YA Contemporary Month: The Secret Year

Congrats to the winner of last's week's giveaway:

SIDRAH!!!

It's in the mail. :) (Or at least it will be as soon as Amazon wakes up. It's about 6 am in that part of the world. lol)

It's YA Contemporary Month (thanks to The Contemps). Every Thursday this month, there will be a YA contemporary book up for grabs. It's international and open to anyone! Good luck!

Today's offering: THE SECRET YEAR by Jennifer Hubbard.

From Goodreads:

Take Romeo and Juliet. Add The Outsiders. Mix thoroughly.

Colt and Julia were secretly together for an entire year, and no one—not even Julia's boyfriend— knew. They had nothing in common, with Julia in her country club world on Black Mountain and Colt from down on the flats, but it never mattered. Until Julia dies in a car accident, and Colt learns the price of secrecy. He can't mourn Julia openly, and he's tormented that he might have played a part in her death. When Julia's journal ends up in his hands, Colt relives their year together at the same time that he's desperately trying to forget her. But how do you get over someone who was never yours in the first place?

I'm embarrassed to admit that this book has been sitting in my bookshelf since it came out. I've picked it up and put it back down several times, because I didn't want to read another sad book about death. I only picked it up last night because of this contest. And then I practically inhaled the book. I'd forgotten the meaning of "page-turner". In fact, this book is so gripping that I took it to class last night and my colleague got thoroughly absorbed in it. In the middle of class!

The summary does a good job of summarising the novel,so I'm just going to share a few points.

5 (not-so) Secrets about THE SECRET YEAR.

1. A boy narrates. WIN!

2. Sex. But not gratuitous. Or vilified. Or glorified. Just another fact of life.

3. It's more about the person who died, than the death itself.

4. Class distinctions.

5. It's about love. All types.

To enter:
Tell us in the comments, did you ever have a secret from the whole world? How did you handle it? (Don't worry, you don't have to tell us the secret!)
Open to everyone, internationally.
Entries close Wednesday at 11.59 pm EST.