Book Review: Second Star - Alyssa B. Sheinmel

Pub. Date- May 13th 2014 Publisher- Farrar, Straus and Giroux

 Pages- 256 Genre- Contemporary/Young Adult 

Goodreads - Book Depository

I received this courtesy of Farrar, Straus and Giroux through

NetGalley in return for an honest review.

A twisty story about love, loss, and lies, this contemporary oceanside adventure is tinged with a touch of dark magic as it follows seventeen-year-old Wendy Darling on a search for her missing surfer brothers. Wendy’s journey leads her to a mysterious hidden cove inhabited by a tribe of young renegade surfers, most of them runaways like her brothers. Wendy is instantly drawn to the cove’s charismatic leader, Pete, but her search also points her toward Pete's nemesis, the drug-dealing Jas. Enigmatic, dangerous, and handsome, Jas pulls Wendy in even as she's falling hard for Pete. A radical reinvention of a classic, Second Star is an irresistible summer romance about two young men who have yet to grow up--and the troubled beauty trapped between them.

Retellings have quickly become the hot new thing in the YA world and I’m a completely loving it. One of the first retellings that I read this year was this Second Star, a Peter Pan retelling. Set in the beautiful Californian beach side this book follows Wendy Darling, who to put it simply, sets out to find her younger brothers that have been missing for months. While looking for them she stumbles upon a community of young surfers who are all runaways and makes some terrible choices.

I’ve had a lot of trouble writing this review because there were a lot of elements to this book that I didn’t enjoy versus the few I did. The writing had some of the most beautiful and descriptive sentences I’ve read in a while but it just didn’t fit and made it hard to connect to anything was happening. I was honestly expecting to see ‘it was all a dream' that’s how unrealistic everything was.

So lets get onto the absolute worst part of this book, why not bite the bullet and get it over with. Wendy was one of the stupidest, messed up characters I’ve ever had the sadness to read about. She had the worst morals ever (THAT SHE BROKE A LOT), planned nothing and to finish it off she had a serious case of insta-love not once but twice.

To break down my list of Wendy hate a little here is what she did that drove me get seriously over her. Wendy starts off believing Jas is the big bad wolf for selling drugs but it’s all cool for Pete to steal from families just like hers. Wendy also at multiple times talks about how the drugs ruin people but then she takes them with question. Someone please explain to this reasoning?

Wendy’s plan on how to find her brothers was just down right moronic, usually when you lose someone generally you look around, find where they last were, ask questions and most importantly actually look for them. Not Wendy, she finds a cove full of young surfers and instantly falls in love with the leader of them Pete but then has a falling out with him and falls in love with big bad wolf Jas. The insta-love, what can I say about it other than it was horrible? If Wendy hadn’t of fallen in love with Pete, then the time could have been put in to make her relationship with Jas. He had the makings of being the bad boy love interest which seems to drives the girl nuts.

My final problems with this book were the ending and the mystery, I can’t say much about either without spoiling the book if you still want to read it but both were so poorly done I could bash my head against the wall.  All up if I wouldn't purchase this book for myself or a friend unless they had a crazy love of Peter Pan that would let them look pass all the things that drove me nuts.

Have you read this? Let me know what you think of it down below.