Customer Reviews

Candy (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Candy by Kevin Brooks is an entertaining book to read, it keeps you wondering what Joe Beck's, the main character, next move will be. Joe lives in a nice neighborhood near London with his dad and sister and although he has a few problems with his father and mother, this doesn't seem to bother him much. Basically, Joe is like any other regular adolescent. He plays guitar in a band called the Katies and is very talented with music.

When he meets this beautiful girl, Candy, everything else doesn't seem to matter but her. It's a scary thought, Joe lets everything around him not matter as much as Candy. After meeting Candy, he really changes. Candy is a young girl with various problems involving drugs and prostitution hence, causing problems for Joe. Of course Joe doesn't see these problems himself, all he cares about is protecting Candy, but the problems keep on piling up.

The author doesn't  make the reading as difficult so its pretty easy to read for those who are younger.  Kevin Brooks keeps you anticipating in certain scenes where there might be confrontation. This book kept me reading longer in order to find out what's going to happen. In one of the many scenes that kept me reading was when Joe is confronted by Candy's pimp, Iggy. Iggy is a violent man who doesn't care about hurting anyone. Joe risks his life when he enters this area in hope of

seeing Candy again, but later Joe finds himself right in front of  Iggy. Joe is defenseless against Iggy but fortunately for Joe, Candy helps him escape. Both Candy and Joe care for each other and although Candy is a prostitute, she acts totally different with him. No one seems to realize this and tell Joe he needs to leave her alone, but Joe is convinced he can help her in some way and continues to get in deeper trouble. I like the way the author ends the story, it sure isn't a happy ever after

ending, but with all the intense situations Joe gets involved with, it's a satisfactory conclusion.

Who doesn't crave a piece of sugary goodness every now and then? A morsel of the sweetness can lift our spirits and put a smile on our faces. Joe Beck is obsessed with Candy. But Joe's Candy is not a confection. Candy is a girl. And she is not your average teen. Candy holds secrets and lives a dark world. Little does Joe know, but once he becomes entrapped in Candy's world, his life will never be the same.

In the opening pages of CANDY, Joe muses: "It's hard to imagine life before Candy. Sometimes I sit here for hours, staring into the past, trying to remember what it was like, but I never seem to get very far. I just can't see myself without her. About the best I can manage is the last half hour before we met, the last few moments of my pre-Candy existence, when I was still just a boy. I was innocent then."

Joe is pretty much what one would call an "average Joe." He's a high school student from the suburbs of London. He's not exceptional at school, but he gets by. Plus, he has his music. Joe plays guitar in a band, The Katies, with some boys from school. They play in clubs, sometimes even in London clubs. Joe's parents are divorced and he lives with his father and older sister, Gina. Joe is still trying to figure out who he is and where he will go in the world. Maybe that's why he is so easily drawn in to Candy.

Joe first meets Candy when he goes to London for a doctor's appointment. She's standing outside of a drugstore and she notices him. "Nice hat," she says. Joe is wearing a new wool hat with a star on it. He stands motionless, shocked that this beautiful girl he had been staring at has spoken to him. She disappears as he tries to muster up the nerve to say something in return. Then fate strikes again. Joe runs into the same girl in McDonald's, and she helps him out of an embarrassing situation. As a thank you, Joe buys her a chocolate donut. The girl tells him her name is Candy.

Joe and Candy are enjoying their time in McDonald's until a dark shadow is cast over the table. It's a huge guy who sits down between them. He has "the emptiest eyes I've ever seen --- empty of feeling, empty of hearing, empty of everything but himself. His face was a death mask." His name is Iggy, and Candy is obviously very, very afraid. Iggy knows Candy, and he has control over her. She won't look at Joe with Iggy there, and Iggy does not want Joe around. "I see you again," he says, "you'll be smiling to the bone."

The first encounter with Candy has been both thrilling and frightening for Joe, but when he finds Candy's phone number slipped into his pocket, he knows that he has to see her again.

Kevin Brooks is the critically acclaimed author of MARTYN PIG, KISSING THE RAIN, and LUCAS. His fourth novel, CANDY, is as captivating and entertaining as his previous books. CANDY is a thriller, a romance, and a coming-of-age tale all mixed into one book. Brooks's words are cleverly crafted and make for a haunting story about what happens when an average Joe falls for a girl from the wrong side of the tracks. Amidst the danger and the fear, Joe has to put everything that is important in his own life on the line in order to save Candy from herself.

