Friday, February 7, 2014

Review: Burn for Burn by Jenny Han & Siobhan Vivian

Burn for Burn (Burn for Burn, #1) Postcard-perfect Jar Island is the kind of place where nobody locks their doors at night, where parents can sleep easy, knowing their daughters are tucked away safe and sound in their beds. 

But bad things can happen, even to good girls . . . and sometimes, the only way to make things right is to do something wrong. 

Lillia used to trust boys, but not anymore. Not after what happened this summer. And she’ll do whatever it takes to protect her little sister from the same fate. 

Kat is over the rumors, the insults, the cruel jokes made at her expense. It all goes back to one person--her ex-best friend. Someone needs to teach her a lesson, and, with Lillia and Mary behind her, Kat feels up to the task.

Four years ago, Mary left Jar Island because of a boy. But she’s not the same girl anymore. Now that she’s got friends who have her back, he's going to be in big trouble.

Three very different girls who come together to make things right. Will they go too far?


My Review:

The characters and the story told in this book are really interesting and unique.  This story is very contemporary, but then there's a part that isn't quite contemporary that you don't find out about until later in the story.  The relationships and the revenge make the story interesting.  It's a fast-paced read that keeps you turning the pages.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD

Of the revenge targets in the book, I believe that Lillia's was the least deserving.  Lillia's target was Alex Lind, one of her best friends, and a boy that she thought was in a secret relationship with her younger sister.  I can understand why she was mad when she thought he was with her sister.  Lillia is very protective of her freshman sister, Nadia, and I liked that about her character.  Many of the people that Lillia was friends with were not very people, so I was surprised that she was friends with them, since she seemed like a good person.  The only person in her group who I ended up liking was Alex, which is funny since she was trying to get revenge on him.  I actually think Lillia and Alex would make a cute couple, but I'm not sure if that's going to happen in the next book or not.

Kat is another one of the girls who wants revenge.  Her story intertwines with Lillia's in a few ways.  First of all, she's kind of been in a secret relationship with Alex during the summer.  She clearly really likes him.  In my opinion, Kat is the only thing that is keeping me from completely hoping that Alex and Lillia become a couple.  I would like them together, but not if that hurts Kat.  So I'm pretty torn on who I want Alex to be with.  You might think that she would also direct her revenge at Alex, since, if he was with Nadia, he was also cheating on Kat, but she chooses a different target.  Her target is Rennie, Lillia's current best friend, and Kat's ex-best friend.  Lillia and Kat have been friends too in the past, but, while Lillia simply didn't fight to stay friends for her, Rennie initiated ending the friendship with Kat, and she was mean to Kat as well.  Sometimes I would occasionally like Rennie a little, but only when she with Lillia alone, and there were many times when she did things that made me dislike her.

Mary is the last one in this group, and she has the most heartbreaking story of all of them.  She wants revenge on Reeve.  He is a guy in Lillia's group of friends, and Rennie has a huge crush on him.  Of the three targets of the revenge, he is the most deserving.  I never liked him at all, and he was a complete jerk.  Mary knew him when they were both in middle school, and he gave her the nickname Big Easy because she was heavy.  One of the worst things about Reeve's character was how he wasn't always awful to Mary in her flashbacks.  He would be nice and friendly to her when nobody else that he knew was around.  They were the only people from their school who didn't live on the mainland, so they had to take a ferry to Jar Island every day.  They developed a strange sort of "friendship," but it was never really a friendship.  When anyone else saw them together, Reeve was mean and awful.  I think he deserved what they were doing to him, because he had hurt Mary so much.

If you like YA contemporary, read this book.

Katie

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