Publication Date - 5th July 2010
Paperback - 240 pages
Genre - YA Contemporary
Source - Library
Rating - 4 out of 5: I really liked it
Reviewed by - Amy
Book Info -Warm, winning and real, Zelah Green is back!
My name is Zelah Green and I'm a Cleanaholic. It's the summer hols and I'm on major Flirt Alert. I've joined mysortaspace.com and ever since I've been getting emails from loads of boys.
Boys are Dirt Alert AND Germ Alert. Don't even talk to me about kissing...
The rest of my life's a bit rubbish too.
My Thoughts (contains spoilers for Book 1) - So...? Not being resilient characters, are we?
Well, perhaps that is a good thing (we don’t want people to have the resilience to be difficult- especially Zelah). No, not just Zelah- I mentioned (last review) the (ex)stepmother, a character in Book 1. I kept thinking she’d pop up & I was generally thinking she’d be developed. Why? She just sounded interesting; recently I’ve been reading some books with very developed adults & whole families. And now she’s the missing piece of the jigsaw. she really is missing so maybe it’d be best if I had read the second book first (*cough* mystery read-book-2-in-a-series-as-a-standalone library book borrower *cough*) & knew nothing of her...
I’d have missed lots though & I wouldn’t want to miss any of Zelah even if the books aren’t flawless (in my opinions). So, let’s delve into Zelah Land- as I said I would:
Teen Green (sounds more normal Ze?) thinks she isn’t a difficult child but perhaps this is because at Forest Hill she was the easiest a lot of the time- she really did go through a lot though & in the end Zelah probably reckons that’s the reason Mr Green came back. He can turn his back on a difficult daughter but not so much a perfect(ish) one? As you can tell he’s flawed, like Zelah.
Boom. Character Arc score.
But does that mean there’s room for the flawed Caro (I actually forgot until afterwards that I wanted more Lib- that makes up for the “where’s stepmother?” as Caro is just... --->)
GOSH, it’s a misunderstanding! We know Zelah wanted wanted a Forest Hill person to come into her life but she’d have preferred a certain quieter one (just a heads up, there are no quiet people whose name begins with ‘L’, or ‘C’ for that matter, in this book). We know who! It’s summer, why wouldn’t it be a Summer romance (hello blurb & first few pages... not cover, duh!)? She may forget a high quantity of her to-do’s... Yes, well- that’s what I expected! I’m not going to say what got added/taken away from her to-do’s but let’s just say it involved watching lots of (laugh out laugh) debates between Caro & those who dare cross her path. There was a serious depth underneath that- I may have laughed & wondered if anybody else could argue like that- they can’t- but I did feel empathy.
Relationships were built, broken (that’s the only insta thing by the way, don’t let the blurb make you think of the moment when eyes meet & hearts bonds eternally...) and other elements of OCD were examined in one chapter. It wasn’t preachy but I liked how we came to see how the rituals developed, and are fluctuating. We also get to see other things those with OCD may do & how they feel about it. It was short but I was reminded about why I picked up, and really enjoyed, this series.
Summary (no spoilers, if you just want a general opinion...) - If that isn’t enough for you I’ll say this: it was slightly different from the first book- it wrapped up even better & that is why it has the same rating, others parts didn’t seem quite as excelling. I must admit I expected it to either be better than Book 1 or really not. It wasn’t either of them; I was satisfied & laughed (well... tried not to laugh) a lot more! The characters definitely shone (FYI: My Mum wants a third book with Liv in*) & I am glad I read this in conclusion.
*she actually told me to type that :L
Other books in the series:
1. Zelah Green, Queen of Clean
2. One More Little Problem
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