Something Brand New At Tattered Cover!!!

 

Every now and then we encounter a new children's book that we’re so excited about we want to broadcast it, so we've created a Kids' TC VIB (very impressive book) for a real stand-out among the many delightful and meaningful new books for young readers. Our first selection for this honor is:

“Eleanor & Park reminded me not just what it’s like to be young and in love with a girl, but also what it’s like to be young and in love with a book.”—John Green, The New York Times Book Review

“Funny, hopeful, foulmouthed, sexy, and tear-jerking, this winning romance will captivate teen and adult readers alike.”—Kirkus Reviews 

Bono met his wife in high school, Park says.
So did Jerry Lee Lewis, Eleanor answers.
I’m not kidding, he says.
You should be, she says, we’re 16.
What about Romeo and Juliet?
Shallow, confused, then dead.
I love you, Park says.
Wherefore art thou, Eleanor answers.
I’m not kidding, he says.
You should be.

Set over the course of one school year in 1986, this is the story of two star-crossed misfits—smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try. When Eleanor meets Park, you’ll remember your own first love—and just how hard it pulled you under.

Kate & Jocelyn, two of our most knowledgeable Children's section staffers say:
  
"Redheaded, overweight Eleanor is a smart high school sophomore, just reunited with her mom, siblings and stepfather in a house little more than a shack on the wrong side of the tracks in Omaha. Park is a compact, smart, half-Korean high school sophomore living in the same neighborhood. He is part of a loving and successful working family living in a comfortable home with his mother's beauty shop in the garage.

Eleanor and Park meet on the school bus and eventually become friends and then embark on a slow-moving but intense romance. This very young adult book goes back and forth between Eleanor's voice and Park's voice and is alive with music, comics love, fashion choices and spot-on contemporary teenage vocabulary.

Eleanor and Park are bullied, teased, and chased. Eleanor's home situation is horrifying; her mother is down-trodden and her stepfather is an abusive alcoholic. Park's parents are so real; they work hard and succumb to stereotypes but they are willing to see and consider change and so move the story forward in a kindly way. 

Perhaps this next generation has less regard for surface differences and imperfections and yet can celebrate the wonder of young love.

Rainbow Rowell has beautifully portrayed that idea in her novel, Eleanor and Park."