24 February 2012

Book Review: Bittersweet


Book Details
Author: Sarah Ockler
Format: Kindle Edition
File Size: 553 KB
Publisher: Simon Pulse January 3, 2012

Summary:
From the author of Twenty Boy Summer, a teen pushes the limits to follow her dreams—and learns there’s a fine line between bitter and sweet....Once upon a time, Hudson knew exactly what her future looked like. Then a betrayal changed her life and knocked her dreams to the ground. Now she’s a girl who doesn’t believe in second chances, a girl who stays under the radar by baking cupcakes at her mom’s diner and obsessing over what might have been.
     So when things start looking up and she has another shot at her dreams, Hudson is equal parts hopeful and terrified. Of course, this is also the moment a cute, sweet guy walks into her life—and starts serving up some seriously mixed signals. She’s got a lot on her plate, and for a girl who’s been burned before, risking it all is easier said than done.
     It’s time for Hudson to ask herself what she really wants, and how much she’s willing to sacrifice to get it. Because in a place where opportunities are fleeting, she knows this chance may very well be her last....

Review:
Rating: 5/5

Bittersweet is one of the most delicious books I have ever read. It took me just a couple of hours to finish this book on my Kindle. I was all wrapped up – drooling because the chapter titles are sinfully to die for. It makes me crave for a bunch of cupcakes with weird-sounding names.

Besides those amazing chapter names that could tick your sense of taste and wish it out of the pages, I also love the characters in this novel. Starting with Hudson, she started as a soon-to-be-Olympic-champion-type figure skater, but something went wrong and she turned her back away from it all – from an all-too-promising future. Now, three years later, her life is filled with a lot of stuffs including skating, baking cupcakes, waitressing at the diner, and taking care of her brother. So it’s not really a surprise when she’s near emotional wreck with all of these stuff fell into her lap. She has a lot of issue of things that fell apart along with an unexpected betrayal by someone she loved. I wish I could be more sympathetic to her, but most of the time, I’d like to strangle her more because of her unwise decisions and bad moves. I love the growth of her character all throughout the book. Her decision at the end of the story surprised me, it was unexpected, but I was happy that she stood by it and didn’t regret anything.

She has an amazing best friend, Dani who greatly complements her personality. There is a wise-for-their-real-age brother who is just adorable and sweet.

And of course, who could forget the hockey boys!!! Hudson is quite confused when it comes to the opposite sex. The choices: real tough! It was a choice between the captain who wants her, and then shows it and the co-captain who sends in signals but gets on the phone a lot with another girl. I love the romance. I love the thing she did with the hockey players. I’m glad Ockler didn’t overdo these hunks. They were fascinating, funny, sweet and quite obnoxious (most jocks are).  

Bittersweet is a fun, a little bit emotional and complex. The setting – all those snow and hot chocolates is just perfect and makes those who do not experience winter wish for snow. Once again, Sarah Ockler made an amazing novel, that made me swoon over the characters and over cupcakes.

Favorite Quotes
Everyone says that the internet is so awesome because you can connect with people from all over the world, but I think it’s the opposite. The internet doesn’t make it easier to connect with anyone—it just makes it so you don’t really have to.

Being with Josh is like being touched from the inside out. An unexpected blaze of sunshine on an otherwise bleak winter day. Wrapping your fingers around a mug of hot chocolate after walking home in that frigid lake-effect wind. A fire crackling softly beneath your outstretched hands. The perfect combination of cupcake and icing, the kind where you can’t quite identify all the secret ingredients, but you feel them melting together on your tongue, and you know that for as long you live, this will be the best thing you’ve ever tasted.

“It takes forty muscles to frown, and only twelve to jam a cupcake in your mouth and get over it.” 

“Would 'sorry' have made any difference? Does it ever? It's just a word. One word against a thousand actions.” 
ChuCha

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