[Review] Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

Tittle : Eleanor & Park

Author : Rainbow Rowell

Publisher : The Orion Publishing Group

Published : February 2013

Pages : 336 pages

ISBN : 9781409120544

Price : $13,69 (The Book Depository)

Two misfits.
One extraordinary love.

Eleanor... Red hair, wrong clothes. Standing behind him until he turns his head. Lying beside him until he wakes up. Making everyone else seem drabber and flatter and never good enough...Eleanor.

Park... He knows she'll love a song before he plays it for her. He laughs at her jokes before she ever gets to the punch line. There's a place on his chest, just below his throat, that makes her want to keep promises...Park.

Set over the course of one school year, this is the story of two star-crossed sixteen-year-olds—smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try. 

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I won’t exactly calling this a review, more like a trailer or teaser or pv or something like that. This is pretty much sum it up everything, but don’t worry, i’m not spilling the main conflict. So enjoy.

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Park noticed the new girl at about the same time everybody else did.

‘Watch it, raghead.’ Tina pushed roughly.

'Eleanor,’ Mr Stessman said. ‘What a powerful name. It’s a queen’s name, you know.’

‘It’s the name of the fat Chipette,’ somebody behind Park whispered. Somebody else laughed.

Eleanor wished she had more honors classes. She wished there was honors gym …

‘He’s trying to make peace, Eleanor. You promised that you’d try, too.’ ‘It’s easier for me to make peace from a distance.’

She was reading his comics.

She looked ridiculous. And she was looking at his comics. Park felt like he should say something.
Park didn’t say anything. He just held his comics open wider and turned the pages more slowly.

‘Romeo and Juliet are just two rich kids who’ve always gotten every little thing they wanted. And now, they think they want each other.’

‘No!’ Mr Stessman said. ‘Someone else, someone with a heart!’

What if she didn’t give it back? No, it wouldn’t. What if she did give it back? What was he supposed to say then? Thanks?
When she got to their seat, he was looking out the window. She handed him the comic, and he took it.

I hate him,’ Eleanor would say. 

‘I hate him so much I wish he was dead,’ Maisie would answer.
‘I hope he falls off a ladder at work.’ 

So,’ he said, before he knew what to say next, ‘you like the Smiths?’

‘I hope he gets hit by a truck.’
‘A garbage truck.’ 

‘Hey. Nice job. In English.’ That’s what Park was going to say. Or maybe, ‘I’m in your English class. That poem you read was cool.’ Or, ‘You’re in Mr Stessman’s class, right? Yeah, I thought so.’

She woke up to shouting. Richie shouting. Eleanor couldn’t tell what he was saying. Underneath the shouting, her mother was crying.

He took his Walkman out of the pocket of his trench coat and popped out his Dead Kennedys tape. He slid the new tape in, pressed play, then – carefully – put the headphones over her hair.

That morning, in English, Park noticed that Eleanor’s hair came to a soft red point on the back of her neck. 

‘I don’t want to use up the batteries.’ 

‘I don’t care about the batteries.’ 

‘Really,’ she said. ‘You don’t care.’ 

‘They’re just batteries,’ he said. 

She emptied the batteries and the tape from Park’s Walkman, handed it back to him, then got off the bus without looking back.

Was it possible to rape somebody’s hand?

That afternoon, in history, Eleanor noticed that Park chewed on his pencil when he was thinking.

Holding Eleanor’s hand was like holding a butterfly. Or a heartbeat. Like holding something complete, and completely alive

Even in a million different pieces, Eleanor could still feel Park holding her hand.

That night, Park made a tape with the Joy Division song on it, over and over again. He emptied all his handheld video games and Josh’s remote-control cars, and called his grandma to tell her that all he wanted for his birthday in November was double-A batteries

She wrapped her fingers around his and touched his palm with her thumb. Her fingers were trembling. Park shifted in his seat and turned his back to the aisle. ‘Okay?’ she whispered.

Park stood up when she got to their row, and as soon as she sat down, he took her hand and kissed it. It happened so fast, she didn’t have time to die of ecstasy or embarrassment.

‘Wow, what’s up with her. She looks like she just killed somebody for fun.’
Mr Stessman pretended to fall against the chalkboard when he walked in. ‘Good God, Eleanor, stop. You’re blinding me. Is that why you keep that smile locked away, because it’s too powerful for mortal man?’

While Park ran his finger along the inside of her bracelet, Eleanor asked him for his phone number. He started laughing. ‘Why is that funny?’ she asked. ‘Because,’ he said quietly. ‘I feel like you’re hitting on me,’

‘I don’t like you,’ he said. ‘I need you.’

‘I don’t like her,’ his mother said, adamantly. ‘She comes to my house and cries, very weird girl, and then next thing I know, you’re kicking friends and school is calling, face broken … And everybody, everybody, tell me that family is trouble. Just trouble. I don’t want it.’

'I don’t like you, Park,’ ‘I …’ – her voice nearly disappeared – ‘sometimes I think I live for you.’

She’d heard men’s voices outside. Men cursing. There was more slamming in the kitchen – and then gunshots.

'Your stepdad’s been looking for you,’ Tina said.
‘No,’ Eleanor said. ‘He’s going to kill me.’

‘Eleanor – wait – I love you.’

‘Next time, I’ll just say, “Eleanor, follow me down this dark alley, I want to kiss you.”’  

‘I’ll drive you,’ he said.
‘To the bus station?’
‘To Minnesota.’

‘Next time,’ he said, ‘I’ll just say, “Eleanor, duck behind these bushes with me, I’m going to lose my mind if I don’t kiss you.”’

He’d stopped trying to bring her back. So why did he keep coming here? To this crappy little house …

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My thought.

It’s cute. I mean, it’s cute, cute. But the ending. God! The ending!

I’ve thought about how would it feel if i was born in a different era. Like a hundred years from now, or worse, a hundred years earlier. Because if that’s the case, then i might not know about this book at all, and that would be like, hell.

And i’ve thought about if i lived in a place where technology didn’t exist. Because if that’s the case, then i might not meet with Elleanor or Park at all, and that would be like, what a waste.

So thank you internet! or internet’s creator! or whoever who made me met this book!

And Thank God i live in this era!

And for Mrs Rowell, i don’t know what to say to you, i’m on my tears now and loss at words. I’d just say that without you, i wouldn’t know what it feels like falling deep deep deep in love. *sniff. I don’t have to experience it in person. Just reading your book makes me experience it on my own. Thank you.

When i read this book. I feel like I was happy for them. I was sad for them. I was scared for them. My heart’s clenching for them. And I had butterflies for them.

They’re first conversation. They’re first sharing. They’re first holding hands. They’re first date. They’re first fight. And they’re first kiss. Kya!! I’m acting like a fangirl all over them!

Eleanor & Park makes me feel like i’ve completed. Like i don’t need anything, just this book right in my palm has already made my live.

I was smiling, no, i was grinning like a fool when i read it. People even throw me have-you-lost-your-mind look, eyebrows up. And my friend said, stop grinning! you freak me out!

It’s not that they’re funny or anything. No, i would never put this book on comedy genre at all. It’s just that, they’re cute (i know i’ve mention it) and sweet. I want to pinch them like they’re my own kid. And swoon over them like they’re the best star ever. And ...

I’ll never get over them, that’s for sure.

I just love this book! So much! I can’t help but wondering what kind of other books that Rowell wrote.

So to find that out, i’m going to start now. See you guys soon!

Ah, i’m giving five lilies of course and don’t forget the butterflies.

My favorite character : It’s either Park or Eleanor. I can’t choose!