yolo

August 18, 2014
The girls from Myracle's Internet Girls series are starting college and an array of new adventures. Bubbly Angela is pledging a sorority at the University of Georgia, quiet Zoe is trying to keep long-distance love alive at Kenyon College in Ohio, and daring Maddie heads west to UC Santa Cruz, where she makes her longtime best friends promise to "try everything that comes our way, and we won't be afraid, because even tho we're spread out all over the country, we're still here to support each other." Myracle employs the same instant messaging formula of the earlier books, though there are some smart updates, including references to autocorrect and Instagram, and a topical issue as Angela struggles with whether Greek life is for her, especially after stopping a rape at a fraternity Halloween party. Not all the plot points are completely plausible, but these memorable friends remain highly relatable as they share racy details about their lives, call each other out for bad behavior, and are there to help each other "through dark time." Ages 13âup. Agent: Barry Goldblatt, Barry Goldblatt Literary.

July 15, 2014
Instant-messaging champs Maddie, Angela and Zoe return to hash out their first year away at respective colleges in this fourth installment of Myracle's popular series that began with ttyl (2004). Geographically speaking, the trio has some serious distance separating them. Thoughtful, reserved Zoe is enthralled with her classes at Kenyon in Ohio, even as she misses her boyfriend, Doug. At the University of Georgia, fashion-conscious Angela contends with a freaky roommate who seems to be stealing her stuff while she pledges to a sorority, causing her to become increasingly unsure about the Greek system. And confident Maddie, usually the one who takes charge, finds herself the odd girl out with her suitemates at the University of California at Santa Cruz. As in the first three books, the entirety of this novel is written as texts and instant messages among the young women. While there are a few instances in which this format feels a little forced-usually when a character requires more than two or three lines to sum things up-it remains an incredibly appealing narrative device. The friends' honesty with one another, even about things like embarrassing sexual experiences and depression, is lifelike (and heartwarming, to boot), and their jargon-"fugly," "ex-fucking-scuse me?"-will ring true to many a teen reader.Funny, deceptively smart and just in time for those going off to college. (Fiction. 14-20)

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September 1, 2014

Gr 9 Up-Maddie, Angela, and Zoe are beginning their biggest adventure yet-college-and they are doing it on their own. They encounter many challenges-failure, drunkenness, heartbreak, and successes- and ultimately discover their true friends. Maddie embraces the California lifestyle and is assigned to a suite with three other girls referred to as the "Esbees" because they are from Santa Barbara. Maddie tries hard to find her niche within this group, but soon becomes aware of how challenging it is to be accepted into an already-established social circle. In the first few months of college, Maddie is almost unable to continue with the yolo (you only live once) mission especially when her parents can't afford to fly her home for Thanksgiving break. Angela enters college drawn to the Greek lifestyle of partying, fraternity socials and the appeal of belonging but sees that she may not agree with all of the initiation rituals and the unwritten rules. Through her association with the Zeta's, she finds herself in some questionable situations and one specifically alters the rest of her college choices. Zoe decides to attend a liberal college and try a long-distance relationship with her boyfriend, Doug but realizes that they have both moved on. After overcoming her depression, she also learns that she loves to run to release stress, and she experiments with her sexuality. Zoe faces failure in a creative writing class when a professor does not recommend her to keep moving through the program, but she is not discouraged. Told in Internet-age style of text messages and tweets first seen in Myracle's ttyl (Abrams, 2004), the girls try to embrace the free-spirited yolo philosopy as they grow into their young adulthood.-Jessica Lorentz Smith, Bend Senior High School, OR

Copyright 2014 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2014
Grades 10-1 *Starred Review* Best high-school friends Angela, Maddie, and Zoe have graduated and are off to different universities. Maintaining the characters, voices, and accessible replication of text and instant messaging as the narrative mode, Myracle succeeds in showing resonant and varied views of the first semester of college. Angela, who has stayed in Georgia, pursues sorority acceptance. Zoe, in Ohio, has a bad breakup but finds an emerging sense of her internal strength. Maddie, lonely in California, hides her own troubles from her old friends by getting them through the vagaries of their new lives with the rallying cry of you only live once. Myracle manages to portray depth in all those messages: the friends acknowledge their incipient racism, openly discuss sexual experimentation, and help each other through such misadventures as harboring a homeless man, feeling domestic alienation, and enduring a professor's soul-crushing put-down. This honest, nuanced, accessible, and credible account provides teen girls with an authentic and skillfully told description of college life. The story, which can stand independently from the rest of the Internet Girls series, offers readers realistic, engaging, and provocative perspectives on scary first semesters away from home and sage advice about drinking, partying, and shutting down socially, all without ever leaving the perfectly crafted text-message flow. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Myracle's Internet Girls series made the New York Times best-seller list, and those fans will want to know how Zoe, Maddie, and Angela handle college.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)