Review: Wanderlove

Wanderlove by Kirsten Hubbard

Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: March 13th 2012
Pages: 338
Source: Gift
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads

It all begins with a stupid question:

Are you a Global Vagabond?

No, but 18-year-old Bria Sandoval wants to be. In a quest for independence, her neglected art, and no-strings-attached hookups, she signs up for a guided tour of Central America—the wrong one. Middle-aged tourists with fanny packs are hardly the key to self-rediscovery. When Bria meets Rowan, devoted backpacker and dive instructor, and his outspokenly humanitarian sister Starling, she seizes the chance to ditch her group and join them off the beaten path.

Bria's a good girl trying to go bad. Rowan's a bad boy trying to stay good. As they travel across a panorama of Mayan villages, remote Belizean islands, and hostels plagued with jungle beasties, they discover what they've got in common: both seek to leave behind the old versions of themselves. And the secret to escaping the past, Rowan’s found, is to keep moving forward.

But Bria comes to realize she can't run forever, no matter what Rowan says. If she ever wants the courage to fall for someone worthwhile, she has to start looking back.

Kirsten Hubbard lends her artistry to this ultimate backpacker novel, weaving her drawings into the text. Her career as a travel writer and her experiences as a real-life vagabond backpacking Central America are deeply seeded in this inspiring story.

Wanderlove was everything I could have hoped for, and more. Not only was it a beautiful contemporary, but the story, writing, and setting was breathtaking. Wanderlove is the story of Bria, an 18 year old trying to find an escape after a terrible breakup during her senior year. In her attempt to escape she finds an advertisement for a trip to Guatemala where she ends up traveling the summer before her first year of college. This book has a little bit of romance mixed with a lot of beautiful scenes into an all together amazing book.

The most memorable part of this book has to be the beautiful setting. Most of the book takes place in the Guatemala area (Which is found between Mexico and South America)  which seems like such a culturally diverse and interesting area. There aren't many books that take place in foreign countries, especially third world countries. Reading the book is like a vacation in itself as Bria travels from various cities to waterfalls and ruins, all the while having an epic adventure!

Though the setting defiantly makes the story, the characters are like the icing. Bria is on her trip to escape a horrible break up with her boyfriend, and as the story goes on, more things get revealed about her as she learns about herself. Bria is also an artist which is a characteristic I loved about her. Rowan, another main character is a boy she runs into in a city in Guatemala and eventually travels with to an island where he's giving scuba diving lessons. Rowan is a troubled character with a shady past that Bria learns about piece by piece. At first I really wasn't very fond of Rowan because he wasn't very nice to Bria,  but he kind of grew on me.

There is a bit of romance, mostly towards the end of the story. I loved the romance. I really like it when characters start out not really liking one another and they slowly grow to together, and that happened in Wanderlove. I'm very glad it did because it shows great character development and it seems to make the relationship better.

One final thing I really liked about the story was the illustrations that were scattered throughout the book. Bria is an artist, and the drawings make the book seem more like she is the one telling the story.