Review: Jersey Angel by Beth Ann Bauman

Title: Jersey Angel
Author: Beth Ann Bauman
Published: 8th May 2012
Publisher: Wendy Lamb Books
Source: eARC thanks to NetGalley and Publisher

It’s the summer before senior year and the alluring Angel is ready to have fun. She’s not like her best friend, Inggy, who has a steady boyfriend, good grades, and college plans. Angel isn’t sure what she wants to do yet, but she has confidence and experience beyond her years. Still, her summer doesn’t start out as planned. Her good friend Joey doesn’t want to fool around anymore, he wants to be her boyfriend, while Angel doesn’t want to be tied down. As Joey pulls away, and Inggy tours colleges, Angel finds herself spending more time with Inggy’s boyfriend, Cork. With its cast of vivid and memorable characters, this tale from the Jersey shore is sure to make some waves. - From Goodreads

This sounded like a great summer read, nothing too challenging, the kind of book you can read in a few hours beside a pool. Even though I currently don't have any plans on the horizon for a little summer getaway, I hoped that this book might get me into the summer mood. Well it is STILL freezing here in Edinburgh, I don't feel remotely summery, and this book did not turn out to be what I was expecting.

Angel has the whole summer ahead of her but she does not know what she wants or what she is going to do. After her on and off boyfriend calls it quits and her best friend, Inggy, leaves to tour colleges, Angel ends up spending time with Inggy's boyfriend and questioning what it is she really wants.

The main character in this book is Angel and the whole story is told from Angel's point of view, but it felt really detached. It was almost like she was recounting a story that happened a long time ago. This was actually a bonus for this book as it kept me feeling distanced from Angel's questionable actions.

Even though one of the main strands through this story is Angel having an affair with her best friend's boyfriend, I could not stop reading. The way the story is told made it feel like you were engaged in some really juicy gossip, and if there is one thing I love it's some good gossip.

I did not love this book, but I also did not hate this book. It did not give me the summer feeling I was looking for but gave me the feeling that I had been let in on some really interesting gossip. The story was not really very deep or detailed and did not have any ground breaking themes or messages, it was an OK piece of YA writing.

Review: The Lifeguard by Deborah Blumenthal

Title: The Lifeguard
Author: Deborah Blumenthal
Published: 1st March 2012
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company
Source: eArc from Netgalley and publisher

It's an unsettled summer for Sirena. Back in Texas, her family's splitting apart, but here in Rhode Island, at the cottage of her aunt, it's a different world. There are long days at the beach and intriguing encounters with Pilot, the lifeguard with shamanic skills. Sirena explores her obsession with Pilot and discovers his mysterious--almost magical--gifts. - From Goodreads

I had absolutely no idea what this book was about when I started reading. I had skimmed the blurb, but honestly it was the cover that hooked me and the fact that I think the guy on the front looks like Lucas Scott (Chad Michael Murray) from One Tree Hill. It looked to me like it would be an easy going summer read but I found it to be quite different. I wanted to like this book so much, and I did to start with, but by the end of the book I was glad it was over.

Sirena's parents are getting divorced in Texas and to save her from dealing with the mess of this they decide to send her to spend the summer with her aunt in Rhode Island. Sirena uses this chance to spend time on the beach where she meets the Adonis lifeguard, Pilot. Confiding in her new friend and mentor Antonio, the 80 year old painter she spends her days painting with, Sirena discusses her home life and her obsession with Pilot. After an accident on the beach, we begin to see that there may be more going on with Pilot than we were first led to believe.

I actually liked Sirena at the start of the book. Her whole world as she knew it is beginning to fall apart, and she spends the beginning of the book being quite dark and moody. Then one day on the beach she meets the Lifeguard and everything about her I related to and liked disappeared. Suddenly she could think of nothing but him she stopped being so dark and twisty and started obsessing over Pilot all the time. I would not have too much of a problem with this, but I feel we never really get to know Pilot past how he looks and that left me feeling very detached from him as a character.

In terms of their relationship, I wanted there to be much more between the two of them since Sirena was so obsessed. I was waiting for the relationship to take off, and for a while it felt like it was building up to something good, and then.... it fizzled out!! If the relationship could have been pushed a little further, even if they had spent more time together and we had a deeper insight into what it was about Pilot (apart from his looks) that made him so amazing, then I probably would have understood a bit more and felt a bit happier.

My other problem was that I felt that the book did not know what it wanted to be. It started like most other contemporary romance / summer reads, however every so often some paranormal element would be introduced. The ghosts, magic healing or vengeful stingray all seemed like they were going to be explained, or even visited again later in the book, but then it would be dropped or have no explanation by then end of the book. So am I honestly to believe that there are people just wandering about on the beach that can magically heal people and this is not a magical power?

I think I would have enjoyed this book much more if it had chosen a genre and stuck with it all the way! There were some great parts to this book, and as I said I loved the main character at the beginning and I thought some of the secondary characters were great. Unfortunately for me this book felt like it had a split personality disorder and it left me feeling frustrated that it did not quite deliver as a contemporary romance or a paranormal romance. It was certainly an unusual read and would be perfect for someone who may feel like they are stuck in a genre rut and need to read something completely different.