Tangled

Light, quick read.

This story is about four teenagers who all stayed at the Paradise resort with their respective mothers over spring break.

Jena and Skye are traveling together with their moms who are best friends.
The two girls couldn’t be more different. They aren’t so much friends as they are forced into social interactions because of their moms’ friendship.
Jena is introspective, kind and inexperienced with relationships. She feels insecure around Skye.
Skye is a couple years older, just broke up with her longtime boyfriend, is strikingly beautiful and an actress. She’s also struggling with depression.

Dakota and Owen are brothers.
Dakota is older, cooler and comes off as a lady’s man. He’s very good looking and people show more notice.
But he’s also mourning the death of his first serious girlfriend. Their relationship was so dramatic that even she thought he was a jerk occasionally. Her death has hit him hard.
Owen is attached to his computer at all times. He’s not great with interacting with the outside world. He’s nervous around girls but puts his thoughts on his blog.

The story begins as the teenagers’ paths cross, to varying degrees, while they are staying at Paradise.
The story continues by giving each character their own story to narrate. They each cover a month of the story.

I liked this storytelling technique because it gave the author the chance to make the characters more well rounded than they were in someone else’s story.

Each one, rightfully so, is the lead character of their own story.
I think Dakota and Skye would have been much less likable characters had they only appeared in Jena’s story. And Owen became a much bigger story when he was telling it himself.

A nice, light, quick read. show less

Paradise wasn't supposed to suck.Not the state of being, but a resort in the Caribbean. Jena, Dakota, Skye, and Owen are all there for different reasons, but at Paradise their lives become tangled together in ways none of them can predict. Paradise will change them all. It will change Jena, whose first brush with romance takes her that much closer to having a life, and not just reading about those infinitely cooler and more exciting.It will change Dakota, who needs the devastating truth about his past to make him realize that he doesn't have to be a jerk just because people think he's one.It will change Skye, a heartbreakingly beautiful actress, who must come to terms with the fact that for once she has to stop playing a role or face show more the consequences.And it will change Owen, who has never risked anything before and who will take the leap from his online life to a real one all because of a girl he met at Paradise. . . . From confused to confident and back again, one thing's certain: Four months after it all begins, none of them will ever be the same. show less

In theory, this is the kind of book I dream about. It explores the connections between people that they aren’t fully aware of, and I love that idea. However, this book fell a little bit short of my expectations for it. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy it, but it definitely didn’t captivate me like I thought it would.
Let me first say that it was so refreshing to read a book in which some of the main characters were average. Jena and Owen weren’t knockout gorgeous, but neither were they grotesque; they weren’t particularly witty and clever, but they weren’t dull. They were run-of-the-mill teenagers, living life with a small number of good friends and a lot of people who just don’t get them. To me, that’s real, and I applaud show more Mackler for focusing on those of us who are “normal”, and making it work (because that’s kinda hard to do).
I did enjoy focusing a section of the book on each of the four characters, though I’ll admit that I found it disorienting at the beginning of each section. While I liked watching the characters grow, I found Dakota’s to be a little too quick and easy. I do think that he would eventually come to the place where he ended up, but it seemed to be a bit too soon for him. I almost felt that he hadn’t grappled enough with what he learned. I can concede that it’s possible there was struggling that wasn’t on-page, but I would have bought into his transformation if I’d been able to see some of that.
Because each character had a distinct voice, it was fairly easy to figure out early on in each narrative who the character was. Mackler did a tremendous job with the characterization of both girls, moving Jena from annoyingly whiny and Skye from annoyingly snooty first impressions. Both of them had to go through some pretty disappointing experiences in order to come to a deeper understanding of their true selves. I was left with the impression that they had made permanent, measureable growth by the last page.
I’m not sure exactly what it was about the story, but I closed the book feeling rather indifferent about it. It wasn’t bad, but I wasn’t particularly drawn to it, either. It was okay. I think it lacked the emotional intensity I had wanted to get out of the story, so even though I liked where the characters ended up, I felt a little let down at the same time. show less

I tend to be wary of stories that have alternating viewpoints between more than two characters - it's so easy for things to get confusing and disjointed. However, I should have known that Carolyn Mackler would handle it well. She has a gift for telling young adult stories that feel so natural and real. That's what i remember loving about Love and Other Four-Letter Words when I was in high school, and that's what i love this time around about Tangled.

