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Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
Publication Date: December 2nd, 2010
Published By: Dutton (A Penguin Group)
Hardcover, 372 Pages
Source: Gift
Summary from Goodreads:
"Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris—until she meets Étienne St. Claire: perfect, Parisian (and English and American, which makes for a swoon-worthy accent), and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home.
As winter melts into spring, will a year of romantic near-misses end with the French kiss Anna—and readers—have long awaited?"
My Review: *****+ = 5+ Stars
Anna and the French Kiss is as mouthwatering as the parisian treats that Stephanie describes throughout the pages of this book. As the story goes on, I find myself wanting more and more, the growing and deflating friendships, the budding romance, the adventure of one homesick teen stuck in the city of love. I just couldn't get enough. And now, even after the words on the final page fade from my mind, the story is fully engrained in my brain.
Anna couldn't have been written any better than she was. Beautiful, but not perfect, determined yet still shy, excited and nervous. One of my biggest pet peeves with YA books is when the girl is either completely perfect or she is nothing or has nothing... yadda yadda yadda... you get the drift. Anna is well rounded, and her character grows throughout the book which makes her that much more enjoyable to follow on her journey.
Etienne. I feel like this masterpiece of a male character is best left to be read about, rather than told about. His story is just as beautiful as Anna's, and the growth they have separately, and as two, is a big part of this book. You should enjoy it to the fullest without my snippets of how I feel about him (all very, very good mind you).
One spot that I didn't particularly like, but that was obviously needed for this particular story, has to do with a bit of cheating, nothing major, a kiss... but it was written well enough to where it didn't change my opinion of the story as a whole. (I'm not a fan of cheaters...)
Overall, I am amazed, and in awe of this beautiful book. I said that a lot in this review, beautiful, but this book is nothing but that, and I imagine most of you out there will devour it just as quick as I did. It's nice to hear major postitive hype towards a book, but it's much nicer when you read it for yourself and you can say, "Damn right this book is amazing. More like made of epic." <--- That's what I said, paraphrased. The unparaphrased version is much longer and includes the words, love, awesome and amazing... repetatively.
Nuff said. Check this book out. I don't think you'll regret it!!
Have you already Anna? Share your opinions or links to reviews. I'd love to hear what you thought!
(There is a companion novel coming out next fall, and it's at the top of my 2011 MUST HAVE list. More like my *musthaverightNAOpleasethankyou* list.)
Sherry<3
