Nov 20, 2013

(Autumn Taboo Review) Want by Stephanie Lawton


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Summary:

"Julianne counts the days until she can pack her bags and leave her old-money, tradition-bound Southern town where appearance is everything and secrecy is a way of life. A piano virtuoso, she dreams of attending a prestigious music school in Boston. Failure is not an option, so she enlists the help of New England Conservatory graduate Isaac Laroche to help her.

She can’t understand why he suddenly gave up Boston’s music scene to return to the South. He doesn’t know her life depends on escaping it. Julianne must face down madness from without, just as it threatens from within. Isaac must resist an inappropriate attraction, but an indiscretion at a Mardi Gras ball-the pinnacle event for Mobile’s elite-forces their present wants and needs to collide with sins of the past.


Will Julianne accept the help she’s offered and get everything she ever wanted, or will she self-destruct and take Isaac down with her?"


Rating:




Review:

Want turned out to be much more then I expected. 

As part of our new feature - Autumn Taboo, we are reading books about student/teacher relationships. This book, in its basis, it about that. Julianne Becker is a 17 year-old talented piano-player and is preparing for her audition for New England Conservatory. After her mentor gets sick, comes the mysterious Isaac Laroche who himself graduated in NEC. Who better to teach her?

So it started really great, big potential with Julianne slowly recognizing Isaac as a man. She's an abused teenager with a psychologically sick mother and a lot of pressure for her future. The hot and very intense new teacher coming in the picture is no help. It's no surprise how she had self-esteem problems and was very conflicted about everything in her life. Slowly, she went totally whack-o and even though her actions would normally make me hate her, I really didn't. Julianne was batshit crazy and totally freaky at times, and she annoyed the hell out of me most of the time. But she was supposed to. I was actually fascinated and started to love the story even more.

“We don't always get what we want. And sometimes, when we do, it's not worth the price.”

And Isaac was not less interesting. With the whole town judging him about a past relationship and how it turned out (which I will not spoiler to you), coming to like your new teenage student is so far from what he needs right now it's not even funny. And that whacks with your mind too. He found himself in a delicate situation where want, need, ethics and destiny are all having a hell of a battle.

So who is to blame when two damaged people go even more off the deep end together? Julianne, I can understand, but that doesn't mean Isaac is the bad guy here.

See? Saying this is a book about student/teacher relationship would be totally wrong. Telling you that it's about an abused girl who was just trying to chase her dreams and wants is not enough too. This is a book where grave mistakes are made, actions are done that drive these two to madness, but redemption is still possible. And the ending showed just that. It was very open, anything could happen, but a light shines in that darkness. Julianne just has to fight to keep it.

It was beautiful.




Until next time, 



2 comments:

  1. I think that I've read a few teacher-student relationship books recently, but nothing has totally wowed me so far. This book has also been on my radar for sometime now, but I didn't realise that the author dealt with so much depth with her characters. So glad to see that you enjoyed this! Fab review!

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    Replies
    1. I was really surprised too, Jasprit! And I loved it even more because I didn't expect anything this complex. I hope you enjoy it too.

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