Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen

I've already read and reviewed four of Sarah Dessen books including The Truth About Forever, Lock and Key, Just Listen, That Summer. And three of these four reviews started out with: "Sarah Dessen is one of my favorite authors." So it is with mixed feelings that I write this review of her latest, Along for the Ride.


Dessen still is one of my favorite authors and I was very eager to read her newest book. However, about fifty pages into it, I felt disappointed because it seems like Dessen has fallen into a rut. The plots are so formulaic and predictable now (although it worked for me in the first several books of hers that I read): teenage girl has troubles with her family, moves to a new location, meets an unlikely friend in oddball boy, boy and girl become romantically involved while at the same time girl understands something more about herself and her situation.

So I enjoyed reading this book (I read it in two days), but I'm hoping that in Dessen's next book, she'll hop out of this mold and give us something new.

From her book:

"It was terrible and awful when someone left you. You could move on, do the best you could, but...an ending was an ending. No matter how many pages of sentences and paragraphs of great stories led up to it, it would always have the last word."