Review: Kiss the Morning Star by Elissa Janine Hoole

Title: Kiss the Morning Star
Author: Elissa Janine Hoole
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
Release date: April 1st 2012
Pages: 240
Genre: Contemporary YA
Source: NetGalley - thank you to Marshall Cavendish and NetGalley for providing a free eGalley of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Find out more: Amazon | Goodreads


Goodreads description:

The summer after high-school graduation, a year after her mother’s tragic death, Anna has no plans – beyond her need to put a lot of miles between herself and the past. With forever friend Kat, a battered copy of Kerouac’s DHARMA BUMS, and a car with a dodgy oil filter, the girls set out on an epic road trip across the USA. Maybe somewhere along the way they’ll prove or disprove the existence of God. Maybe they’ll even get laid . . .
It’s a journey both outward and inward. Through the Badlands and encounters with predatory men and buffalo. A crazy bus ride to Mexico with a bunch of hymn-singing missionaries. Facing death, naked in the forest with an enraged grizzly bear . . . Gradually, Anna realizes that this is a voyage of discovery into her own self, her own silent pain – and into the tangled history that she and Kat share. What is love? What is sexual identity? And how do you find a way forward into a new future – a way to declare openly and without fear all that lies within you?

First sentence:

It's strange how a plan can unfold sometimes - an umbrella shooting up at the touch of a button and extending out in all directions quickly, effortlessly.

My rating: 2 out of 5 stars

 I wanted to love this book, I really did. The premise sounded awesome - I love road trips (especially if they're set in the summer after high school), I love grief (well, obviously I don't love grief; but I love reading about grief), and I love romance. So I thought I would automatically love Kiss the Morning Star. But it just didn't work.

Kiss the Morning Star, at least the first half, focuses a lot on religion. I guess the description kind of says so - "Maybe somewhere along the way they'll prove or disprove the existence of God." - but I didn't realize that beforehand. To me, that sentence seems so random, like it's just supposed to show that Anna and Kat have no real plans; that anything can happen. So I just kind of overlooked that aspect, and was surprised at how much talk of religion and God there is in this book. Anna's dad is a pastor, so the whole family is Christian, but ever since her mom died, Anna isn't sure whether she can still believe in God. She goes on this road trip to try to find God again.

I can't explain why - the way religion is handled in this book just didn't sit right with me. The message, religion-wise, is kind of confusing. I figured since her dad is a pastor, Christianity would be seen at least sort of positively, but that's not the case - Anna's view of Christianity, throughout the book, is very negative. I understand it must be hard to believe after losing someone close to you, but I don't know, I thought it was strange how negative her view on believing in general is, considering she went on a road trip just to find God. The book shows some pretty radical beliefs - there's a scene where they're on a bus and the bus breaks down right on the train tracks and a train is coming, and instead of getting out of the bus as fast as possible, the people pray to God to make the bus start again - and Anna is very outspoken on what she thinks of that. I didn't mind that part, since, well, I agree with her there, but it bugged me that there's nothing about how not all belief is like that, how it's not all bad - which surprised me, given Anna's family background. And then, in the second half of the book, belief doesn't even come up again - the whole topic just kind of disappears. I just thought that was very, very weird.

So something about the way religion is portrayed in Kiss the Morning Star didn't sit right with me. Sorry for sort of going off on a tangent there, I promise I'll talk about the other stuff in the book, too! Anyways, I think the book just wanted to include too many topics - there's religion, there's the road trip itself, there's Anna's grief, there's the Dharma Bums stuff, there's Anna's relationship with her dad, and then there's the whole Kat-and-Anna's-friendship-turning-into-more storyline. I think I would have preferred if the author had left one or two of those topics out - the way it is, it all felt kind of jumbled together, and none of the issues are dealt with in a way that satisfied me as a reader,

The Dharma Bums aspect didn't work for me. The girls use the book Dharma Bums as their itinerary - they open a page at random and let one paragraph decide for them where to go or what to do next. I actually like that idea, but I would have liked to know more about the actual book, what happens and what it's about. And I would have liked to know why they chose that book - I know Kat's dad gave it to them, but it still seems like a very random choice for two girls who just graduated high school.

The grief storyline is okay. I liked reading about Anna's grief and her memories of her mother, but I wanted it to go deeper. I also like the dynamics between Anna and her father, how they're described in the beginning - Anna's father is dealing with his own grief, doesn't preach anymore, and barely gets out of bed. I really liked that set-up. But there's one scene where Anna pocket-dials her dad and he overhears a conversation he shouldn't have heard, and there's a  bit of a fall-out. And then after that... it's never addressed again. I wanted there to be more, wanted more development in that relationship, but the storyline just kind of stopped.

