Review: Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

So, has anyone read this book yet? Because I hate it. (Bear with me, ok? It gets better.)

I hate it because I'm not certain I can ever love another YA book --hell, another book at all-- like I love this one. This is everything I've ever wanted in a book, everything I've never known I could want in a book. It is perfection.

You know those books that just reach into your soul and tug at every hidden string you've ever buried? One of those books that you're certain the author must have climbed into your head? It's that. This was one of those that I had to set down because I was so, so nervous and heartache-y with the main character, but then immediately pulled back open to devour because I HAD. TO. KNOW.

In short, it's about a girl (Lola) whose distinctly colourful life gets turned upside down when the family next door moves back in: her first crush/love who broke her heart returning to the window right across from hers.

Here's the thing: I'm nothing like Lola. I'm not a costumer, I don't dress in colours, I don't have some super sexy hot rocker boyfriend, my parents are not two gay dads, I don't live in San Francisco (how I wish, though...), I'm not in high school--and from what I can tell, my high school experience was nothing like hers.

But I am Lola. I am the girl filled with good and love. I am the girl torn by emotion, frustrated by the rush of everything all at once. I am doubtful and filled with doubt. I am questioned and questionable and questioning, unsure of everything and hopeful just the same. I want more and dream even more and desire the most. Maybe I don't have that boy next door who makes my heart jump and tense all at once (and trust me when I say Cricket Bell sounds close to the ideal), but I struggle through love and loving someone and loving someoneS. I fight every day to be honest and truthful and to figure out what being me really means.

And for that, I highly recommend this book. Because I think you'll be Lola, too, and I would love to have a world of them.

And a world of Cricket Bell's couldn't hurt, either.

*"imported" from my personal blog You're the Charlie Browniest