Saint Anything
Ratings53
Average rating4.1
This wasn't as good as I remembered it being. Also it made me want pizza but I'm broke so half a star off for that.
This book made me feel very uncomfortable at times, due to the way the main character, Sydney, parents treat her and the close family friend. The romance was cute and predictable, as well. But the ending left much to be desired.
Setelah What Happened to Goodbye dimana aku kurang suka dgn background story nya, ternyata aku suka dgn Saint Anything.
Sydney menganggap dirinya tak terlihat di mata siapa pun, terutama keluarganya sendiri. Peyton, kakak laki-laki Sydney, selalu menjadi segalanya. Perhatian orangtua mereka tertuju sepenuhnya kepada Peyton. Hingga suatu hari mobil polisi mendatangi rumah mereka, Peyton terlibat masalah besar, dan pada akhirnya harus dipenjara. Semua pun berubah kacau. Sydney mencoba mencari tempat di tengah keluarganya. Tapi semua orang terlalu mengkhawatirkan Peyton.
Sydney bertemu keluarga Chatham yang heboh, yang memiliki kehidupan berbeda dengan keluarganya, dan yang ternyata bisa membuatnya merasa diterima dan ‘terlihat' untuk pertama kalinya.
Setiap orang memiliki cara tersendiri untuk menghadapi kesulitan, tdk semuanya terasa baik bagi org lain, begitu juga aku melihat bagaimana ibu Sydney menghadapi kesulitan. Sepanjang buku akan terasa menyebalkan & tidak adil bagi Sydney, namun pada akhirnya dia tetaplah seorang ibu. Dalam pemikirannya, mgkn dia gagal mencegah Peyton melakukan hal buruk namun dia msh bias mengarahkan Sydney.
“The future was one thing that could never be broken, because it had not yet had the chance to be anything.”
An enjoyable story with good characters. Her portrayal of teenagers and families is very genuine. And there's something about Dessen's writing that consistently draws me in.
I've heard only great things about Sarah Dessen's books and Saint Anything was the first one that crossed my radar a few months ago now and I knew immediately when I read the synopsis that I would be adding it to my To Be Read pile, if not only in part because the cover art for this book is absolutely beautiful.
A contemporary story this is a beautiful story with its roots very much in the importance of family and friendship. Sydney is a high school junior when her brother Peyton is sent to prison for a DUI accident which leaves another young teen in a wheelchair. A culmination of a long series of criminal misdemeanors and drug issues means that Sydney has no illusions about her brother's culpability but her parents still seem to be blinded to their golden child's faults. Struggling to escape the shadow her brother casts over their lives Sydney moves to a new school and there meets Layla, Mac and their close family who run a local pizza restaurant and their friendship and welcoming home suddenly offer a safe haven that Syndey is badly in need of.
This book is so heartwarming, it is a character focused book in which we truly fall in love with the people we meet throughout. Sydney is a great character, she is intelligent and hard working and clearly struggling to feel noticed within a household where the entire attention of her parents has been focused on her wayward brother. She is clearly having to be self-sufficient and struggling with the presence of her brother's creepy best friend who keeps hanging around their home.
When she meets Layla and her family you instantly fall in love with them. The unquestioning way Layla accepts her family's troubles and the warmth she offers Sydney mean they are impossible to dislike. The joy of this book is the absolute focus that Dessen puts into building a story about the importance of a strong support network and the people you choose to surround yourselves with. Friends, family and those you love. For Sydney, this has been missing and it's wonderful to follow her journey from loneliness and isolation to feeling part of a family.
For the first book I've read by Sarah Dessen I was blown away, I loved it. I read it in just under 2 days and literally could not wait to keep reading it. Chapters flew by as I just wanted to lose myself in this book. I couldn't recommend it highly enough. I will absolutely be reading more books by this author in the weeks and months ahead. I know in the UK that Sarah Dessen is perhaps a little less well known alongside other Young Adult writers but from having read this book I truly fail to understand why.
I like the focus of this book.
As always, the characters feel very true.
Actual rating: 3.5
“That was just it. You never knew what lay ahead; the future was one thing that could never be broken, because it had not yet had the chance to be anything.”
I'll be honest. This is my first Sarah Dessen novel. Anyone reading YA fiction has heard the name of Sarah Dessen before- she's basically that young adult romance author. So yes, while I hadn't yet read a Sarah Dessen novel, I knew what I was getting into. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a huge romance fan, but this one was cute.
It had some meaning, and focused a lot on friendship and justice, actually. I think my biggest gripe was that I never really connected to any of the characters. I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong, but when they were first introduced it felt kind of like,
“WOW! Look at this unique and developing character!”
And after having met them for a few pages it was kind of like,
“Wow. They're actually kind of flat.”
Why? Because they were flat. They had something that defined them and that was it. The book was good, yes, I enjoyed it, but I felt like I was looking in from the outside a lot.
Like I said, my biggest gripe was the characters. The story itself was good, and the writing was very good. Will I read another Sarah Dessn novel? Probably. Will I read it soon? Probably not.
I don't know. Give it a try. The book's worth a shot.
“One minute you're walking through a dark woods, alone, and then the landscape shifts, and you see it. Something wondrous and unexpected, almost magical, that you never would have found had you not kept going.”
I've only read a few other Sarah Dessen books so I can't speak very much to how this compares to others of hers, but I really liked this one. I think she's so great at making clear how high the stakes can feel for relatively mundane things. I was really turning the pages to see how things would turn out! And all the major characters are so three dimensional–I love how sympathetic Sydney is to her parents, even as her parents are treating her unfairly.
Also like 20% of this book is just loving descriptions of pizza and French fries and garlic knots and I'm so hungryyy
This is a fun book about a girl who lives in her brother's shadow and learns how to be herself and find her own happy ending. The characters are relate-able and lovable. I enjoyed the story and wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to most.
