Wednesday 27 May 2015

Book Review - The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson

The Sky Is Everywhere

Author: Jandy Nelson

Genres: Young Adult, Realistic Fiction, Contemporary, Romance.

Published: June 7 2010

Pages: 368 pages (Hardback Edition) (Walker Books)

Read: March 2015

Rating: 2 Stars




Seventeen-year-old Lennie Walker spends her time tucked safely and happily in the shadow of her fiery older sister, Bailey. But when Bailey dies abruptly, Lennie is catapulted to centre stage of her own life - and, despite her nonexistent history with boys, suddenly finds herself struggling to balance two. Toby was Bailey's boyfriend; his grief mirrors Lennie's own. Joe is the new boy in town, with a nearly magical grin. One boy takes Lennie out of her sorrow, the other comforts her in it. But the two can't collide without Lennie's world exploding...

Book 11/60 - 2015 Goodreads Reading Challenge


The Sky Is Everywhere is a Contemporary / Realistic Fiction stand-a-lone about a teenage girl named Lennie who suddenly and tragically loses her older sister. The story of this book then follows Lennie as she grieves and learns to live without her sister. 

I picked up this book close to the time after it was released many, many years ago. It caught my attention because it was a special hardback bind up and because I was interested in the blurb. I was basically intrigued by the book and wanted to read it. 

The cover also drew me in. I loved the simplicity of the clouds and how it symbolised with the titles of the book also. So yes, if I  can remember, I think may also have been a factor as to why I picked up the book - the beautiful, simple cover. 

As mentioned above, the main plot to this novel was Lennie grieving about her sister and learning to live without her. But Lennie was someone who was a very destructive griever. She grieved by falling in love with her sister's boyfriend and doing very explicit things with him. She also falls in love with the new boy in town and has to juggle her cheating habits to make sure that one doesn't find out about the other. I'm sure you can all guess how that turns out...
As for how I felt about the plot. I just couldn't get into it. The story, the events that were occurring, I just couldn't. And plot wise, this book was a huge disappointment. 

The same can go for the characters. I understood where Lennie was coming from but I just couldn't like her as a character. She insistently got on my nerves along with many of the other characters including Toby, Joe and her grandparents, which left me not caring about any of them and just not connecting with them because of this. 

My likes in this book were very few and far between. I continued to read the book till the end which counts for something but I constantly had that nagging feeling of boredom and indifference while reading the book and just slumped through it.

And to bring up another error or dislike about this book, it was the writing style. I couldn't get into it. I have heard people saying that Jandy Nelson has a beautiful writing style but I just couldn't see anything special. Maybe that was due to me not having an interest in either the story or the characters. I'm not sure though. 

But in the end even though this book was not the one for me and I am still looking into reading Jandy Nelson's other book I'll Give You The Sun because of all the great things that I've heard about it. Maybe I shouldn't follow the hype but I'm going to anyway. Besides the cover for the book and the book itself is absolutely gorgeous, I don't think I'll be able to walk by it again without bringing it to the checkout.

For any of you who still want to read this book, don't let my review throw you off and let me know in the comments if you've read this book and what you thought. 

Here is a link to the book on The Book Depository as I am an affiliate there. Please consider if you are going to buy this book by buying it using the below link. Thank you!!
http://www.bookdepository.com/book/9781406354386/?a_aid=yabookaholic123

2 comments:

  1. It's a shame that no matter how much you tried you simply could not get into this book. Kudos to you for trying and keeping at it, even though you were being disappointed.

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    1. I know :( It just wasn't happening with this one but I'm still going to be reading the authors second book and hopefully I'll like that one :)

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