Kat and Anna's relationship didn't ring true to me. I know there's supposed to be all this sexual tension, but I just didn't feel it. They seemed more like best friends than anything else, if I'm being honest - I just didn't buy these two as a couple. I never got Kat as a character, either.

The actual road trip is the only storyline I really liked. I liked reading about all the places they go and all the unusual things they do, the people they meet.

Wow, my review has gotten longer than I intended. I give you props if you've stuck with me this long! I loved the premise of Kiss the Morning Star, and each storyline held a lot of promise. but I thought there were too many of them for any one to be fully developed. I wanted there to be more of everything; for all of the storylines, characters, and relationships to be more fleshed-out and deeper. I'm pretty disappointed, because like I said, this book held a lot of promise. The way it is, though, it just didn't work for me.

If you've read this book, what did you think?

Interview with Elissa Janine Hoole (Kiss the Morning Star Blog Tour)

Today we have Elissa Janine Hoole here for an author interview! This post is part of The Teen Book Scene's blog tour for Kiss the Morning Star by Elissa Janine Hoole. You can find out all about the tour here. Make sure to visit all the other stops if you'd like to know more about Kiss the Morning Star!

1. I love books about road trips! Have you ever been on one yourself?

I love road trips, in both book form and in real life. I have a box in my office full of maps that I’ve highlighted the paths I’ve taken on trips ever since I was in high school, and I keep journals and photographs of all my trips. On road trips, I like to be spontaneous and just drive all the back roads, which is why I really enjoyed working with the idea of Anna and Kat choosing their destination based on flipping to a page in a Kerouac book.

2. I was looking at your website, and I came across the crazy fact that you had a naked wedding reception. Um, what? Care to elaborate?

We had a small wedding ceremony in the Mount Hood National Forest, on the shore of the Clackamas River, just a few friends hiked with us into the woods—and a couple of random strangers who happened to be in the woods! One of our best friends officiated over the marriage, my maid of honor sprinkled rose petals around our tent, and we all wore flower crowns and big smiles. The place we camped was near a natural hot springs, a place that was very special to us during the time we lived in Oregon, and we all spent most of the evening soaking in a giant barrel of hot water, passing around a bottle of wine and enjoying our potluck feast of camping delicacies that we spread out on the benches around the tub area. It was a beautiful November evening, and all of my memories are wrapped up in lovely images of crisp air and swirling steam and friendship.

3. Without spoiling anything, could you tell us what was your favorite scene to write in Kiss the Morning Star?

My very favorite scene to write was actually the last one—as a writer, it was just one of the scenes that felt right to me, and I enjoy the feeling of creating closure, while still leaving the path into the future a little open. I love imagining what happens to Anna and Kat on the pages after the end.

4. How do you go about naming your characters?

On some level, I think the character names just arrive, along with their voices, as I start to write. I have changed the names of my characters (after noticing, for instance, that all of the characters’ names start with a J…this has happened twice. I guess I like J names!), but that takes a big shift in the way I think about the character. It’s kind of like with real life people, where the name takes on a lot of meaning and associations. I think a little bit about the ethnicity of my characters, the type of parents they have, the beliefs they have, and this impacts my choice of name, and then I do have a baby name book that I’ll flip through for inspiration at times, too. Sometimes I’ll use a phone book for the area where my characters live as a way to get last names that will fit.

5. Why did you decide to have your novel take place the summer after high school?

I’m fascinated with transitions in life, the points where a person has to make important choices that will impact the direction of their future. Anna has to figure out where her future is leading her, and the scary place right after graduating high school seemed like a natural place for her journey to begin.

Thanks for the great interview answers, Elissa!


Check out all the other stops of the tour, and keep your eye out for Kiss the Morning Star, which has already been released.


Kiss the Morning Star by Elissa Janine Hoole
(Amazon | Goodreads)

The summer after high-school graduation, a year after her mother’s tragic death, Anna has no plans – beyond her need to put a lot of miles between herself and the past. With forever friend Kat, a battered copy of Kerouac’s DHARMA BUMS, and a car with a dodgy oil filter, the girls set out on an epic road trip across the USA. Maybe somewhere along the way they’ll prove or disprove the existence of God. Maybe they’ll even get laid...
It’s a journey both outward and inward. Through the Badlands and encounters with predatory men and buffalo. A crazy bus ride to Mexico with a bunch of hymn-singing missionaries. Facing death, naked in the forest with an enraged grizzly bear... Gradually, Anna realizes that this is a voyage of discovery into her own self, her own silent pain – and into the tangled history that she and Kat share. What is love? What is sexual identity? And how do you find a way forward into a new future – a way to declare openly and without fear all that lies within you?