The Anatomical Shape Of The Heart

or Night Owls (UK Edition)

Rating

4 stars+

Date Read

5/5/16 - 9/5/16

Age Group

15+

General Thoughts

A petite, artistic misfit and a dark and gorgeous rebel. A witty wallflower of a girl and a rich, prep-schooled, rockabilly guy. A gruesome, cadaver-painting teenager falling in love with a charming, if troubled, minor criminal. A reimagined Wednesday Addams and a buddist -

I'm out of ideas. You get my point.

Any way you put it, this book shouts of YA in its best form.

Main Characters

Bex

Quirky and strong headed. Beatrix Adams (nicknamed Morticia Ad*d*ams by lower IQ classmates) is stubborn, morbid and intelligent, all of which show in her decision to defy her mother's explicit warning and start drawing cadavers that premed students use for reaserch in the local hospital, in order to win scolarship money in an art competition (following in Da Vinci's footsteps and hoping to become a modern medixal illustrator as she so delicately puts it); She is both talented at drawing and loves studying Anatomy/Biology (no wonder loved her), combining art with a logical mind and so valueing structure and neat pencil strokes over creative doodles and reforming using Prismacolours in her paintings for the past couple of years .

I'm mentioning all that about her art because it bespeaks her mental image; she's a pragmatist who likes structure and seldomly gets emotional, choosing the comforting black and white over the overwhelming upset of bold colours, drawing greusome pictures of the human anatomy.

And that's exactly where Jack's rebellious (he)art helps her, showing her a different way to view things and proving that strong emotions aren't always so bad.

Jack 

Jack the Vandal. Has a nice ring to it, does it not? Jack's backstory is full of spoilers and his guarded secrets comprise most of the plot so I'll have to refrain from sayong too mich and stick to the basics. The Jack of the first have of the book is all tall and gorgeous and mysterious and charmingly bold in his pursue of Bex. The Jack of the latter half is still the same just with his secrets slowly exposed and his heart stolen: troubled yet attentive sensitive and supportive. In a nutshell he's the ultimate perfect boyfriend with the "wanted felon" status (minor crime! ) lending him a desirible bad boy appeal.

Narrative & Writing

For all her self descriptions as unemotionless, Bex has had a tumultuous and emotional summer. That certainly lends to her voice that honest and relatable quality that deem a YA heroine successful. Her struggles and her regrets and her nervousness are all so very realistic and relatable, feelings and actions that could actually take place in real life (as opposed to crazy YA heroines that come up with assumptions off the top of their head and their lack of common sense leads to all their struggles) including her doubts when the love interest seems to be blowing her off (which she's not making up he actually has ben ignoring her), her stress of her mother finding out she's been sneaking around (also perfectly normal since she's a 16 year old ad Great Katherine's wrath is terrifying) and her inability to keep a major secret that wasn't hers to share from her brother (the weird thing would've been if she had actually been able to take such a secret to her grave considering it's not just gossip but also lends insight into Jack, who had still been a blank page to her back then).

All in all

A good, honest book on teenage love with lovable characters and satisfying plot, a very easy quick and appealing read that pokes around some more serious issues (Jack's secrets, Bex's father) without digging too deep. All in all a YA through and through and a good one at that.

XOXO

Aggie Pearson