The Kari AnnAlysis

Posts Tagged ‘megan mccafferty’

Forget menapause, once you are 18, you are infertile, thanks a to a virus that has spread across the country. Or at least that’s the case in Megan McCafferty’s first “young adult” novel Bumped. McCafferty introduces us to two 16-year-old twins, Harmony and Melody.

Melody is your typical teen, waiting for that perfect contract match to bring in 6 figures and finally get her bumped. But she is getting to the point where although she was a great prospect, and one of the first “professionals” to sign, she is now the last to be bumped.

Her twin Harmony lives in a completely different world. Well, not really, but she’s married at 16 and lives in Goodside, a very religious community. She shows up on Melody’s doorstep, with hopes to turn her sister to the “Goodside” and take her back to find a husband and get married, not pimp out her babies for money.

Melody knows this won’t be easy, but decides to take Harmony’s sins in her own hands. I mean, t

That’s not really how it happens though. Both girls learn quite a bit about themselves and leave us hanging on the edge to find out what happens next.

In real life, our world has gone through so many cultural changes about when it’s appropriate to have kids. My grandma was 17 when she first got pregnant and popped out 8 of them. My mom was 25 when she had me and my husband and I plan on waiting a couple more years, which will put me in my mid-to-late 20s. In the meantime, one of by best friends is pregnant at 24 (Yay Baby Pugh).

We all have different ages when we are ready, and apparently I’m not the only one noticing all the high school kids that are getting “bumped”. Sixteen and Pregnant, Teen Mom, The Pregnancy Pact, they are all prime examples of teenagers getting pregnant and our country accepting it. Yes, I have had friends get pregnant when they were young, and I’m not bashing or anythng of the like. But I am traditional and conservative and those shows drive  me nuts, not to mention the headlines in the magazines, “I want my life back”, “Having a baby ruined my life”.  Well, you should have thought about that before having unprotected sex. I mean seriously, do you not know what caused that?

And don’t get me started on Britney Spears sister and Bristol Palin.

All of these were contributing factors in McCafferty’s idea for this book. She recently posted this picture on Twitter; notes for the book:

At first, I wasn’t sure how much I was going to like this book. I’ve been reading a lot of dystopian lately and absolutely admire authors who write this genre. A lot of us can write fiction and incorporate things that could potentially really happen and use the past to write. But it takes a great mind to make up something completely out of the present.

Within the first few pages, I was thinking “I get enough teen baby drama on tv, I don’t know if I can handle it in this book.” Yes, I knew what I was getting myself into when I started reading it, but kept with it because I love Megan McCafferty. And I’m glad I did. I ended up really loving it.

McCafferty did a great job of unfolding this new world throughout the book, even throwing in some great new slang, although I’m too old to use it. I also loved all the little plot nuggets that were revealed in the book. Of course I am not going to share them. Go out and buy the book yourself I felt really close to the characters and for the first time in a long time was into a book enough that I started planning actors and actresses to play the roles in the movie.

I give Bumped 5 bookmarks.

ISBN: 978-0061962745
Released: April 26, 2011
Author Website
Kari got this book from NetGalley

Jessica Darling is a senior, and more ready that ever to get out of Pineville. She’s narrowed down her choices for colleges, with Columbia being the top choice. Now she just has to get through the rest of the school year, stay away from the drama and slide by. But it doesn’t quite work like that. She gets in a quitting mood and gets away from everything she knows. She gets a boyfriend *gasp* but realizes they’re really not on the same page. And of course, Marcus Flutie is hanging in the rafters waiting, watching, judging, but not really saying much. All the has to do is get through this year, and get excepted into Columbia!

I absolutely loved this book. The first one was good, but I was afraid I wasn’t going to love the series like I had hoped for. The second one did it for me. I seriously laughed out loud at parts of this book. Jessica is a great character. She is extremely funny, witty and smart. She is the kind of girl I wish I would have been in school, not waited until I got older to pop out of my shell.

When I read, I try to get in tune with the character. At times, it was easy to get inside Jessica Darling’s head. She likes to write, she’s funny, that stuff I got. The part that was hard for me was while I am reading this book about a senior in high school, I know that she graduated high school a few years before me (September 11 references), so I felt like although I am reading about a high schooler, I felt like I am reading the story of someone older than me. Sorry if that doesn’t make sense, it was hard getting out

I am really looking forward to following the next few years of Jessica’s life. I read an interview with author, Megan McCafferty who says that in this series, we follow a whole decade of Jessica. I am eager to see where she goes with her life and what she becomes. I like closure! I am also biting my nails, not sure what is going to happen with her love life. She finally gets what she wants and it is going to be taken away from her, to the complete opposite side of the country.

I give Second Helpings 5 bookmarks.

Jessica Darling Series:
Sloppy Firsts

This week’s Teaser Tuesday comes to us from Second Helpings by Megan McCafferty. I am not consistent with this weekly meme. It juts depends if something jumps out at me while I am reading. This week, it definitely did.

Pg44: “I don’t even like babies. I have a very low tolerance for people who sit in their own defecation.”

LOL I felt the same at one point in my life, plus I just like the word defecation

What are you guys reading this week?

Jessica Darling is nothing less of depressed. Her best friend Hope moves away, now she’s stuck with the Clueless Crew, whom she sits with at lunch, but tries to do her best not to spend time with them out of school. Jessica is a smarty pants. She is a top notch runner. Oh and she’s into one boy at her school, who doesn’t seem to even notice her.

As Jessica goes through the year, she tells her story through her journal and letters to Hope. She gets betrayed by someone she thinks could be her next best friend, she finds out a deep-dark secret about the guy she would chew off her right arm for, the guy who has had a crush on her for years, misses his chance, and somehow, she gets mixed up with a guy known as one of the top drug users in the school. His nickname, Krispy Kreme because he has dozens of donuts in his box. Yikes!

I have been anticipating this read for quite a while now. I’ve been wrapping up all of my other series so I could focus on this one. I really enjoyed the layout of the book. I don’t journal every day, but I write a lot of things down, so this layout definitely appealed to me.

I have to admit, I had to reel myself back in as I read this book. Going from the Private series where at least one person dies a book, and working on my own writing, that is a little murder-mystery, I kept forgetting that this was on the opposite side of the spectrum.

However, I felt like I could relate with Jessica, and definitely understand my girl WriteMeg!’slove for Marcus Flutie, especially once he got rid of his dreads. Yuck!

I look forward to reading the next books in the series, and you know me, I have the first four! I give Sloppy Firsts 4 bookmarks.

For the Holiday Swap this year, I got Second Helpings by Megan McCafferty. So, I decided I needed the rest of the series. I got Sloppy Firsts, Charmed Thirds and Fourth Comings.   I decided not to get Perfect Fifths yet because I always carry a book with me and I like carrying paperbacks better than hardbacks. The paperback for Perfect Fifths comes out in March. That gives me enough time to get through the rest

I also got LA Candy by Lauren Conrad. I feel like I watched Lauren grow up from Laguna Beach to The Hills. I quit watching the show when I got out of college, but I was really excited when this book came out. But, like already mentioned, I wanted to wait until it came out in paperback.

Now I know I said I got 5 books, but only mentioned 4. The other was a gift for someone that they aren’t getting for a couple of weeks, so I’ll wait until I give it to them to post it, just in case they happen to stop by

This week, I got a lot of presents, to me, from me. Borders.com had a special where you could buy 4, get one free. So, of course, since I had tons o’ gift cards, I took advantage. I got 5 books using gift cards and still have a few dollars left.