GUEST REVIEW: Eleanor And Park - Rainbow Rowell

GENRE: Contemporary
PAGES: 336
PUBLISHER: Orion
FORMAT: Paperback
BUY IT: Waterstones
RATING: 5 Stars

SUMMARY

Eleanor is the new girl in town, and she's never felt more alone. All mismatched clothes, mad red hair and chaotic home life, she couldn't stick out more if she tried. Then she takes the seat on the bus next to Park. Quiet, careful and - in Eleanor's eyes - impossibly cool, Park's worked out that flying under the radar is the best way to get by. Slowly, steadily, through late-night conversations and an ever-growing stack of mix tapes, Eleanor and Park fall in love. They fall in love the way you do the first time, when you're 16, and you have nothing and everything to lose. Set over the course of one school year in 1986, Eleanor & Park is funny, sad, shocking and true - an exquisite nostalgia trip for anyone who has never forgotten their first love.

REVIEWSo Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell is one of my favourite books so, why not tell you guys why you should read one of the best books known to the YA universe. I love Eleanor and Park, the whole is book beautiful from the first letter to the last, I loved it.

Eleanor and Park is about a girl called Eleanor and her difficulties at home from her abusive stepfather and her almost absent mother (her mother is always there but never for her daughter). She doesn’t have proper clothes so she has to do with what she got. She sits next to a boy called Park. In a normal situation, you think they will talk, seeing they go to the same school, but no, not for while that is. They soon develop their relationship by Park lending his comics that he reads, then his mix tapes and then finally they TALKED. Even though their relationship started in an ordinary way, it became an extraordinary romance (Eleanark FOR LIFE). However Eleanor, throughout this book, has so many tough experiences from being bullied, to be fearful from her stepfather. Park is to be part of the popular crew (due to him being the only Asian at the school, ASIANS ARE AMAZING) however he is also judged as his father doesn’t think he is masculine enough.

Main Characters:

Eleanor Douglas: Eleanor is amazing. She is strong, beautiful, amazing and just so warming to read about her, shes just awesome. I love her amazing red hair, that gives her character that extra depth. Eleanor kept her head up throughout all the hard times she faced and she never thought the worst in people. Eleanor goes through so many difficult experiences, which is so unfair to her because she is portrayed as such a lovely person like how can you harm a hair on her body, like how?

Park Sheridan: Park is perfect. I love him, I love him, I LOVE HIM. Anyone who knows me, I love PARK. I even have a T-Shirt with his name on it (look at bottom for pics). He is just an amazing character, he always made Eleanor smile (which made me smile) through her bad times, and he always was her comfort blanket (and became mine).

What does Eleanor and Park teaches us?

It is so easy to judge someone so easy and we should never judge anyone. Never ever EVER. It makes the person feel like crap, and we shouldn’t judge someone by the way they look. Eleanor dressed they way she looked because she couldn’t afford to dress in the latest trends. Park doesn’t want to be muscular like his dad wants to him to be. That’s because he doesn’t want to, he feels different. That’s okay. It is okay to be different because it is our life, and we can do whatever we want, and other people shouldn’t judge because we don’t know the full story about why they look like the way they do, or why they act the way they do.

Eleanor and Park is such an amazing book because you get such feeling reading the book, that it just warms your heart and feels with such comfort that undescribeable. It has the teenage awkwardness that we get everyday yet it is prosed so beautifully that if you feel that you are actually living in that moment, and that is what any book should be about; living in the moment of the book.

Eleanor and Park (like Rainbow’s other books) is written beautifully and it is just perfect, honestly. Perfect. However, there is one thing I don’t like; the ending. (You’ll see why).

 

- Ambi.