TAMARA IRELAND STONE writes young adult and middle grade novels. Her New York Times bestseller, Every Last Word, won the Cybils Young Adult Fiction Award, the Georgia Peach Book Award, the Buxtehuder Bulle German Youth Literature Award, and was a YALSA Teens’ Top Ten pick. She is also the author of Time Between Us, which has been published in over twenty countries; its sequel, Time After Time; and Click’d, the first book in her new middle-grade series.
Before she began writing fiction full time, Tamara spent twenty years in the technology industry. She co-founded a woman-owned marketing strategy firm where she worked with small startups as well as some of the world’s largest software companies. When she’s not writing, she enjoys skiing, seeing live music, watching movies, and spending time with her husband and two children. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Little Do We Know by Tamara Ireland Stone is a novel that will definitely leave you thinking long after reading it. The concept of faith is explored in an interesting way that will have readers question their own beliefs. Friendship and what it takes to maintain a relationship with your friends is a theme that also runs deep through the book. Continue reading
Title: Every Last Word
If you could read my mind, you wouldn't be smiling.
Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has Purely-Obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can't turn off.
Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn't help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Yet Sam knows she'd be truly crazy to leave the protection of the most popular girls in school. So when Sam meets Caroline, she has to keep her new friend with a refreshing sense of humor and no style a secret, right up there with Sam's weekly visits to her psychiatrist.
Caroline introduces Sam to Poet's Corner, a hidden room and a tight-knit group of misfits who have been ignored by the school at large. Sam is drawn to them immediately, especially a guitar-playing guy with a talent for verse, and starts to discover a whole new side of herself. Slowly, she begins to feel more "normal" than she ever has as part of the popular crowd . . . until she finds a new reason to question her sanity and all she holds dear.
❃ I received this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. ❃
Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone may seem like a typical contemporary “sick lit” book, but don’t be fooled. This book is more about the main character, Sam, and her life as a teenager. Sam is such a relatable character, as she is filled with determination. There is also some intrigue in Every Last Word, as it features a secret poetry club, making the book pretty fascinating! Continue reading