Book Review: Saving June by Hannah Harrington

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BOOK review
Started on: 1.June.2012

Finished on: 4.June.2012

Saving June by Hannah Harrington

Title : Saving June
Author : Hannah Harrington
Publisher : Harlequin Teen
Pages : 322 Pages
Year of Publication : 2011
Price : $9.99 (http://www.amazon.com/)

Rating: 4/5


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"After all, this trip is about her. For her. And I deserve to carry all of this. Her ever-present memory. The incessant twinge of guilt in my gut. I deserve every bit of pain I get. I deserve to hurt."

Harper Scott, a 16-year-old girl, who just lost her older sister, June - who killed herself. Compared to Harper, June is the perfect daughter with amazing achievements and great personality. June's death has caused many people devastated, including their mother and Harper. Thankfully, there's Aunt Helen to help her Mother survive; and there's Laney - Harper's one and only best friend, who's always there supporting Harper through her hard times.

One day, when Harper was going through June's stuffs - to find hints or anything June left behind which might be a clue to explain the reason why she killed herself; she found a mysterious mix CD. That mix CD was the last thing June listened to, before she finally killed herself in the back of her car. Harper thought it would lead to some clue or explanation; so when she decided to find out who made the CD, she found Jake Tolan. After going through several arguments because Jake didn't want to explain his relationship with June, the three of them decided to go on a road trip to California - the one place that June always dreamed of. Bringing June's ashes along with them, they went on a long journey - which leads to many other things and revelation.

"So I'm going to do this. I am going to go to California and spread June's ashes in the Pacific like she sould have wanted, like she deserves, and that is it.
Period. End of story."

Through the long journey to California, Harper gets to know more about Jake and his music obsession. The three of them goes through a troublesome adventure which let them experience so many new things. And little by little, the secret about Jake and June's relationship is revealed. But there are things Harper didn't know; that she would develop a certain feeling towards Jake, and there is one secret Jake's been keeping all these time.

"Some people think that a place can save them... Like if they could just be somewhere else, their lives would be totally different. They could finally be the people they always wanted to be. But to me, a place is just a place. If you really want things to change, you can make them change no matter where you are."

Read the full story in Saving June.

It's been quite a long time since I read an English book; so I thought this book - which was a birthday present from my best friend - would be a good one to begin with. After finishing the book, I'd say this is a good book; might not be the best YA I've ever read, but nevertheless still enjoyable. This is Hannah Harrington's debut, so I'll say she did quite a great job on her first book.

There are some things that I like and some things that I don't from this book. First of all, somehow I can't relate to Harper's character. This can be caused by several reasons; probably because I've never had such lost like Harper experienced, or the emotions in the story wasn't described too well. The point of this book is to show how sad Harper feels with the death of her sister, but I didn't really grasp that fact from how she's acting. But I think this is maybe part of Harper's character which is the strong type rather than the melancholy-weeping type. Secondly, the plot doesn't really excite me. There are also things left unexplained; such as Laney's problem - which was solved like a piece of cake (even though for me it was even worse than Harper's problem), and also Harper's Mother who recovers but didn't get much portion in the story. The plot of the story is actually very deep, since it's about losing a family member; but I think this story didn't dig in the emotions deep enough the make me sympathize with the characters.

But on the good side, i love Laney and Jake's characters. Laney is the dream best-friend; since the beginning she was very supportive and caring towards Harper. She also has this really bright and friendly personality, which makes me automatically love her! While Jake is the guy with a bad-attitude, but very sexy and charming. His love for music is also very admirable - though I think the music had too much portion in the story. The song he wrote at the end of the story makes me love him even more - which caused me to increase the rating. Besides the characters, I also love the beautiful words written in the story; I always love books with beautifully written words. And aside from all the down sides, I still think the book is very enjoyable through the end - so I think Saving June deserves a 4-star rating :)

by.stefaniesugia♥ .