Book Love: Windfall

Windfall by Jennifer E. Smith
page count: 416

I've been on a pretty good YA streak lately with The Sun is Also a Star, The Sea of Tranquility, When Dimple Met Rishi, and the Lara Jean series.  I know it's not because only really good YA is getting published or if I've just gotten really good recommendations or if I've just gotten picky about what I read.  But no matter how it's happened, I've really enjoyed pretty much all the YA I've read recently which makes it so fun.

The latest,Windfall is another good one to add to my (ever growing) list.  It's about Alice who buys a powerball ticket for her friend (and secret crush), Teddy, on his 18th birthday.  Big surprise to everyone, he's one of the big winners, coming into $141 million or something insane.  More money than I'm guessing any of us can even imagine.

What do you do when a friend wins a ginormous sum of money with a ticket you bought?  Well, if you are Alice, you decline sharing any of it.  And push your romantic feelings even further down because you don't want to be one of a multitude who all of a sudden want something from Teddy. You try to keep being his friend, even when it goes to his head a little bit.  You wonder if you should have accepted some of his millions, that he's offered many times.  It sounds a little complicated.

And Alice's life was already a little complicated.  Her parents both died unexpectedly 9ish years earlier, when she was 9ish, 13 months apart.  This sends her from living with them in San Francisco to living with her aunt, uncle, and cousin in Chicago.  Her entire life is turned upside down.  So while she appears rather lucky to have picked the winning powerball numbers, she'd much rather have had luck 9 years earlier and kept her parents.

But life happened this way and her cousin, Leo, her, and Teddy become great friends and are going through high school (mostly) together.  They are the first people Teddy turns to when he realizes (or Alice realizes and then tells him) that he's won money.  He's the people who try to keep him from going crazy with all that money.  (Seriously, can you even imagine that much???)

And, of course, as with most YA there is some teenage drama (not that there wouldn't be drama if a "real" adult won millions).  There a big of a love triangle, romantic problems, figuring out where to go to college, things most of us can relate too from our teenage years.  The ones I couldn't relate to: flying first class and staying in a fancy hotel.  (But I still look back at my high school years fondly, not that I'd ever want to repeat, besides through reading fictional stories about teenagers.)

This was just a fun, charming, enjoyable read.  I was rooting for Alice and Teddy to figure things out, Teddy not to be a jerk with his money, and everyone to find some sort of happiness by the end.  I don't have the "lost my parents at a young age" (or at all) problem (THANKFULLY) but I still felt for Alice and all she had been through, wanting to honor their memory and figure out who they would have wanted her to become.  And who she wants to be.

I thought this was a perfect read for summer and one I had a hard time putting down.  (I read it over the course of two days.)  If you're up for a fun YA books, I'd recommend this.  Or just want to feel better about NOT winning the lottery.  Because it sure makes not winning (and not even playing) seem a whole lot easier. =)