"You look like a protagonist. You look like the person who wins in the end."

Eleanor & Parkby Rainbow Rowell

I started reading Eleanor & Park last Monday night and I gobbled it up right away. Work has been really stressful lately and I wanted something light to distract me from the mountain of reports I have to finish. After I did, I couldn't stop thinking about it, and even when I was busy with other things it still didn't leave my mind. Last Thursday, I stayed up until 1 am the next day just reading; I didn't plan on getting any sleep at all (very irresponsible, Krissy. Very. Irresponsible.) just so I can continue reading, until my father checked why I still had the light on and caught me red-handed. Good thing he didn't confiscate my Kindle LOL. I couldn't wait until I could get some me-time again so that I could finally finish it, but at the same time I didn't want the story to end. 

I stayed all afternoon in my little corner just so I could finish it today. No regrets.

The story is set over the course of 1986 - the year I was born - and tells of how two star-crossed misfits from two opposite sides of the tracks met, discovered they belonged to one another, and fell in love. I love how it's sarcastic, geeky, sweet, and has lost of mushy and gooey parts that wouldn't make you want to retch. 

"I miss you, Eleanor. I want to be with you all the time. You're the smartest girl I've ever met, and the funniest, and everything you do surprises me. And I wish I could say that those are the reasons I like you, because that would make me sound like a really evolved human being... But I think it's got as much to do with your hair being red and your hands being soft... and the fact that you smell like homemade birthday cake."

How do you reconcile feelings between someone who has always had a sheltered and comfortable upbringing and someone who has always had to deal with family problems, financial constraints, and constant bullying in school?

"He tried again to remember what he'd thought the first time he saw her. He tried to remember how this happened - how she went from someone he'd never met to the only one who mattered."

I guess most love stories start at the most unlikely circumstances. I guess it's nice that it's an "in spite of" kind of love and not just "because of".

"What are the chances you'd ever meet someone like that? He wondered. Someone you could love forever, someone who would forever love you back? And what did you do when that person was born half a world away?"

I want that, you know?

Most books and movies with the he said-she said format I've read and seen (like Flipped), I loved. Eleanor & Park is no exception. I love their personalities and the unique voice Rainbow has given them, and most of their lines will definitely stay with me long after today has passed.

SPOILER ALERT! DO NOT READ BEYOND THIS POINT IF YOU DON'T WANT SPOILERS! The book ends in a bittersweet note, and although a little part of you wants them to have a Hollywood-trademarked happy ending, you know it is more realistic for them not to end up together. For now. Because even though their story ends for now doesn't mean it's for good. That's the way some first loves work, right? After all, Rainbow has already hinted at a possible sequel years from now...

"He'd stopped trying to bring her back. She only came back when she felt like it anyway, in dreams and lies and broken-down deja vu."

I wonder where my first love is and whether he still remembers me.