Guitar Notes

This is a fascinating story you can easily relate to, and warning you may cry and laugh out loud! Tripp Broody is a shy, awkward boy that just wants to be alone and play his guitar. Lyla Marks on the other hand is the perfect, organized, strait A student. Tripp’s mom has a plan to help him “socialize”, so she takes away his guitar. He finds a guitar at the school but doesn’t have time to play it. So he schedules to use the practice room on odd days. Lyla also uses the practice rooms on even days. These two personalities could never mix. Or could they? Rude notes back and forth turn into making plans to write songs together. This is a fun book with teenagers and twists! I liked this book because I could see myself in a situation similar to that. I loved how thought to be enemies turned out to be best of friends.This is a great story that pulled me in and I could literally not stop reading. If you like realistic fiction that you can put yourself into this book is for you! I loved how the characters got out of their comfort zones and went for their dreams. Guitar notes is a great read about music, friendship, and passion! Written by Aspen, 7th grader

What a sweet book! Absolutely loved it. Loved it. It's been a while since I've read a contemporary fiction book and a really long while since a book has been this sweet. You can clearly read romance into the whole thing, but that's not really what it's about a friendship that develops over a period of time AND about doing what matters to you. The way it was written, the characters and the plot were just not something I've read in awhile, and it was a breath of fresh air! The main characters: Lyla was great. Funny and real and determined and sweet. I liked her a lot. She wasn't perfect, although everyone at school thinks she is. Her struggle was so believable. I felt for her. She wants to make everyone happy, but is finding that in doing so she's not happy herself. But like most teenagers, she doesn't know how to change anything. No Tripp - he's great too. Super funny and if he was a girl I'd call him a spitfire! What he does to get back at his mom is great! But what I really liked was the depth to his character. I gained an understanding about why he behaved how he did, and it was wonderful to have that depth build into him. The two of them together were a perfect match (and not really in the romantic way!). It was so great to watch their friendship grow and see how they pushed each other. Wonderful. I was actually sad at the end of the book, because I wanted to experience them more. Their story was just a great place to be. And if that isn't enough to get you to read the book - I read it in one evening. That RARELY happens with me!

I am in love with this book. I saw it at the book store and wanted to read it desperately. Now that I have, I have no regrets. Although it really isn't a romance between Tripp and Lyra, it's a special friendship that is connected through music. The only thing I didn't particularly like was that it didn't give details on what the characters look like besides two times. Get past that though and it's a great read. It's an emotional book. Humorous but there was one part that got me to cry. There is also some bonuses to the book. If you are a guitarists, somewhere in the middle of the book, it gives you a link to the website Lyra makes. Click on it and you can download and listen to the songs they write. At the very end of the book are the songs, chords, and how to play the chords. Boom, you just taught yourself how to play some songs. Music lovers should really read this if interested. Totally worth it.

I'm a junior high teacher and I'm constantly buying books for my classroom library. I bought this one recently and decided to read it myself before putting it on the shelf (Hey, that rhymes!). Guitar Notes is a story told through the eyes of Lyla Marks (a seemingly perfect honor student/cellist) and Tripp Broody (a seemingly odd slacker/guitarist). The story opens on the first day of school. Tripp finds out his mom hijacks his beloved guitar because she feels all he does is lock himself in his room and play it. She wants him to become more social and bring up his grades. Needless to say, he is MAD...and desperate. Switch to Lyla...she is starting to suffer anxiety from being under so much pressure all the time to be a perfect daughter/friend and serious musician. Tripp and Lyla's paths cross when they both sign up to use a music practice room during lunch. For Tripp, this is a way around his mother's punishment since he will get to use one of the school's guitar when he uses the practice room. For Lyla, it's a way to escape the stress that surrounds her and be alone for a while. Soon, they start leaving behind notes for one another in the practice room, which start over Tripp leaving behind some trash one day, but quickly evolve into notes about music and their lives. It was a cute story and I LOVED the idea of a boy and girl communicating through notes. It sounds very romantic. HOWEVER, if you're looking for more romance, then look elsewhere. Guitar Notes is the story of a great friendship between a girl and a boy, but I wouldn't call it a romance. I can see Lyla and Tripp getting together sometime in the future, but this book didn't go that far. And that's ok. I think Lyla and Tripp both needed a friend first, someone to "get" them, and they found that in one another. My main complaint with the book is the climax/falling action/resolution. It happens WAY too fast. I kept waiting to see how Lyla was going to deal with her father who expected her to follow in her mother's footsteps to be a professional cellist and attend a prestigious music school. Lyla figures out she might not want this, but doesn't know how to tell her father. I was also looking forward to how Lyla would deal with her suffocating friendship with Annie. Annie wasn't a bad person, but she was very intense and kept expecting Lyla to care as much as she did about auditions, talent shows, and getting accepted to a prestigious music school. However, we don't get to "see" Lyla deal with them at all. The climax is traumatic, yes. But it's over fairly quickly, and this lessens the emotional impact of the event. Then it's fast forward to the end. I felt like I was missing a few chapters at this point. We're left guessing that the climax must be the catalyst that "helps" Lyla solve her problems, but I think the story would've been much stronger if there had been more showing than telling at this point. Guitar Notes is a clean story. No profanity that I can recall, and no drug use, violence, or sexual situations. Definitely appropriate for ages 10+.

You will cry. It's amazing