The Sun is Also a Star
Nicola Yoon
2016, 384 pages
Young Adult Fiction
This is the book for the hopeless romantic. It chronicles Daniel and Natasha’s love story from just before they meet until they part ways with broken hearts. Yoon explores hope, love, logic, science, God, race, nationality, immigration and possibility over the course of one incredible day. The narrative style is quite creative: Daniel and Natasha each tell their sides of the story from a first-person perspective, but we also get to hear the points of view of Daniel and Natasha’s family members, a store clerk, a security guard and almost everyone else the two main characters encounter throughout the day. We even hear from dictionaries and history books!
The love story is both deliciously real and unbelievably impossible. The chemistry between the two teens is clear, but the writing remains appropriate for young adolescents as well as teens and adults. The entire story plays on the idea that chance and happenstance are the only reason that anything happens in life, and that the most amazing (and most tragic) moments in our lives are not something we can see coming.
Cheri Hardy Concord Public Library
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