Want by Stephanie Lawton (Blog Tour)

Yup, you saw right, this is my second blog tour! I've actually tried to schedule everything before my exams so I can be sure of posting, so the next blog tour I take part in may be next month.... But anyway, today, I'm here to review Want (an Upper YA Romance) by Stephanie Lawton.

Basically, Want revolves around Julianne (Juli), a music prodigy who's trying her best to escape her mom and the small town she grows up in. But due to some unfortunate events, she ends up with a new teacher just before (a few weeks) the critical audition. And since this is a romance, she starts to fall in love with her teacher (Isaac), who's hiding some sort of big secret.

Want is basically a very deep romance novel. There's little of the "he-likes-me-he-likes-me-not" in most fluff. Instead, we're presented with very flawed characters. Juli has a dysfunctional family (her mom has a mental illness) but everyone pretends that everything is ok (town environment). And due to her mom, she doesn't have many friends either (but she did get low self-esteem). The book is as much about her journey through this difficult period of time as it is about her romance.

The romance part was actually really interesting. There's a lot of angst on both sides, but it's so well done that I didn't mind it. In fact, it made the book interesting. I can't say much without giving away spoilers, but the ending was not only surprising, it was also very apt. After thinking about it, it makes perfect sense (the clues are all in the book).

But, I just have to mention, this book is really for upper YA and up. There aren't any explicit scenes, but there are mentions of mature themes fairly often in the book, especially in the lower half.

And of course, I have to say something about the music. As a failed pianist (I mean this literally, I failed my piano exams 3 times), I loved reading about the descriptions of music. One of my biggest weakness is that I can't interpret music (my meager skills are only concentrated at the technical level); my piano teacher and I have given up on modern music because I play too strictly to the time (and this is without ever using a metronome). So reading about how the music moves Juli was inspiring. I hope that one day, I can see and feel all this emotion too.

All in all, this is a really interesting book. What I probably loved most was about the music, but really, the other aspects were also well-written.

(P.S. I'm sorry this is posted so late. I went to support my seniors at the kendo competition today and just got back...)