--- Reviewed by Kristi Olson (zooey24@yahoo.com)

"Candy", a novel by Kevin Brooks, is quite simply one of the best YA novels I've read in the past few years. The book's subject matter is not exactly joyful; prostitution and drug use and abuse are parts of the plot, but looking past that, the story really is captivating.

It starts with the story's protagonist, Joe, getting lost in an underclass neighborhood. He hears a girl shout out at him. He's amazed by her looks, and finds himself fascinated by her. His fascination turns into an attraction, and then his attraction turns into an obsession for this girl named Candy. But, he soon realizes that his love for her can become dangerous. Her world is the complete opposite of his. Turns out, Candy is a prostitute, working for a pimp named Iggy. She works for him to support her Heroin addiction. But Joe still wants to be involved with Candy.

But as Joe gets deeper into Candy's world, the road turns dark. His world is turned upside down, and he's forced to make the decision of his life.

The characters were pretty well developed in the story. I found myself liking both Joe and Candy rather quickly, and I believe that Kevin Brooks did a great job at bringing Joe and Candy to life, as well as Mike and Gina, who are Joe's sister and boyfriend. The books portrays drug addiction rather realistically, for there are scenes were Candy goes through withdrawals from not using heroin and Brooks doesn't hold back describing what it's like. So I recommend this book to anyone looking to read a good story. The most important thing of all is that it keeps you reading. Pick this book up today.

One ordinary day, a kid named Joe takes a train to London and get lost around the city's station...and meets Candy.

Candy is the girl who takes average Joe out of his safe, comfortable world. As Joe stumbles into Candy's life of drugs, prostitution, and violence, he becomes more and more drawn in until he can't think of nothing but her. Soon Candy's problems become Joe's problems and their lives become both at stake.

This was a completely captivating novel, but I kind of wanted to know more about what happened in the end. However, overall it was well-written and I do recommend it.

I will be the first to admit that this book takes an amount of experience to fully understand. If you're too young and haven't experience some of the things in this book, it will be boring, and if you lived the sheltered life then it won't do you much good either. Candy is a book that is written in a format that is not often seen in the literary world. Whereas most novels attempt to make their sentences and paragraphs form pictures that move smoothly in your mind, this one is different. The paragraphs are abrupt and jump quickly, and are purposefully done so, which gives the book a feeling of....well, it's like looking through a window that's so dirty you can't see anything. But there's a hole in the dirt where someone's recently wiped it off with a shirtsleeve. You can only see through that one part of the window. The rest isn't clear. The hole in the window being what the author makes the subject at the time, everything else the adjectives that we assume are true about the subject.

A good book in it's own right, it doesn't live up to the generic teen "guy meets girl guy and girl fall in love guy and girl break up weep weep sob sob the end," making itself very unusual and a very enthralling read. It's unique, well-written, and enjoyable. I'd really give it four and a half stars because nothing's perfect, but we can't have everything in life.

I recommend this book to all teenage girls. It would be good for parents to read to so they can see the struggles kids are faced with. If you have a friend of family member who is involved with drugs this could be a good chance to relate to them. Candy is a love story set in a dangerous world of violence, drugs, and desperation. Joe is a boy who grew up on the right side of town. He loved his music and that is about all. He had never experienced drugs or violence. That would soon change. Joe met Candy outside the station next to Euston Road. Candy once had a good life to. She lived close to Joe. This book illistrates drugs have the power of taking even the best things away. Whether thats family or friends. Candy needed help but first she had to be willing to fight for herself. Candy's life consisted of sex for money. That's what her pimp Iggy taught her. If she tried to have a life she was beat, and locked in her room. She needed that life style to survive. Heroin kept her going. Joe was going to get her away from the addicting world she had grown to know. He risked his life doing this to. Sneaking Candy passed Iggy would be the hardest thing he would have to do. Once Joe was over the first hurdle the second challenge was keeping her safe and away from drugs. Candy became very sick from not using heroin and she threw her anger in her caretakers face. Joe understood she was facing a complete life change and took the good with the bad. He knew she was on her road to recovery. Candy grew stronger and faced her fears when Iggy finally uncovered her hideaway. Everyone needs help sometime in there life and this book shows those struggles.

