Hit play and enjoy one of my favorite songs at the moment.  While I have a different version for my Itunes, I find this one simply breathe taking.

Last night, after the thunder storm woke me up, I was tempted to write this post but decided to put it off and try my best to sleep.  While that failed, I was able to think about what I could write about and decided it's going to be the first of that some of my favorite things.  This one is going to be about books because I'm a huge nerd and want to share my favorite books slash write about my favorite author.  While the author is for young adults, I found her while I was a teenager and still get excited when she has a new book out.

Sarah Dessen.  Probably the single author from my youth that I will be reading no matter my age as long as she keeps publishing books.  I don't remember when I started to read her books, sometime back in high school, but I feel in love.  In the beginning, I noticed a trend in the material she wrote.  Some of her earlier books were about girls who entered bad relationships.  While I don't have any experience with that, you could not help falling in love with the characters and wanting to shield them from all the pain that these relationships caused them.  Sarah's writing has progressed throughout the years.  I'm happy to say she publishes about a book a year and I often go back to reread them.  One of the great things about being a loyal reader is she inserts some of her older characters into her newer books.  

While I love all her books, This Lullaby and The Truth About Forever the most.  Funny story is I wrote about This Lullaby in one of my college courses junior year.  I honestly can not say enough good things about her books.  While all her characters are often seniors in high school, I still can not help remember going through all the emotions they did back while I was in high school.

Now this book?  I reread it at least once every six to eight months.  This is hands down my favorite book.  Could it be because it takes place during that magical time of summer?  Possibly.  Actually, that is probably a very high likelihood.  This book is amazing, from the relationships Ann makes so realistically to the struggles that the main character, Alice, faces when she has finally become an adult and must face relationships with childhood friends and a sister who does not want to grow up.  While I read it, I longed to have the summers of traveling to an island, like Fire Island in the book or a vacation spot of the Cape, where you have a whole different life.  Now that I think about it though, I sort of have that with my Milford family, but that's a story for another time.  This book I highly recommend; I was sold after seeing the cover (hello the beach!) but fell in love with all the characters, Alice, Riley and Paul.  Its a great book for the summer, and for all the people who are like me who believe the summer is a very special time.