I went along for the ride

Along for the ride by Sarah Dessen

Rating: 3 out of 5 hearts
424 pages
Released: January 2010
Buy it @ book depository

Ever since her parents began fighting, Auden has been unable to sleep at night. Now, spending a summer at a charming beach town with her father and his new family, she has to find new places to pass the time she spends awake. And so she meets Eli, a fellow insomniac who becomes her nighttime guide. Together, they embark on parallel quests: for Auden, to experience the carefree teenage life she has missed; for Eli, to come to terms with the death of a friend. In her trademark blockbuster-style, Sarah Dessen creates a powerful and irresistible story of two people learning how to connect. 

Review

"So I decided to relax into it, bumpy and crazy as it might be, and try for once to just go along for the ride"

This is my first Sarah Dessen book and I wasn't won over. I've been wanting to read one for quite some time now and felt like this was a good one to start with because I had been recommended it. Not to say I hated this book, it's just that I found myself thinking it was a little mediocre.

The story started off pretty boring and I believe this is because Auden was a boring person. Perfect student, always studying hard, never goes to parties and does things by the book. Because she has always tried hard to be perfect and make her mother proud she never got to experience normal teenage life. As the book progresses though, Auden changes, she and the story start to transform. She becomes friends with girls from her stepmother's clothes shop and Eli, the quiet and brooding guy, who teach her how have fun, ride a bike, become a store goer and maybe even fall in love. The transformation of Auden is one of the things I really enjoyed about this book but something (more like someone) I really fell for was Eli. I don't think I would've liked this as much if Eli wasn't in it. He is sweet and makes rice crispies from scratch! How can you not fall in love with that! There's also that mysteriousness about him, there's something about his past that is slowly revealed and makes him all the more dreamy for his reasons behind his mystery.

As I was reading I was thinking to myself that this would make a perfect summer movie - It's set in a town that's close to the beach, a girl who meets a boy, they go on nightly adventures together and of course there's a prom like party towards the end of the book. It would be the perfect Chick flick to cuddle up with, eat popcorn and maybe even need some tissues...

One minor character I want to mention is Auden's father. I hate him, he's selfish and so horrible. He deserves a bad father award...BOO to him! The book was enjoyable but I've only given it 3 stars because it was slightly predictable and long winded. I've read other reviews where people have enjoyed the slow unraveling of the characters, but for me I felt that over 400 pages was too much. I will probably try another Dessen book, I've got my eyes on Dreamland as I've heard interesting things about it.

On the cover

The cover above is ok, but I saw the same cover with a white background and it made the cover so much nicer. There are two other covers which feature a girl on a bike which would be better covers than this one because the book is called 'Along for the ride' and bikes are a main part of the story. To the left is one of the new covers which I LOVE! Blue is my favourite colour so I love this cover a lot!

What I'm reading next: Two & Twenty Dark tales by multiple authors