Title: Two Way Street
Author: Lauren Barnholdt
First published: 2007
Recommended for: YA romance & chick-lit fans, teens
Date read: 16-17 Nov 2012
Rating: 4.5/5
This book was awesome! Instead of just reading about Courtney and Jordan’s road trip you get to be part of it, and read details about their from both points of views, as well as reading about their life before and after the trip. By telling the reader the past and the present, Barnholdt gives us a really creative way of completely telling Courtney and Jordan’s story. However, I also want to note that despite reading from a girl and boy’s point of view, it does still feel to be a female-oriented story.
I really did like both of the protagonists, Courtney is sarcastic yet a bit of a goody two shoes, however not really boring and you still love her for her strength and self-respect. It’s was good to experience Jordan’s development throughout the book, from basically being a bit of an a-hole and avoiding real relationships of any kind with people, including his parents, to him and Courtney not only having a romantic relationship, but seeing their initial friendship develop. I really loved all the angsty romance throughout the novel.
I was intrigued the whole novel and I definitely didn’t expect the events to play out as they did. I thought this might be a book where the ending is obvious, and although most of the storyline was predictable, you didn’t expect things to play out as they did. I thought I worked out one answer in the second chapter, I thought I was spot on, all the clues for my prediction were there, but I was completely off! I also found this book quite funny and the characters thought and emotions quite realistic. I especially enjoyed all the comment about Myspace, as in the novel it’s cool to have Myspace, and obviously today, it’s not.
I would give this book a 5/5, but the ending scene really disappointed and annoyed me. It was so inconclusive and just left things. There was so many things that were left unresolved or needed to be explored deeper. It feels like there needs to be a sequel.
Despite, the ending, I did enjoy this novel and am looking forward to reading more books from Lauren Barnholdt (and hopefully one of those could be a sequel to this book, it really needs one!)!
between the covers 