Skip to main content

ALL THESE THINGS I’VE DONE by Gabrielle Zevin



copyright date: September 2011
primarily marketed for: young adults (8th grade and up)


I wish I would’ve known this was the beginning of a series before I started this book.  Then again, I might never have picked it up if I thought I might be committing to multiple books…

At any rate, this is not a story I will be sad to return to this fall when the sequel is released. 

Anya’s story takes place in New York City, in the future.  Around the time you will be old enough to be grandparents. This is a sort of post-apocalyptic, dystopian kind of book in a mild way.  Basically, the United States has self-destructed, and yet life seems to go surprisingly similar to the way we live nowadays.  Except that water and paper are costly and hard to come by.  Chocolate is prohibited.  Caffeine is an illegal drug.  Which is all to say that the setting alone is intriguing.

Add to that setting, the fact that Anya is the oldest daughter of the biggest mafia boss, and you’ve got a great story.  Anya’s parents were both murdered by mobsters and she is left to care for her older brother Leo, who suffered brain damage in a terrible accident, and her younger sister Natty.  Anya’s only support system is the grandmother being kept alive by life support and the nurse who cares for her.  The rest of the family cannot always be trusted.

Mix with Anya’s already complicated life story a romance between Anya, member of a family connected with criminal activity, and Win, son of the future District Attorney, and you have an incredible story you won’t want to end. 

Lucky for you it doesn’t!  When I neared the last pages, I was just starting to enjoy that Anya had figured out some of the people she could truly trust and some of the people who she should have been more suspicious of all along.  Then it occurred to me that the action was still too thick to be resolved in so few pages.  This could only mean one thing: a sequel!

Although, I was frustrated to not have Anya’s story neatly tied up at the end for good (only temporarily), I will be happy to return to Anya’s world to continue to follow her journey. 

Anya’s world is definitely a place I think some of you would enjoy.  If you enjoy the intrigue of the mafia lifestyle, Romeo and Juliet star-crossed lover romances, or complex mysteries, this is the book (well, series) for you!
Labels:

Comments

  1. Ms. YinglingFebruary 28, 2012 at 5:11 AM

    Hadn't heard about the sequel in the fall! My students will be sooooo excited. (Of course, if they would let me have the library copy I could finally read it!)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Linda BFebruary 29, 2012 at 10:19 PM

    Christy, finally had some bit of time to read these recent few reviews. You are adding to my YA list every time. Thanks for sharing all this with us. The books do sound worth reading & some I've not heard about. See you tomorrow!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Miss KMarch 15, 2012 at 4:47 PM

    I'm a new fan of your website and happy to find it. I find myself rejoicing when I read a stand-alone book since there are so many series these days. Still, I will be checking out the sequel to this one when it comes out, particularly for more scenes with her Japanese friend!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS by John Green

You knew it was coming.  How could I not share?  EVERYONE MUST READ JOHN GREEN’S LATEST WORK OF ART: THE FAULT IN OUR STARS .  Throughout my life (well, at least from 4 th grade, when I was introduced to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl until now, the 7 th month of my 34 th year of noticing the universe) the name ‘Augustus’ immediately evoked an image of a chubby, stubborn, chocolate-loving boy, doted upon by his mother, with the last name of Gloop.  The name ‘Augustus’ made me giggle about this character’s gluttonous follies inside the chocolate factory. Until reading John Green’s beloved new book The Fault in Our Stars . From now on, the name ‘Augustus’ will forever evoke an entirely different image and an entirely different set of emotions.  A casually hot, lean, limping ‘Augustus Waters’ has forever replaced the ‘Augustus’ of the book I treasured as a child—an unlit cigarette held loosely between his lips.  A longing sigh ...
9 comments
Read more

A MONSTER CALLS by Patrick Ness (inspired by an idea from Siobhan Dowd and illustrated by Jim Kay)

“Every time the monster moved, Conor could hear the creak of wood groaning and yawning in the monster’s huge body.” In her review for the New York Times , Jessica Bruder refers to A Monster Calls as, “A story that lodges in your bones and stays there.”  This, I believe, is an understatement.  I am afraid my words, mere pixels on the screen, cannot begin to honor how truly special this book is. From his words in the Author’s Note, Patrick Ness held me spellbound.  Siobhan Dowd had developed an idea for a book about a monster and a boy whose mom had cancer.  Breast cancer cut her life short and she was unable to finish her story.  Patrick Ness, when asked to craft something from the seed of a story Dowd left behind said, “…the thing about ideas is that they grow other ideas.”  And so, A Monster Calls was born out of Dowd’s seed and Ness’s nurturing. I suppose a book with that kind of conception was bound to be incredible, but I am sure not even ...
7 comments
Read more

THE MISFITS by James Howe

copyright date: 2001 primarily marketed for: grades 4-8 In honor of No Name-Calling Week, the idea for which originated with this book, I thought I would post a review of The Misfits by James Howe.    This book has one of my favorite leads: "So here I am, not a half-hour old as a tie salesman and trying to look like I know what I am doing, which have got to be two of the biggest jokes of all time, when who should walk into Awkworth & Ames Department Store but Skeezie Tookis. " I think I like it because it is such an inviting introduction to Bobby and Skeezie, two of the four friends referred to in the book’s title.   Bobby, Skeezie, Addie, and Joe are seventh graders who decide to create their own political party to run in the student council election.   Their goal is simple: to put an end to name-calling.   Who doesn’t think that is a good idea? The wonderful things about this book aren’t limited to the positive messages about acceptance and k...
5 comments
Read more