You Are Here

So this will be the fourth book I've read by Jennifer E. Smith and considering she only has 6 books out, and I have yet to dislike one, I think that's pretty good don't you?. While it may not be my favourite, that title goes to The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, it still was fluffy an cute and all things we come to expect while reading a book by Jennifer.

This lovey story is set around two neighbors, Emma and Peter. Both very different from their family, both hoping for what the other has. Not long before her seventieth birthday, Emma stumbles upon a box in the attic, at the bottom of the box she finds a birth and death certificate belonging to her a twin brother she never knew she had. Emma finally thinks she found show more whats been missing. She decides to go on a road trip to visit her brothers grave in the town she was born, and after losing her mode of transport, calls Peter and ask's him to come to her rescue and help her continue her trip, although she doesn't explain what it is or why she's desperate to do it, he agree's, more than happy to get away from home himself.

You Are Here is written like any other of Jennifer E. Smiths books, by the end of the book you feel like you know the main characters inside out and sometimes , the sub characters too. She creates enough back story for you to really get a feel for them and enough of the present for you to slowly fall in love with them. The only thing I didn't like about this book was the fact that it seemed to drag a bit, and though it was developed nicely, I didn't seem to feel the romance. Unlike her other books I have read, I think she would have been much better making this story about friendship instead of a budding relationship. One thing I did like about this book was how they understood each other without words, the connection they have runs much deeper than they thought, and the road trip just opened both their eyes to the person who was always there for them

You Are Here wasn't perfect, but a mark of a good book is accepting the flaws but being able to see past them and enjoy the book anyway. I know lots of other people are tired of the road trip story line in YA books but I happened to really enjoy it and although I loved the chapters where they visited battlefields, I think more could have been done to make them fun as they were the times in the story that dragged for me.

Overall I enjoyed it, like already stated it wasn't my favourite but it was still a really lovely story about friendship, family and first love. The love aspect to the story didn't overshadow everything else, it was subtle and part of me thinks that's why I thought they were better of as friends. For those of you who have read and loved her others books, if you are going to pick this up do not expect an emotional roller coaster when it comes to the romance , its there just done in a different way to the others :) show less

Back in 2008 I read Jennifer E. Smith’s The Comeback Season which probably made it to my best of 2008 list. Since I hadn’t really followed Smith after that, I was surprised to stumble upon her latest book, You Are Here. I was not disappointed. As a matter of fact, I highly recommend it.

Peter and Emma are next door neighbors in upstate New York. They are more similar than they are different. Their birthdays are days apart. Both are loners, but for different reasons. Both feel like they don’t fit into their families. Both are missing someone in their lives; Emma a twin brother who died days after birth and who she found out about a few days earlier and Peter, a mother who died giving birth to him. Neither family talks about the show more missing persons.

Emma hatches a plan to visit North Carolina, where she was born and where her brother, Thomas, is buried. It involves a few steps: go back to New York with her older brother Patrick after his 4th of July visit, “borrow” his car and drive to North Carolina, stopping off in Washington, D.C. to visit her sister Annie, visit Nate, her brother who lives in the house she was born in and visit Thomas’ grave. As with all impromptu road trips, something goes wrong. In this case, Patrick’s car dies at a rest stop on the New Jersey turnpike. So, Emma calls the only friend she has, Peter, who for reasons of his own, is in the mood for a road trip as well.

Smith’s writing is descriptive. She so aptly describes the relationship between Emma and Peter, friends sort of at the start of the trip, the long bouts of silence as they drive, the awkward attempts at forming a relationship, the insecurities. She populates You Are Here with great characters, best of which is the 3-legged dog that adopts Emma. Peter’s father and Emma’s family are real people with personalities. They deal with their grief in much the same way, a way that does not suit Emma and Peter. Their exploits are fun and interesting . The ending is emotional.

OK, I do have one criticism though. The road trip takes place in two Mustangs and the cover photo is a Cadillac. Hey, what’s with that, Jennifer???

