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Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

Posted by Brian on Monday, Apr 29, 2013

Everyone has been in love, is in love or wants love.  It's universal.  Young love is white-hot.  Rainbow Rowell has captured its intensity in "Eleanor & Park," an insightful and honest tale of two people who genuinely need each other.

Park is half-Korean and tries to fly under the radar in his own world of music and comics.  Eleanor, with her wild red hair, is new in school, wears weird clothes and comes from a broken family.  The two characters--and the reader--fall in love over the course of a school-year in 1986.  Like any romance, there are complications, but they're blips.  The real problem is Eleanor's alcoholic, time-bomb of a step-father.  Eleanor and Park make the most of the time that they have--but there's never enough time when you're young.

If I haven't convinced you, John Green loved it and recommended it during his Reddit AMA.  I honestly don't think I've cared about a fictional relationship as much as I did in "Eleanor & Park."  I recommend this book to everyone--young, old, everything in-between--who has been in love, is in love or wants love.

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Brian works as the Senior Adult Services Librarian at the Iowa City Public Library.

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