Books, Movies, and Chinese Food

Summary from Christianbook .com: What would YOU do if you had to make a life altering decision? Would you stand your ground and choose a path that follows your belief? Or would you give in to peer pressure to avoid rejection? With this 2 in 1 book you are given the opportunity to do just that. In High Stakes, Amber and Brittany are best friends but now they're in competition with each other. Whoever has the best grades and perfect attendance is able to win a brand new car! Amber wants to win so badly, especially since her father got laid off and money has been really tight. But when Amber cheats on a test and Brittany gets blamed for it, will Amber own up to it or let Brittany take the fall? You decide and discover the life-altering consequences. In Essence of Lilly, Lilly will do anything to avoid being at him, including making up youth group events to hang out with her boyfriend Jason. But when Jason wants her to lie to her parents about an overnight church retreat so she can st...

Kate Walker joins the swim team and becomes obsessed with practice and making it through the championships with flying colors. What will Kate do when she s faced with pressure from her teammates to take an illegal substance that will help her swim multiple events in their championship meet? This book was another major improvement in the series that targets an older audience. And it's a move I really appreciated. Kate is a regular teen girl who's looking to find something to fill her spare time and that thing happens to be swimming. She's a natural at it and even at her best is better than the top swimmers already on the team. However in this day and age of competitive pressure, your natural best is not good enough. How Kate gets sucked into a downward spiral happened naturally. For the record, I don't drink energy drinks but that's purely because I can't stand the taste. I'll drink lots of coffee but I pass on the Red Bull. I liked how it was sho...

Molly Jacobs isn’t sure what she should do: Should she follow through with stealing some clothes for her friends from Magna—the trendy girls’ clothing store where she works? Or should she do what she knows is right, even if it means losing her newfound popularity? Remember how I had a bit of trouble with the previous two books in this series? Not that I thought that there was anything really wrong with the books, it was just that I thought the stories targeted a younger audience that what I felt they were intended for Well this book totally erased any of those thoughts. The ages of the characters in this book were 15 and I really felt that they acted like 15 years olds. Pretty much everything in this book was rather realistic and it made me feel like a teen all over again. I adored all the scenes that took place while Molly worked at Magna. There's lots of clothes talk and it's actually clothes that girls really do wear these days. One worry about Tween and YA fiction i...

Drew Daniels finally has what she thought she wanted—popularity and a cute boyfriend. But now she’s faced with choosing between pleasing her boyfriend and doing what’s right. Tween readers make the choice in this interactive story and see how the consequences change Drew’s life. Includes a contract and prayer to remind the reader of the importance of making godly decisions. I will say that I liked this book A LOT. To be honest, I enjoyed it more than the first book in the series. Previously I had issues with characters acting younger than their age or too many actual sermons in the book. This book had neither. Both Drew and Dani act like actual freshmen in high school. It's interesting to see how they began to grow apart and start trying to form their own distinct personalities. Stories about twins growing up sometimes have one twin resenting the other for leaving them behind. This one begins that way but Dani soon finds her own niche. Once again, the characters have clos...

Lindsay Martin is faced with a tough choice: Does she give in to peer pressure and make her friends happy or does she do what she knows is right—even if it means losing her friends forever? Tween readers make the choice in this interactive story and see how the consequences change Lindsay’s life. Includes a contract and prayer to remind the reader of the importance of making godly decisions. When I was growing up, I adored the Choose Your Own Adventure books. I would try out every scenario and keep my thumb held in place so I could go back and switch my decision to get a different outcome. The problem with those books though was that they usually involved situations that I would never find myself in and therefore couldn't really relate to. Therefore I was pleased to hear that there were these books coming out that were in the same vein as the CYOA books but involved real teens and tweens in situations that come across in life. This books deals with the ever popular game of Trut...