Smith has a readable, enjoyable way about her writing and her stories. You can’t go wrong by reading The Comeback Season and You Are Here. show less

Full review on Reader's Dialogue: http://readersdialogue.blogspot.com/2013/03/you-are-here.html

Peter and Emma are both misfits, but both of them don't realize just how much of their own doing this is. Peter at least has some sense of his problems in a wider context - he keeps responding to Emma's complaints about her family that "most families are like that." But Emma is safely ensconced in her misery in thinking that she is the most unfortunate person in the world because she doesn't fit into her family. By the end of the book, by the end of their journey, they both learn - with a lot of mishaps and starts-and-stops - how to break out of the cycle of loneliness they've built around themselves.

Emma ends up being a lovable but show more self-centered character. You root for her even when she is making the most selfish decisions, even when she uses Peter for days at a time, never once stopping to think about his life, wrapped up in her own woes. You wonder at times why Peter likes her, what he sees in her - but by the end of the journey, you understand why he likes her. As he says, he knows her. And of course, by the end Emma changes and begins to see the world around her, not just herself.

Peter's quirkiness is immediately endearing. His obsession with maps seems strange and possibly OCD-ish at first, but I quickly came to understand what it stands for, what it's symbolic of, and began rooting for him too. His journey is much more subtle than Emma's, but it's maybe even more moving. Emma sees her family in a different light, but Peter begins to see himself in a different light.

That's what I love most about this book. It's not only about finding and understanding love. It's also about finding and understanding yourself - like stumbling across the signs that say "You are here." show less

[he] understood the opposite of lost was: that it had nothing to do with maps or direction or stay on course; that is was, in fact, nothing more than being found"

Emma - quirky family with siblings that range in ages. her parents are professors at colleges and spend their time from college to college roaming the US. They have finally settled, now that only Emma remains in the house. She's never felt like she fit in. She's not intelectual, not a huge fan of school - and when she always wanted balloons and silly cake for her birthday, she's always gotten books of poems and other scholarly works.

Peter - the neighbor next door. he's been raised by his Police officer father, but really they just co-habitate the same space. Having never known show more his mom, he's never been anywhere - but has a love of maps and GPS coordinates. Anything that is not "this is where you are" - anything away from where he is.

although they've casually known each other for years, Emma and Peter aren't what you'd call friends. Until the chance of fate in the form of a broken down car, a 3 legged dog - and the need to find something that's lost - all these things bring them together on a road trip to find what they didn't even know was missing.

It's a very touching story. Emma is pretty stubborn & selfish, silent and moody. Peter is equally stubborn, silent & moody. But after long hours in the car with a dog it's easy to see where, although they seem so different - underneath they aren't so different after all.

I thought Peter was a great! he was stubborn and a little moody - but he was also so sweet. He tried so hard to think of Emma and how she might be feeling. But he wasn't a pushover. And when things started to go awry, he was strong enough to make the tough decisions (even if they may not have been the right ones).
this was such a touching story. show less

I love road trip books, and especially road trip books with a deeper story to them, this one did not disappoint. It was well written, funny and engaging. I found from very early on that the characters, especially Peter, were very likeable.
I loved how this book focused a lot on family dynamics, even though the bulk of it takes place away from their families.
It was a great read.

From Simon & Schuster:

"Emma and Peter are alike in a lot of ways. They are both lonely in a way that they really only mind once in a while. They both come from families that they don't quite understand. And they both feel like something big is missing from their lives. So this summer they are off to find something. For Emma, it is a grave, a grave that may be her only connection to her family. For Peter it is harder to define, but perhaps easier to navigate. It is a freedom, a sense of something more than what he has now. So off they go, searching for what we all search for; something to make sense of who they are where they come from."


If you are looking to read something at a relaxed pace then this is the book for you.

Emma Healey show more comes from a family of intellectuals that leaves her feeling so completely ordinary. One day she accidentally discovers a birth certificate for her twin brother followed by a death certificate dated 2 days later. In an instant, it all makes sense to her why she’s felt like the odd man out. Now she’s determined to visit her brother’s grave to feel a connection to something, to someone.

