Reviews

Forever in Blue by Ann Brashares

natwc's review against another edition

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5.0

When I first read this, I was still in high school so I didn't relate to it as much but I still cried at the end. Reading it again while I'm in college, I can really relate to how the girls felt in some the situations they had gotten into and how much they had to struggle to get out of it. I wasn't as sad when I finished reading it this time since I found out that there is 5th book that is set 10 years from the end of this book. I'm so excited to read it!

marieintheraw's review against another edition

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3.0

November 2015: I feel like the series has gotten formulaic by the end but I am interested in how the later addition fits in.

July 2016: I forgot that the only thing I truly loved when I first read this was the ending to this book because I felt like it was a great end to the series, but it's no longer the ending and now I'm not sure how I feel about this book.

blloyd13's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional lighthearted reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

colleengeedrumm's review

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5.0

Loved this series! One more to go I think...

The only true paradise is paradise lost. - Marcel Proust

One's real life is so often the life that one does not lead. - Oscar Wilde

...and down they forgot as up they grew - e.e. cummings

Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song.
A medley of extemporanea:
And love is a thing that can never go wrong:
And I am Marie of Roumania.
-Dorothy Parker

Pain is inevitable: suffering is optional. - Greta Randolph

Make friends with your sweat this summer. She had a kind of boot-camp mentality Bridget decided. She was excited about privation.
Well, Bridget could get excited about privation too.

Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not. - Epicurus

In the depth of winter. I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. - Albert Camus

Most people when they sensed a crisis got despotically curious, needing to stake out the far boundary of trouble.

Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterward. -Vernon Law

A wife like you had in a real family. Kids like you had in a real family. Kids who jumped around and needed things.

An opera in Italian was playing over the speaker to the left of Effie's head.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad. - Aldous Huxley

Illusions are art, for the feeling person, and it is by art that you live, if you do. - Elizabeth Bowen

Love was an idea. Nothing more or less.
If you lost the idea, if you somehow forgot about it, the person you loved became a stranger. Love lives in the memory. It can be forgotten.
But she knew the darkest parts of growing up had become linked to him that night. Those dark parts had attached to him & somehow overwhelmed the fragile idea of love.

Where there is nothing, there is the possibility of everything. When you live nowhere, you live everywhere.
You have to be like a turtle; you have to figure out how to bring your home along with you.

Carmen felt the familiar reactions, outmoded and dislodged though they were. She felt the old pull of gratitude. She felt needy & uncertain. She still clung to the notion of a friend, even a crappy one.

Life's a voyage that's homeward bound. - Herman Melville

crazy is what crazy do - The Black Eyed Peas

Poor empty pants
With nobody inside them. - Dr. Seuss

At first cock-crow the ghosts must go
Back to their quiet graves below. - Theodosia Garrison

Ruins stood for what was lost, and yet they were beautiful - peaceful, historic, intellectual. Not tragic or regrettable. Why not celebrate what you had had rather than spend your time mourning its passing? There could be joy in things that ended.

How powerful it was to give up your desires. It was like bargaining for a rug. Your only leverage was being able to walk away.

So often the world was made of jumps & starts, but tonight it was round & continuous.

She looked out the window and saw the proud full moon hanging over the Caldera, seeming to enjoy its own perfect reflection below.

It seemed to Carmen they were putting off having to touch their feet to the earth again. The earth turned and time passed and then they would have to think about what it meant. But the hour did come, as all hours do.

Those are the places we grew up and the times we spent together, but they aren't us. If we think they are, then we're lost, because times end and places are lost. We aren't any place or any time.
That's the thing. We are everywhere.

"It is not enough for you to succeed; your friends must also fail" = toxicity = BOO!

mrsbrharris's review against another edition

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2.0

I was disappointed with how the series ended. There was a lot of inappropriate behavior. If you want the low-down I'll just tell you what happens so you don't have to read it.

stephxsu's review against another edition

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4.0

To be honest, I felt like FOREVER IN BLUE start off rather slowly and depressingly, but in fact the novel is so astounding and fitting for the final book in this amazing series that I am still reeling from reading it.

The Septembers—Carmen, Tibby, Bridget, and Lena—haven’t really gotten together since the summer before they each went their separate ways to college. Now, it’s the summer after their freshman year of college and once again they’re apart, though together in spirit. Still, though, each girl has her own mistakes to make and lessons to learn.

Tibby is taking a summer screenwriting course at NYU. At the same time, she takes a big step forward in her relationship with Brian…with consequences that shatter their old ideas of almost blind love. Lena opts for an art studio class at RISD, where she develops a crush on the intense, incredibly talented artist Leo and asks herself whether she has, in fact, actually moved on from Kostos.

Carmen has tagged along with her college friend Julia to a theater camp Julia is excited to attend. In a move completely unlike the invisible background person she’s become over the course of the year, Carmen tries out for a highly esteemed part in a play…and gets it, much to Julia’s dissatisfaction. Finally, Bee is on an archaeological dig in Turkey, where she has feelings for her older, married professor and tries to learn how to miss someone and remember to have a home.

The ending of FOREVER IN BLUE is bittersweet and excellent. It’s realistic, touching, and satisfying, all at once. All the years we’ve loved these four girls, here is one last time to see them mature and learn how powerful their bond with one another is. It’s a bond that can outlast anything, even time and distance, and that is what makes this series so special.

syndi3's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I enjoyed Forever in Blue very much. The friendship of these young girls are to die for. Love how they live their own live and yet somehow connecting with each other through a jean. I like the idea that 1 pant can fit to their body type and reflecting their everlasting friendship. 

mtjehy's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful lighthearted slow-paced

2.5

katiebtatton's review against another edition

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3.0

Lena tries to get over Kostos by taking an art class and posing nude for a classmate, but after sleeping with him realizes that she doesn't feel for him the way she still feels for Kostos. Bridget goes on an archeological dig and begins a relationship with a married man, and it isn't until his family shows up unexpectedly that she realizes the kind of person she is becoming and vows to change. She makes an effort to reconnect with her father and brother. Carmen learns that not all friends are as true and selfless as her sisters while at a drama camp. Tibby has a pregnancy scare and once again sabotages her relationship with Brian.

I didn't like this book as much as I liked the previous three. Three of the sisters have sex and each of them ruins a relationship because of it and realize they weren't ready for that step.

ginganinja90's review against another edition

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adventurous funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0