Pink Polka Dot Books: Friday Rewind- The Secret Year by Jennifer Hubbard

Before The Blog is/was a feature hosted by YA Litwit... and is super cool! The whole idea is that we've all been reading a lot longer than we've been blogging, so why not pull out one of those old books and feature it?? It's a way to rediscover books from our past...

I decided I'm going to do this on Fridays because it looked fun and there's a lot of books I read before March that I want on this blog :)

Go there and check it out!

My Choice this week is:

The Secret Year By Jennifer Hubbard

Why did you choose this book? I chose this book because I really liked the idea of a guy going through this grief process without being able to tell anyone about it.
When did you read this book? November 2011
Who would you recommend this book to? For people who like the big event to happen in the beginning of a book and then dealing with the fallout the rest of the way through. If you liked Twenty Boy Summer By Sarah Ockler you would probably like this book!

Goodreads Synopsis:
Take Romeo and Juliet. Add The Outsiders. Mix thoroughly. Colt and Julia were secretly together for an entire year, and no one, not even Julia's boyfriend knew. They had nothing in common, with Julia in her country club world on Black Mountain and Colt from down on the flats, but it never mattered. Until Julia dies in a car accident, and Colt learns the price of secrecy. He can't mourn Julia openly, and he's tormented that he might have played a part in her death. When Julia's journal ends up in his hands, Colt relives their year together at the same time that he's desperately trying to forget her. But how do you get over someone who was never yours in the first place?

My Thoughts:
I was mixed on this one... part of me really loved it and I still think about this book a lot even 10 months removed from it, but still I had a few things that I wished would've been there and weren't.

The Good Stuff: I felt like I had to read this book in one night. Maybe I just loved Colt, I don’t know (he did seem like a guy I would date if I was that age). But really it was more than that, it made me feel something. The grieving that he went through felt real and heartbreaking. The emotions were just there. The loss, the pain… I felt it.

The Other Stuff: The journal/letters were not as good as they could’ve been. It’s like Colt didn’t really gain anything by reading it. I kind of liked that the ending was left open because that’s how life is most of the time. I just wished Julia would’ve said in the end how she truly felt because that was the saddest part for Colt.

The writing in it was A+ though! Really well done characters and metaphors and all that. I think it really spotlights not only dealing with grief but also what it feels like to be looked down upon and excluded.

Add it to your To-Read List