Review: Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

  Title: Beauty Queens                      Pages: 396
  Author: Libba Bray                          Source: Own
  Publisher: Scholastic Press              Published: May 24, 2011
  Series: N/A                                       Purchase: Amazon

The fifty contestants in the Miss Teen Dream pageant thought this was going to be a fun trip to the beach, where they could parade in their state-appropriate costumes and compete in front of the cameras. But sadly, their airplane had another idea crashing on a desert island and leaving the survivors stranded with little food, little water, and practically no eyeliner.

What's a beauty queen to do? Continue to practice for the talent portion of the program--or wrestle snakes to the ground? Get a perfect tan--or learn to run wild? And what should happen when the sexy pirates show up?

Welcome to the heart of non-exfoliated darkness. Your tour guide? None other than Libba Bray, the hilarious, sensational, Printz Award-winning author of A Great and Terrible Beauty and Going Bovine. The result is a novel that will make you laugh, make you think, and make you never see beauty the same way again.

Beauty Queens is like no other novel - zany and unique and just plain WTF crazy.

The characters in Beauty Queens were wonderful. They were all so diverse and sometimes even stereotypical, but brilliantly done. There was the girl that hates beauty pageants, the dumb one, the bossy leader, the black girl, and the fresh-out-of-juvie lesbian. They all came together and made one heck of a dysfunctional family and a great team.

My favorite was Mary Lou, she was the type of girl to do what she's told and she really blossomed, becoming exactly what her mother didn't want her to be - a wild girl. I loved her middle-of-the-night adventures with the sexy Tane Ngata.

Now the writing and plot were downright comical, but in a good way. I've never read a novel that is totally off-the-wall like Beauty Queens. Some of the stuff that happens just leaves you sitting there stunned by the craziness of it, yet you're laughing and smiling all the way because some of the stuff Libba Bray comes up with is just unbelievable! It's definitely a novel you have to read for yourself to get what I mean and it's definitely worth it.

Overall, I had a fantastic time reading Beauty Queens. It was out-there and such a light, fun read. I definitely would recommend Beauty Queens to just about everyone, no matter your tastes, unless you dislike fun things and laughing your socks off!

Cover thoughts: I'm in love with this cover. It fits the book so well!

RAK: October Wrap-Up!

Random Acts of Kindness is a monthly feature hosted by Book Soulmates. For more information, please go here.

I unfortunately wasn't able to send anything this month, but I have some books waiting to be sent, I just need to get the funds in order. I currently do not have a job or a source of income besides babysitting and I'm already in debt to my boyfriend for various necessities. I really hope to send books in the near future!

Received:

I received quite a few books this month, which definitely surprised me!

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

I received this from Emma at The Girl with a Book. After hearing all the wonderful things about this one, I was dying to get my hands on it! I'm currently reading this right now and am so far loving all its quirkiness! Thank you, Emma!

The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan

I absolutely fell in love with The Forest of Hands and Teeth and already had The Dark and Hollow Places, so I couldn't wait to read this one! This one came from Jen at At Random. Thank you, Jen!

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

I've been wanting to read this one since I saw the movie! I mentioned that I was going to look for this at my local used bookstore and Joli at Actin' Up With Books emailed and said she had both this and The Notebook. Thank you, Joli!

The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

I also mentioned in the same post that I wanted to look for more Nicholas Sparks books, because I found Dear John at the local Goodwill. Thank you for this one, too, Joli!

That's what I got for RAK this month and I'm absolutely ecstatic! I can't wait to be able to send books for this wonderful feature!