Mel's Book Blog

There's only one word to describe this book and that is FUNNY! Admittedly the plot was fairly simplistic and a bit predictable, but the characters the author has created are all works of wacky art. They are quirky, weird, oddball, and laugh-out-loud hilarious, yet down-to-earth and the genuine real deal. I positively adored each and every one of them.

I already have the rest of the series (thus far) loaded onto my Kindle and look forward to meeting the rest of these guys.

A sweet Christmas story that made me tear-up a bit.

Since there are over 1,000 reviews on Goodreads, I’m not sure what I can I say that hasn't already been said except this is probably one of the best books, if not the best, that I'll read all year. Henry Jerome Denton takes us through all of the traumas and trials that a teenager could face from bullying and sexual assault, the inexplicable suicide of his boyfriend, a broken home and unresolved issues with his absent father, a jerk of a brother who vacillates between sometimes bully and sometimes protector, the death of his unborn niece, a grandmother grappling with Alzheimer's, and a mother with serious self-esteem issues. Is it any wonder that he can't come up with a single good reason to press a button and save the world from annihilation? Henry envisions all sorts of doomsday scenarios which could bring about the end of the world. But is it the end of the world that he is trying to prevent or just the end of his world?

Wonderfully written with an amazing array of characters, this is an unforgettable story that takes the reader from the depths of despair to a place of healing and new-found hope. #OMG

I had a love-hate relationship with this book. I love the characters and the engaging and often hilarious story line, but, man, was it long. There were a lot of meanderings into "what-the-hell" territory, but I finally decided to look at it as several stories rolled into one. Like an entire season of a television series binge-watched in one sitting. And I ended up enjoying the book quite a lot.

The author has a wonderful writing style and I love that he has a large vocabulary and isn't afraid to use it. All in all, it is entertaining and funny and has a great cast of characters that take the reader on a zany, whacked-out adventure.

I had a love-hate relationship with this book. I love the characters and the engaging and often hilarious story line, but, man, was it long. There were a lot of meanderings into "what-the-hell" territory, but I finally decided to look at it as several stories rolled into one. Like an entire season of a television series binge-watched in one sitting. And I ended up enjoying the book quite a lot.

The author has a wonderful writing style and I love that he has a large vocabulary and isn't afraid to use it. All in all, it is entertaining and funny and has a great cast of characters that take the reader on a zany, whacked-out adventure.

Book 2 of the Fadeaway trilogy is just as stellar as the first. In this book, we follow Danny to Texas A&M where he is the only freshman in the starting lineup in over ten years. And this does not make him the most popular player on the team. As he starts his first year, he is just as determined to suppress and deny his sexuality as before; that is until he meets his Facebook fantasy, Sam Parker, face-to-face. Sam is immediately taken by how genuine and nerdy (and hot) the socially awkward basketball player is and Danny is drawn to Sam's outgoing personality and boldness in being out and proud. But out and proud is just not in the cards for Danny which makes a relationship with Sam impossibly difficult.

There are times you just want to shake both Danny and Sam for the things they do to each other, but that just highlights the hopeless obstacles gay players face in college and professional sports. Nobody ever tells a straight player that he can't play college sports if he is a man-slut, but throw a gay player into the mix and suddenly we need contract provisions addressing sexual deviancy. So Danny is left with trying to satisfy the normal emotional and sexual needs of a healthy young adult male while dealing with jealousies and racial tensions from fellow players in what is supposed to be a team sport.

This book is chock-full of wonderful characters. There is Danny's dad who works unfailingly to help Danny accept his sexuality. Saying that is an uphill battle is the understatement of the century, but fortunately Danny gets his stubborn streak from his dad. Nate is back as Danny's steadfast best friend, who makes a great member of the "it's ok if you're gay, Danny" team. And in this book, we meet Rod, Danny's agent who doesn't really care about Danny's sexuality but sees his job as keeping Danny on the basketball court. There are also a delicious array of evil antagonists who see their job as helping Danny derail his basketball career. And then there's Danny, who loves Sam, but does he love basketball more?

I love how the author gets down into the nitty-gritty of the game. The locker room rivalries and backstabbing teammates and the political posturing of athletic department bureaucrats and the propaganda/gossip machines that are sports reporting outlets.

An all-around great series for anyone who loves sports or if you just want to see the hoops we make people jump through to conform to artificial stereotypes.

Daniel Devin Monroe, basketball extraordinaire... gay, confused, basketball extraordinaire.

