Jellicoe Road

Product Information

I think what also added to my experience was that I read this with a group of besties. We'd text eachother our thoughts and laugh about how much this book was making us cry. I had the best time reading this. A thousand thanks to Fares for suggesting we read one of his favourite books. It has become one of mine as well 🌻.

Seriously, this woman is one of the most creative people alive, one of the most amazing writers I came across and I wish I could put into words the actual awesomeness of this book, but I feel a bit at a loss for words – well, once again. I feel like her stories have a soul. Like her characters are living beings, trapped in a fantasy world, waiting for us to come and listen to their stories. They seem to breathe through our emotions, and I don’t remember a moment when I didn’t feel something (deep) towards this story and these wonderful characters. These people have history and I crave history. I crave someone knowing me so well that they can tell what I'm thinking." The Territory wars. I thought that storyline was limping on both feet. Why all the intensity if the whole thing only takes place for about 2 months each year? Why the whole issue with the Club House when it's only a few weeks when it becomes relevant? Honestly, just setting up a rivalry between the 'factions' would have been enough for the story. Especially since about halfway through the story any of that territory stuff becomes completely irrelevant as nobody pays any attention to it anymore. The story is of Taylor Markham, a girl who was abandoned by her mother as a young child and now resides in a boarding school for kids who are troubled, neglected or criminally inclined. Her closest friend and mentor is Hannah, a woman who lives on the edge of the school grounds. Taylor is elected as a leader in the territory war games played by her school with the Townies (locals) and Cadets.On the Jellicoe Road is more than just a book; it is a hauntingly beautiful journey towards an unexpected destination where tragedy and despair become the bridges to the greatest of friendships. Word of advice— suitably apt mood music will make reading this endlessly more exhilarating. Do it. Trust me. Here's mine: The Takedown by Koda & Dabin.

Taylo Sometimes the books we love tell us morethings about ourselves than about the characters and the author. And maybe that’s why this is my favorite story – because the connection between Taylor and I is stronger than what I felt with any other character – I can understand her, I know where she’s going, what she wants and what/why she’s scared of.This book is about love, every kind of love. The one between siblings. The one that's so intense it's everything to you and leaves you dying when that love suddenly stops. The one that's as natural as breathing. The one that you try to bury beneath excuses. And about the love for life, for living, despite it continuously trying to shove you down. To top all of Taylor’s problems off, there is a territory war going on between the boarders, the Townies (kids from the Jellicoe Town) and the Cadets (Sydney boys who come for a six-week training exercise every year to Jellicoe). The leader of the cadets this year happens to be the very boy who Taylor ran away with when she was 14 in search of her mother. The one who betrayed her trust and she never wants to see again.

The two story lines merge as Taylor begins to understand the meaning of Hannah's writings, which help explain Taylor's dreams and memories. The five inseparable companions from the 1980s invented the territory wars. Hannah is the “Narnie” of the written story, and she is in love with the Cadet, Jude Scanlon, who became the Brigadier. Hannah's brother was Xavier Webster “Webb” Schroeder, who impregnated Tate, Taylor's mother. Fitz, the rescuer, accidentally shot and killed Webb, after which he committed suicide. And now Hannah, the person Taylor had come to rely on, has disappeared. Taylor's only clue is a manuscript about five kids who lived in Jellicoe eighteen years ago. She needs to find out more, but this means confronting her own story, making sense of her strange, recurring dream, and finding her mother- who abandoned her on the Jellicoe Road." Now, I have to say that not once did I look at this book as a mystery even though it's marketed as such. The central mystery of the story - well, I easily figured it out only a few chapters in, and the rest of the details easily came into light as the story developed. Not much took me by surprise; it was quite predictable, actually. But since the mystery was not why I enjoyed the story, the reading experience was perfectly fine. To use the book's own language, the whole mystery setup was not a trip but a journey. It was never about the resolution but about the emotional journey it took to get there. " I remember asking, "What is the difference between a trip and a journey?" and my father said, "Narnie, my love, when we get there, you'll understand," and that was the last thing he ever said."What I loved was the friendships that the 'old five' and the 'new five' have developed throughout the course of their respective stories. My favorite by far was between Taylor and Raffaela, with the developing friendship with annoying but adorable Jessa as a close second. Even though there was a romantic story threatening to take the foreground, it never overshadowed the rest of the story and the friendships, and I'm thankful for that. " This is the best night of my life," Raffy says, crying.When she runs across a book/journal written by Hannah, she begins to unveil some long-standing secrets. Along with some friends from her school, she has several creepy encounters and a variety of adventures. There is some sort of rivalry described between the two groups of kids...but I was pretty confused so I can't say I ever really grasped what that was about for sure. And so here I am, begging you to read this book if you haven't done so yet. Let it be a journey for you. Another thing that might bother readers is that some characters go through a lot of tragic events, sometimes too many. However, the story never becomes overly melodramatic or emotionally manipulative IMO. When Chaz shows her a picture of a boy their age who disappeared years before, Taylor realizes two things: The boy is not only one of the kids in Hannah's book, but is actually her father. By the time she sees a photo of the five kids themselves—including her mother, who was also one of them—Taylor is past the point of taking no for an answer when she asks about her past, and decides it's time to take drastic action. Taylor's past is filled with abandonment, grief and pain. When her caretaker at school, Hannah, the only adult she trusts, leaves unexpectedly Taylor has a need to know where Hannah could be and in doing so also finds out other unexpected truths.