When you love to read, there are few things as exciting as finding a great new author. Even better is when you discover that they're really only new to you, and they actually have a few other books you can scoop up right away. Such is the story of my love affair with Rainbow Rowell. In the span of approximately one week, I read three of her books - the only three I'm aware of. (If there are more, please, please, PLEASE let me know!) Since I've already professed my undying love for Ms. Rowell, I'll keep these individual reviews on the short side.
Let's see - my first exposure came with Fangirl, a story about a girl (Cather) who's obsessed with the well-known Simon Snow book series (*cough* Harry Potter ripoff *cough*), and writes an uber popular fan fiction story about its main characters. [Sidebar: Did you KNOW about this fan fiction stuff? Holy crap - if the internet was around during the time of New Kids on the Block, I probably never would've left my computer. I'm aging myself, I know. But, still...awesome stuff, this fan fiction.] As Cather heads off to face the next chapter of her life in college, she struggles with the changing relationship she shares with her twin sister, Wren, while exploring that wonderful, crazy, demented thing known as first love. Throw in the usual family drama (an absent mother, a mentally unstable father) and you have something that sounds pretty ordinary. But, these characters are anything BUT ordinary. They're humorous, annoying, lovable, irritating, and all those other adjectives that describe your everyday John (or Jane) Q. Public. In other words, they're enormously human, which makes them enormously endearing. I miss them all immensely.
Before I even finished reading Fangirl, I went on Amazon.com and ordered myself a copy of Eleanor & Park. This is another coming of age story involving two misfits named - big surprise - Eleanor and Park. Eleanor appears to be going through normal growing pains - not the skinniest chick on the block, her hair is abit unruly, and her clothes seem...er...unique. As the story progresses, you'll see that there are reasons for her personal style choices. Park, on the other hand, seems a little more middle of the road. While he's not part of the exclusive 'in' crowd, he's not the class loser, either. Somewhere over the course of the daily bus ride to school, the two manage to connect over comic books and new age music. It took awhile for me to become completely sucked into this tale. For one thing, I thought it went from zero to sixty a little too quickly. Somewhere around page 150 or so, however, I started to become a little puddle of goo, realizing that I was in *love* with these two people. I'm simply in awe of any author who can make me able to relate to a couple of teenagers as if I were back in high school myself. Score another point for Ms. Rowell.
This brings me to the third, and final, book in my new-favorite-author triumvirate. While the two previously mentioned books were of the YA genre, The Attachments falls into the adult category. Surprisingly enough, this old broad far preferred the books aimed at the young'uns. The Attachments tells the story of Lincoln, an IT guy whose main function at work is to monitor (read: spy) the many emails sent by his co-workers during the day, with the goal being to limit its unwarranted use. Forwarded a joke? One warning. Let an f-bomb fly? Another warning. You get the gist. Anywho, during his nightly fishing expedition, he comes across a conversation between Jennifer and Beth, who discuss just about every aspect of their lives via computer. Before you know it, reading their conversation becomes Lincoln's favorite part of the day, not least because Beth has the hots for the new IT guy