Life can be confusing when you lose your mother at five and you're left with a befuddled, twenty-three-year-old Marine dad to figure out this gig called parenthood, which at the best of times is a raging trial-and-error cluster$#*&. Toss in a son who begins to notice his growing attraction for boys at the ripe old age of eleven and life can get complicated, fast. Through a series of mixed signals, Danny begins to get the impression that being gay is not the way for a Marine's son to be. The one steady constant in his life, his touchstone, is his dad and he'd rather die than disappoint him. And so Danny does the only thing a devoted, loving son can do... he sets himself on a course to NOT be gay. His answer to that is to throw himself heart and soul into basketball.

In this first book of the Fadeaway series, we grow up with Danny. We live with his confusion, his insecurity, and his anger at himself for his inability to be "normal." John Goode does an amazing job of putting the reader right at the center of Danny's universe. We feel Danny's turmoil, pain, and frustration acutely. We laugh, we rage and scream, and we love right along with him.

But it wasn't just Danny that made this book such an amazing read. Turns out John Monroe, Danny's dad, is a pretty incredible stand-up kind of guy... what he lacks in communication skills, he more than makes up for in loving his son, just the way he is. And Nate, as Danny's big-brother best friend is a treasure for any young gay man trying to figure out life and how he fits in.

Read this book! You will laugh, you will cry, and you will fall in love with these characters. Walk in Danny's shoes as he engages in adolescent and teenage antics and experiences tragic events that threaten to derail his hopes and dreams. I'm diving headlong into book two... right now.

Daniel Devin Monroe, basketball extraordinaire... gay, confused, basketball extraordinaire.

Life can be confusing when you lose your mother at five and you're left with a befuddled, twenty-three-year-old Marine dad to figure out this gig called parenthood, which at the best of times is a raging trial-and-error cluster$#*&. Toss in a son who begins to notice his growing attraction for boys at the ripe old age of eleven and life can get complicated, fast. Through a series of mixed signals, Danny begins to get the impression that being gay is not the way for a Marine's son to be. The one steady constant in his life, his touchstone, is his dad and he'd rather die than disappoint him. And so Danny does the only thing a devoted, loving son can do... he sets himself on a course to NOT be gay. His answer to that is to throw himself heart and soul into basketball.

In this first book of the Fadeaway series, we grow up with Danny. We live with his confusion, his insecurity, and his anger at himself for his inability to be "normal." John Goode does an amazing job of putting the reader right at the center of Danny's universe. We feel Danny's turmoil, pain, and frustration acutely. We laugh, we rage and scream, and we love right along with him.

But it wasn't just Danny that made this book such an amazing read. Turns out John Monroe, Danny's dad, is a pretty incredible stand-up kind of guy... what he lacks in communication skills, he more than makes up for in loving his son, just the way he is. And Nate, as Danny's big-brother best friend is a treasure for any young gay man trying to figure out life and how he fits in.

Read this book! You will laugh, you will cry, and you will fall in love with these characters. Walk in Danny's shoes as he engages in adolescent and teenage antics and experiences tragic events that threaten to derail his hopes and dreams. I'm diving headlong into book two... right now.

Another great book from Rebekah Crane who also wrote The Odds of Loving Grover Cleveland, a book I absolutely adored. With this second book (which actually came before the first one I read), Rebekah Crane has become an auto-buy for me. Her characters always have a certain degree of quirk, but also possess a richness and depth that make them so real and draw the reader into their story.

I can't really say a lot about the book without giving things away, but suffice it to say that Aspen is a regular kid who blends into the background of high school until she is suddenly thrust into the forefront, quite literally by accident. She has a hilarious supporting cast of characters: A pot-smoking, free-loving hippie mom and two besties: Kim who throws the f-bomb around like confetti and Cass who is as obsessed with sex as any teen-aged boy who's never had any can be.

The book eloquently portrays how trauma can affect our perception of events and how the secrets we keep can compound that trauma. And how sharing our truths can heal and strengthen relationships.

Welcome to Camp Padau—‘Crazy Camp’ or, as the brochure proclaims, a camp for “kids with heightened mental or emotional states.” This book is a journey through the emotional landscape of kids who see the rough side of life far too early. Kids who have endured things that can and do break most of us at any age. I think this book put me in a heightened mental/emotional state as I went from fits of uncontrollable laughter to bouts of reading with tears rolling down my cheeks. And what an amazing experience it was.

The author has a smooth and easygoing writing style that gently pulls us along for the ride, occasionally slinging us into a wall of teenage emotions. The story is told from Zander’s POV—the girl who isn’t there for depression, or cutting, or suicidal tendencies, or an eating disorder, but because “my parents signed me up.” The truth is that the kids are there for any number of reasons, some because they have to be and some because they want to be.