Peter Finnegan is the neighbor who has always wanted to be a part of Emma’s family. Her parents have always welcomed him as one of their own which is in stark contrast to his relationship with his widower father. Peter’s penchant for maps of all kinds and his aversion to anything sports-related only widens the distance between them. Feeling stifled and misunderstood he dreams of leaving town and exploring the world with his maps in tow.

The opportunity comes when Emma calls him out of the blue to rescue her after her car breaks down on her way to North Carolina to visit her brother’s grave. She invites Peter to join her and he seizes the chance to tag along. The two sit comfortably in silence, lost in their own thoughts. Peter never questions why Emma's motivation for going to North Carolina and Emma indulges Peter’s fascination with visiting all the old battlefields during their journey.

Once they begin to open up, each one offers the other a perspective they haven’t considered in regards to their own circumstances. Peter who feels his father has never understood him wishes that his dad would share memories of his mother with him. Instead his father finds fault with his need to escape from their life and go to college elsewhere. Emma tries to convince him that his dad loves him in his own way, “The thing about parents is that you always just assume they’re supposed to be good at their jobs, because they’re parents. But they’re usually not.” Being a parent myself, that sentiment resonated with me.

Meanwhile, Emma feels betrayed that no one has ever told her about her dead twin brother. She has felt that there was a missing piece all this time and blames her family for it. Peter calls her on this pointing out that there have been plenty of times where she has enjoyed the advantages of being “different" from her siblings and parents. As the journey moves forward, Emma learns more about her family and the impact her brother's death had on them. There's a very moving scene with Emma and her older sister, Annie that narrows the gap between them.

I really enjoyed reading about Emma and Peter - Peter especially. He's so uniquely introspective that it's hard to imagine what Emma would have been like making the road trip on her own. He helps draw her out of her shell. Both of them come to some self-realization about their own flaws and mature into wise young individuals. They gain a new understanding of the people they love most and know that despite what they had believed before, they are certainly not alone.

- Bel

www.bibliojunkies.blogspot.com show less

Sixteen-year-old Emma Healy has never felt like she belonged in her family full of professors, geniuses, and success stories. While her much older siblings went on to college and careers, Emma kept to herself, dreaming of “normal” birthday parties and conversations that didn’t revolve around obscure literary figures.

Emma’s neighbor, Peter Finnigan, is a Civil War-obsessed nerd who wishes he had a family like the Healys. Instead, it’s just him and his cop father, forever separated and at odds by the taboo subject of Peter’s mother, who died giving birth to him. When Emma discovers a birth and death certificate for a twin brother she never knew she once had, it’s as if she suddenly feels complete. This discovery leads Emma show more and Peter to take a road trip from New York State to North Carolina to visit Emma’s brother’s grave, but what they discover is not grief and loneliness, but rather togetherness in all senses of the word.

Jennifer Smith certainly knows how to write. At the end of the book, we know Emma and Peter inside out. Neither one is without flaws, but all of their complexities, worries, passions, and dialogue simply sing through the pages. Jennifer is in real command of the language here.

I think that the book’s weak point, the one thing that made me not like the book as much as I would’ve wanted to like it, was its plot. Road trips are a pretty common plot in YA lit, and so it’s hard to redo the age-old plot without falling into a rut. Emma and Peter’s road trip, while completely realistic, was also unfortunately not very exciting or engaging. Never mind the fact that this book has a strong message: family is not just about similarities, but also about staying together despite the differences. It’s a great message…provided you don’t get lost along the way.

Overall, however, YOU ARE HERE is far from being a bad and unenjoyable book. Jennifer Smith is definitely a strong writer whose talent deserves to get noticed. Readers who enjoy character-driven books will like YOU ARE HERE, and for those of us looking for a faster-paced read, well, you’re going to have to wait for another book. show less