Eleanor and Park is an unlikely love story about two misfits in the mid-80s who find out they fit with each other. Though that sounds like the plot summary for a lot of YA books about young relationships (minus the 1980s, probably), Rowell really has a gift for putting you inside the heads of our titular protagonists. The chapters are divided between the two POVs. Many shared moments are expanded for the reader, as they first read how Eleanor experienced something, then read how Park perceived the same event. Other chapters are internal revelations exclusive to that character; hard, secret truths about sincerity, identity, sex, family dysfunction, and abuse. I listened to this book on Overdrive, and the two voice actors reading as Eleanor and Park did a wonderful job.
Eleanor is the new girl on the school bus, a curvy girl with wild red hair and bright, unusual clothing like mens’ Hawaiian print shirts and scarves tied all around her arms. Park is a Korean-American teen who’s into punk rock and getting a driver’s license. When he gruffly tells her she can sit next to him on the bus that first awkward day, he sets off a chain of interactions that will bring them closer and closer together until they can’t bear to be apart. Sharing comic books and mix tapes, they are two bright, hopeful blossoms on the incredibly bleak landscape of their drab neighborhood, which Eleanor refers to as The Flats. Eleanor challenges Park and confuses him, in love with him but unable to fully trust the intentions of anyone around her. Park wants to love Eleanor forever, though at 16 years old, she skeptically remarks several times that they are no Romeo and Juliet.
It’s a real, raw story about falling in love for the first time, facing your demons, and listening to The Smiths on the way to school. I would highly recommend it.
Earl Grey and A Million Words 