This was denfinitly a good book. It kept me guessing, it kept me wondering, and overall, it kept me engrossed. The plot was a good one, but the main character "Joe" annoyed me. He seemed to think that he was invincible, and he never really htought things through. Something else that got on my nerves about the character was that he was always knew that there would be consequences, but he always chose to avoid them. There was one part in the story, where Joe decides to go find Candy, he skips school and travels around London for the day, looking for a refurbished Victorian house, which Candy had once told him that she lived in. After having no luck whatsoever, he runs into Iggy, Candy's pimp, and decides to follow him, and see where he goes. It was sweet that he was willing to risk himself just to help her, but he hardly knew Candy, and most of his love for her was solely based on her looks. Another think that annoyed and kind of upset me about the book was the way that they portrayed black people. it was like, Joe see's a bunch of bulky black guys sitting at a table at McDonalds and he freaks out. The only African Americans that are metioned in the book are described as evil, cold, selfish. They have no feeling, their big, their scary, their mean, they all do drugs, their all drig dealers, and their all manipulators. The only nice African American in the book was Mike, Joe's sister's boyfriend. But once again, Mike is some huge rock hard man. Close to the end of the story Joe describes Mike as having a cold look in his eyes, etc, the whole way that black people were described took away the whole point of trying to say that Mike looked this way because he was upset about what has happened to his gitlfriend. I also think that the author tried a little bit to hard to make "Joe" seem deep and thoughtful. Joe thought very complex thoughts, full of personification, similes, etc. The average teen doesn't speak, let alone think like that, and I can say that because I am one. The ending was very predictable, you knew from the start that Joe was going to save Candy, be her night and shining armor. You knew that Joe was going to stop her herion addiction. I thought is was so great though, that the author was able to make oppisite sex charcters, with a obvious sexual attraction to one another, be in a cottage alone and not have sex. In every young adult book that I read, the characters have sex, and although it does make for juciy imagery, it seems like people think that its impossible to hve oppisite sex, non-related characters, non-sexual. This book was a quick read, and had great imagery, if your looking for somethin that it's keep you from bordem and keep you interested, go pick it up!

Joe is an average guy living his life day in and day out. Then one day he meets Candy, at that point he never knew that his life was going to change. They shared a lot of laughs and tears and they were starting to fall in love. At that point Joe didn't know that he was being sucked into Candy world of drugs and prostitution. Candy was suffering in this life all she wanted was to be loved and get away from all the things that she put into her body. She has tried many times but she keeps going back for more. Although Joe had some doubts that Candy was doing this he knew from the very beginning what she been up to. He didn't care, he loved Candy and wanted to be with her, that love made them due the impossible.

I really liked this book, it has something to do with the most important problem in our generation today and that is the dealing of drugs. one of the biggest problems today are because of them and if more people read this book they can understand that they do hurt sometimes and its better to fight them with the people you love than to fight them alone. I wouldn't recommend this book to everybody. I would to people who are dealing through the same problem as this young girl Candy. I would recommend it to drug addicts, "junkies' as so people call them, parents, and most of all people who are fighting or done fighting the addiction of drugs. This book is very inspiring and it could probably save a life.

"Candy," Brooks' fourth compelling novel, portrays the life of a suburaban teenager from the right side of the tracks who unwillingly falls deparately in love with a girl he meets on the streets during a trip to London. However, this girl is no sweet innocent angel. Candy is a prostitute who's addicticted to Heroin, and soon Joe is dragged into her world of desperation. Will a run-in with Candy's pimp become fatal? Or will Joe sacrifice everything to save someone he loves?

" Okay it's taken four books but I finally see the common thread of Brook's books. It's murder. Sure there's doom and gloom but his tightly woven tale of teen emotion is packed with a wallop. Joe Beck meets heroin-addicted prostitute, Candy. As with all of Brook's books he warns the reader of impending danger. "I don't know what would of happened if I hadn't seen the patrol car. Maybe everything would have turned out okay. " Besides falling for Candy, Joe is a talented musician whose band is on the edge of discovery. I think the most exciting scene in the book is where Joe's band the Katies perform in the Black Room. Tension is at an all time high. The sound check was a disaster, Jason the lead singer is strung out on speed and the place is packed including people from a record company and Iggy the villain pimp who is searching for someone. The reader is sure the event is going to be a fiasco and is partially correct. The band electrifies the audience and the reader will feel the energy and get a glimpse of life in a band. But all does not work out by the end of the evening because Iggy found who he was looking for- Candy. This book is sure to please young and old readers alike. The only thing that bothers me is the blue cover. The girl on the front is no Candy. What were the publishers thinking? "