There’s Grover Cleveland, a tall, lanky boy, named by a father who talks to dead presidents and who just so happens to have a fortuitous last name for christening his son appropriately. Grover is maddeningly captivating as a boy who lives his life by the odds… or maybe he’s just acknowledging them. And there’s Cassie, a girl who has spent her life shuffled from foster home to foster home who wears sarcasm and contempt like high tensile barbed wire to keep people from getting too close. And adorable Alex Trebek, the pudgy kid, who has a penchant for compulsive lying… except when it comes to love. It’s a wonderful cast of characters that will steal your heart, break it, and patch it back together again.

I can’t say it enough—read this book. It’s a journey. It’s life. We’re all broken and that’s okay, because we survive… sometimes against the odds.

Welcome to Camp Padau—‘Crazy Camp’ or, as the brochure proclaims, a camp for “kids with heightened mental or emotional states.” This book is a journey through the emotional landscape of kids who see the rough side of life far too early. Kids who have endured things that can and do break most of us at any age. I think this book put me in a heightened mental/emotional state as I went from fits of uncontrollable laughter to bouts of reading with tears rolling down my cheeks. And what an amazing experience it was.

The author has a smooth and easygoing writing style that gently pulls us along for the ride, occasionally slinging us into a wall of teenage emotions. The story is told from Zander’s POV—the girl who isn’t there for depression, or cutting, or suicidal tendencies, or an eating disorder, but because “my parents signed me up.” The truth is that the kids are there for any number of reasons, some because they have to be and some because they want to be.

There’s Grover Cleveland, a tall, lanky boy, named by a father who talks to dead presidents and who just so happens to have a fortuitous last name for christening his son appropriately. Grover is maddeningly captivating as a boy who lives his life by the odds… or maybe he’s just acknowledging them. And there’s Cassie, a girl who has spent her life shuffled from foster home to foster home who wears sarcasm and contempt like high tensile barbed wire to keep people from getting too close. And adorable Alex Trebek, the pudgy kid, who has a penchant for compulsive lying… except when it comes to love. It’s a wonderful cast of characters that will steal your heart, break it, and patch it back together again.

I can’t say it enough—read this book. It’s a journey. It’s life. We’re all broken and that’s okay, because we survive… sometimes against the odds.

Three teenagers… two who are fixable, and one who is not. Two boys—one who has never known caring, but feels its loss; one who has had it, lost it, and wonders if it’s worth the pain—and a girl who knows both caring and loss and wants to show them both that it’s worth everything.

Casper is a larger than life character who manages to push her close friends away—an attempt to save them from the pain of her loss, but finds herself adrift and lonely until she makes a connection with two boys seemingly as lost as she. Her bravery in the face of her illness is inspiring and her determination to make Vince and Adam come to appreciate things she has taken for granted is heartbreaking and life-changing for them both.

A very poignant and emotionally charged story which takes us on a journey through the full gamut of human emotion. You experience despair, abandonment, connection, loss, debilitating grief, and finally hope and love. And as the author says, what happens next is life.

This book was very hard to read at times as I became emotionally engaged with the characters, but it is definitely worth all the tears. Tissues are recommended. #OMG

Three teenagers… two who are fixable, and one who is not. Two boys—one who has never known caring, but feels its loss; one who has had it, lost it, and wonders if it’s worth the pain—and a girl who knows both caring and loss and wants to show them both that it’s worth everything.

Casper is a larger than life character who manages to push her close friends away—an attempt to save them from the pain of her loss, but finds herself adrift and lonely until she makes a connection with two boys seemingly as lost as she. Her bravery in the face of her illness is inspiring and her determination to make Vince and Adam come to appreciate things she has taken for granted is heartbreaking and life-changing for them both.

A very poignant and emotionally charged story which takes us on a journey through the full gamut of human emotion. You experience despair, abandonment, connection, loss, debilitating grief, and finally hope and love. And as the author says, what happens next is life.

This book was very hard to read at times as I became emotionally engaged with the characters, but it is definitely worth all the tears. Tissues are recommended. #OMG

This will always be one of my favorites!

This will always be one of my favorites!

Nachos and Hash is a very sweet novella exploring love at first sight between two young men who have absolutely nothing in common, other than their inexplicable mutual attraction. Darwin and Cody, the two main characters from opposite sides of the track, are both very genuine and likable, but I wish they had been more fully developed. The story tackles some very complex issues so, for me, it felt a bit rushed and it was hard to see Cody diving headlong into such extremely self-destructive behavior based on the provocations as presented in the story. His personality and his actions just didn’t sync with me.

That aside, the series has a number of interesting characters which have the potential for some entertaining future stories.