen is a touching, satisfying romance with a musical bent and a main character who is learning just how much the truth can set her free.

There comes a time in every life when the world gets quiet and the only thing left is your own heart.  So you'd better learn to know the sound of it.  Otherwise you'll never understand what it's saying. 

Dreamland by Sarah Dessen

When Caitlin O'Koren's sister Cass runs away the morning of Caitlin's sixteenth birthday, leaving Caitlin, her hurt and perplexed parents, and her glowing future at Yale behind, Caitlin is lost and more than a little confused. All at once she is suddenly out from beneath her perfect sister's shadow and able to exist on her own terms. Yet, Caitlin finds that though she can now define herself, none of the people who matter are really watching. Cass is gone, and everyone else is so preoccupied with her sister even in her absence that Caitlin is just as overshadowed as ever.

Soon Caitlin finds herself traveling down some unwise and unintended paths as she tries to move forward in her life without her sister blazing the path ahead of her. She gives in to her best friend's pleas for her to join the cheerleading squad, something she starts out disliking and ends up loathing. She turns her back on the boring football star and begins dating the dark and dangerous Rogerson Biscoe. She begins smoking the drugs that Rogerson spends most of his time dealing. By the time things really go south, Caitlin is sure it's too late to get back to good. She's locked up in a nightmarish dreamland that she's powerless to escape from.

Dreamland features the excellent writing and important message that I associate with Dessen from books like The Truth About Forever. While The Truth About Forever was one of my favorites from last year, parts of Dreamland didn't quite click for me. (This part might get a little spoiler-y, so do tread carefully if that matters to you.) For the most part, Caitlin is a sympathetic and believable young narrator. It's easy to see how lost she is after Cass abruptly departs. It's easy to believe that she might get pressured into joining cheerleading and even into the party scene. However, she seems to fall for Rogerson a little too easily. She's lost and confused when she meets and lusts after him, but not so lost and confused that it seemed a believable turn of events that she would fall head over heels for him when their first "date" consists mostly of his driving around selling drugs to other teenagers at parties. I failed to see what there was to love about Rogerson from the outset, and it seems that fact made the story less believable overall. When he begins to show the rest of his true colors, the story suddenly becomes believable again, and my issues with it, for most part, cease.

Despite my occasional quibble with it, it's obvious that Dreamland is an important book exploring an important topic using a well-written story to warn about the dangers of abusive relationships. Dessen's exploration of Caitlin's growing feeling of isolation, her inability to break her silence about what's happening to her, and her guilt and shame over the situation she's allowed herself to fall into paint a realistic picture of how women of all ages become trapped in abusive relationships. It's a cautionary tale for all of us, a reminder to all women to be cautious about who they allow themselves to trust and to be vigilant when it comes to our own loved ones who might just be silently fighting a losing battle against abuse before our very eyes.

The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen

"Fine," he repeated, and I wondered why it was I kept coming back to this, again and again, a word that you said when someone asked how you were but didn't really care to know the truth.

Macy Queen is fine. Just fine. She's been fine ever since her dad died the day after Christmas as she looked on. Ever since she and her mom ordered and organized grief out of their lives in favor of silent and predictable days, she has been fine. Ever since Macy started dating Jason, a brainiac who seems to know all the answers but is a little lacking in the love department, she has been fine.

As she sinks into another long summer at home, taking over Jason's job at the library info desk while he heads off to "Brain Camp," Macy is determined to be fine even though her co-workers treat her as something less than human, her mother has entirely lost herself in a townhouse project at work, and her dead father's obsession with infomercial inventions continues to haunt her. Alas, when she makes the mistake of professing her love to Jason via e-mail and not taking her library job seriously enough, Jason declares a break for their relationship. That's when Macy takes up with the chaotic but full of heart Wish catering crew and everything starts to change, most of all Macy herself. As the summer wears on, her friends from Wish teach Macy how to start living life again, and handsome, artistic Wes who seems to understand her in ways she could never have imagined has a lot to teach her about love.

"It's hard to do," I said.

Wes looked at me. "What is?"

I swallowed, not sure why I'd said this out loud. "Get it right."

The Truth About Forever is an excellent book which is targeted at a young adult audience but can be appreciated by anyone looking for a great story populated with entirely lovable, believable characters. Macy is an incredibly realistic teen narrator, someone who, while not a social outcast, is struggling with many problems and laboring under the weight of the facade she relies on to get through the day. It's impossible not to root for her, wishing that she'd dump her terrible library job not to mention Jason whose loveless cerebral approach to their relationship and total lack of emotional warmth make readers loath him as much Macy loves him. Each of the members of the Wish crew is a fully fleshed out character and each has a part to play in Macy's story.

What's best about this book, though, is Dessen's grasp on Macy's many conflicting emotions and her brilliant ability to pace events just right, so that we can really feel the emotional punch her story is packing. If you're anything like me, this is not a book that you'll want to read too much of in public. I found myself crying repeatedly as Macy finally finds the understanding she's been looking for, works through the grief she had bottled inside, and learns that real friends don't want an act, they want her.

But then, I couldn't imagine, after everything that had happened, how you could live and not constantly be worrying about the dangers all around you. Especially when you'd already gotten the scare of your life.

"It's the same thing," I told her.

"What is?"

"Being afraid and being alive."

"No," she said slowly, and now it was as if she was speaking a language she knew at first I wouldn't understand, the very words, not to mention the concept, being foreign to me. "Macy, no. It's not."

This is my first Sarah Dessen but definitely won't be my last. Everything about this story just seems so right, and I can't recommend it heartily enough. (You must reeeeaaaad it...now!)