Review: The Moon and More

Goodreads Summary: Luke is the perfect boyfriend: handsome, kind, fun. He and Emaline have been together all through high school in Colby, the beach town where they both grew up. But now, in the summer before college, Emaline wonders if perfect is good enough.

Enter Theo, a super-ambitious outsider, a New Yorker assisting on a documentary film about a reclusive local artist. Theo's sophisticated, exciting, and, best of all, he thinks Emaline is much too smart for Colby.

Emaline's mostly-absentee father, too, thinks Emaline should have a bigger life, and he's convinced that an Ivy League education is the only route to realizing her potential. Emaline is attracted to the bright future that Theo and her father promise. But she also clings to the deep roots of her loving mother, stepfather, and sisters. Can she ignore the pull of the happily familiar world of Colby?

Emaline wants the moon and more, but how can she balance where she comes from with where she's going?

Sarah Dessen's devoted fans will welcome this story of romance, yearning, and, finally, empowerment. It could only happen in the summer.

The Moon and More wasn't your typical Sarah Dessen novel. This is one of those things that really stood out to me as I was reading it. Though it started off as one and I felt myself slipping into that familiar grove, somewhere along the lines it veered and went in a completely new direction.  

I loved the family, I loved that there was so much family. In all honesty I wish we could have spent more time with them, I was always smiling in the scenes when Emaline was home or at work where she was in constant motion with the lot of them. For having spent little time with them, at least in comparison to what I craved, they are really developed functioning people. And great to have Emaline bouncing off of. I felt the same way about her good friends, Morris and Daisy. Sarah Dessen really has a knack for writing memorable characters.

For those of you who are super fangirls of Dessen, I count myself amongst your numbers, then you will be happy to know that she continues her grand tradition of having cameos of characters past. How could she not though, really? We're back in Colby after all. So for those of you stressing you will see some familiar faces, and hear mentions of others. 

I loved that there wasn't a happy ending in the traditional sense for everyone and everything, though I won't say any more on that so as to not give anything away. Just be sure to keep an open mind and enjoy, Sarah Dessen seldom (if ever) steers you wrong.