Jena is the lovable girl-next-door type with a generally cheerful disposition and a hold on the last dregs of childhood innocence. Her desire to be liked, as both a friend and a romantic interest, is relatable and makes her one of the characters that you want most to end up happy.

Dakota, on show more the other hand, was harder to love. His initial ego, attitude and behavior made him close to irredeemable. It's when we see him recognize this for himself, on top of struggling with familial and social issues, that he shows how much more substance there is to him.

Sky is sort of an ice queen, but when her turn to narrate comes it's immediately understandable why. Her problems are the more difficult for her to deal with, thanks to her acting career and a stage mother in denial. Her story is, perhaps, the most poignant of the bunch.

Owen, like Jena, is one of those kids that you want to root for. He just wants to measure up and his difficulty with that causes him to hide behind his computer. When his mom throws him to the wolves at this program for teens addicted to a Facebook-like site, we get the funniest moments in the story and a way for him to bond more with his increasingly less distant brother, Dakota.

Tangled is a very worthwhile read...
To continue reading this review, head to my blog The Eclectic Book Lover. show less

A one-week spring break vacation at the Caribbean resort Paradise affects the lives of four very different teenagers. Self-conscious Jena learns which guys are and are not worth it; playboy Dakota begins to realize how much of a misogynistic jerk he’s been; teen actress Skye must come to terms with her past and the fact that it may all be an act for her; and reclusive Owen may at least be ready to come out from behind his computer and meet the girl who’s changed his life.

Veteran talent reigns supreme in this intriguing blend of four short stories. Carolyn Mackler shows that she can make any story idea win over her old and new fans with TANGLED.

The four teens’ stories interlap only slightly, but remarkably each one is well defined show more and strong reads in and of themselves. Jena, Dakota, Skye, and Owen are all flawed, yet their flaws are endearing and human instead of the consequences of shoddy writing. As a result, we are easily able to delve into the minds of these four.

I was surprised at, but not put off by, how little the four stories were actually interconnected. The first three stories end rather abruptly and incompletely, and it’s not until reading the final story (Owen’s) that we realize how these four characters are supposed to have been affected by one another. The “tangles” are tentative at best, but overall TANGLED is still appealing due to its masterful writing.

Longtime Carolyn Mackler fans like me should not hesitate to pick this one up, while those new to Mackler’s works will be able to appreciate her talent. TANGLED is good for a sweet and lighthearted read. show less

This story was a lot different than I expected, both in good ways and bad. I felt like the book jacket summary made it sound like Paradise was the setting for the story, though only Jena's bit took place there. I also felt like the POV kept switching just as stuff was getting good and deep for a character. Specifically Skye, who I had just started to like, and then Poof! It's on to another character. I would have liked more first-hand telling of people's lives, because it sounded awkward for Owen to explain how Jena knew Dakota, and for Jena to explain what happened to Skye to Owen in his section. I don't know, it was on the verge of being a really great story, but it felt really choppy.

Scratching another book off my own tbr pile, this book took me by surprise.
1. Point of views. This story contain four short point of views of big changes in their lives. Some changes are good while other are good. It’s clear that in the end, they all learn a lesson.
2. Graphic. Since this is YA book I didn’t expect it to be so graphic. Still it had some adult humor in it that made me snicker.
3. Tangled. Just like the title, all of their lives crash violently together to come together for something bigger. They all have a part of each other lives that needed to weave so that they can grow and learn.
4. Taking chances. It clears that all of these teens live hard, fast lives. Taking chances on bad things, they all had to learn to take a show more chance on something good for once. Even if it means making drastic changes.
5. More. At the end of the story, it came together so wonderfully that I wanted more. I loved Jena’s story and I’m glad that she got a happy ending. I’m still interested in learning what happens to the rest of the characters.
Tangled is great book. Raw and exciting, I can’t wait to read more by this author. A great summer read that will leave you wanting more, Tangled is daring. show less