The Stats
📖 BOOK REVIEW⠀📚
BOOK: Eleanor & Park
AUTHOR: Rainbow Rowell @ rainbowrowell
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press@ stmartinspress
Stars: ⭐⭐⭐
Published: February 26, 2013
The Review
✨ The Title/Cover Draw:
- I have been wanting to read more by Rainbow Rowell and was able to get my hands on this one.
💜 What I liked:
- Eleanor is very much like me physically so I probably connected to her the most here. The story of her and Park being awkward together is both cute and also uncomfortable. However, the story is told in a very real way.
😱 What I didn’t like:
- There are quite a few trigger warnings when it comes to bullying, fat shaming, and potential sexual assault. It’s not that I didn’t like that this was included, but rather how it was portrayed. I am not sure that this story has aged well in the last 8 years with all of the awareness that has happened. Eleanor has a lot of things happen to her that aren’t totally explained just for the fact that she is plus size and has red hair, while her African American friends and Park (who is half-asian) are not affected by it. I think I would have rather seen their response to society’s social injustices more than is shown.
💁♀️ The Characters:
- Eleanor and Park come from different worlds and cultures.
🚦 The Ending:
- This ending is a tad iffy. Part of me liked it but it’s very open ended so if you like that kind of thing, you may like it.
💬 The Narrator:
- Rebecca Lowman and Sunil Malhota do a back and forth style narration as the chapters are told from both Eleanor and Park’s point of view.
💭 Consider if you like:
- Hard-hitting YA novels.
All thoughts and opinions are my own.
📘 Summary:
Eleanor is the new girl in town, and with her chaotic family life, her mismatched clothes and unruly red hair, she couldn’t stick out more if she tried.
Park is the boy at the back of the bus. Black T-shirts, headphones, head in a book – he thinks he’s made himself invisible. But not to Eleanor… never to Eleanor.
Slowly, steadily, through late-night conversations and an ever-growing stack of mix tapes, Eleanor and Park fall for each other. They fall in love the way you do the first time, when you’re young, and you feel as if you have nothing and everything to lose.