The Life Of Glass by Jillian Cantor - Review

Synopsis via goodreads:

Before he died, Melissa’s father told her about stars. He told her that the brightest stars weren’t always the most beautiful—that if people took the time to look at the smaller stars, if they looked with a telescope at the true essence of the star, they would find real beauty. But even though Melissa knows that beauty isn’t only skin deep, the people around her don’t seem to feel that way. There’s her gorgeous sister Ashley who will barely acknowledge Melissa at school, there's her best friend Ryan, who may be falling in love with the sophisticated Courtney, and there’s Melissa’s mother who’s dating someone new, someone who Melissa knows will never be able to replace her father.

To make sure she doesn’t lose her father completely, Melissa spends her time trying to piece together the last of his secrets and completing a journal her father began—one about love and relationships and the remarkable ways people find one another. But when tragedy strikes, Melissa has to start living and loving in the present, as she realizes that being beautiful on the outside doesn't mean you can't be beautiful on the inside.

This is a lyrical tale of love, loss and self-discovery from the author of THE SEPTEMBER SISTERS

Let me first start by saying I ended up liking The Life of Glass, mostly. However, there's a few things that I really did NOT like at all.

The writing is really breath taking, the way Jillian writes about different things with in the book, I found intriguing, like for instance, I have NO earthly idea of what a “wash” is – where both Melissa and Ryan ride there bikes – but the way that Jillian describes it, I could almost picture it.

In it's basic form, The Life of Glass is about a girl, Melissa, who looses her father. When the story opens it's been about a year since it happened, but Melissa cant seem to step past the grief, and begin to live again. She's not the popular one, or the prettiest one...and she's only got one friend. She's just kinda stuck, thinking about the past, and struggling with the present – not even thinking about the future. It's a story about learning to accept yourself for who you are, no matter who that person might be.

It honestly took me quite a while to really like Melissa – I mean, for a LONG time she was just a girl, whom seemed REALLY lonely. She has only one friend, and does not seem to want any more, but at the same time is whining about not having any. She and her sister fight all the time, and all she did was ride her bike in the wash with Ryan (her only friend).

However, she did start to grow on me, and by the end I was rooting for her to at least learn that she could be such an amazing person if only she stop looking only at the past, and started to think about the present. I rooted for her to come into herself, and find her strength...a strength that it was hinted at that she had before her dad passed away, but lost for some reason.

The book felt a bit long, to me though it's only 340 pages (in the ARC I read) it seems like it's 1,000 sometimes, I almost wanted to skim parts, but then held back thinking I might miss something that might make a difference in the fabric of the story, so I did not.

It also did not always seem to add up, I mean – the teachers NEVER seemed to care what these kids were doing in there classes, and in Biology they dissect a frog for a whole semester (with my sister being a Biology teacher, I know this is done within a few days – not a semester).

Also, the relationship that Melissa has with her sister, did not ring true all the time. I have a sister, we are 16 months apart in age, though we have never suffered a tragedy, such as the one described in the book, we are WAY closer than Melissa and Ashley. I mean at times it almost seemed like Melissa wanted to run over her sister with a car, and when her sister gets hurt Melissa is not even sad or upset about it, not really. This to me was weird, I fight with my sister ALL the time, but I would lie down my life to protect her, and would NEVER EVER want harm to come to her, no matter how mad I am at her.

Bottom line - I did end up really enjoying the story, even with it's flaws – I really enjoyed seeing Melissa come into herself, and discover that she does not have to live a life of regrets or continue to live in the past.

I give The Life of Glass a 3 stars!

The Life of Glass
Written by: Jillian Cantor
352 Pages
Published: March 1, 2010
Publisher: Harperteen

Book provided to me via the Bloody Bad Borrow My ARC Tour, for my honest review.