North of Beautiful

by Justina Chen

Book Overview

As he continued to stare, I wanted to point to my cheek and remind him, But you were the one who wanted this, remember? You're the one who asked-and I repeat-Why not fix your face?

It's hard not to notice Terra Cooper.

She's tall, blond, and has an enviable body. But with one turn of her cheek, all people notice is her unmistakably "flawed" face. Terra secretly plans to leave her stifling small town in the Northwest and...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316025054
• ISBN13: 9780316025058
• Release Date: February 2009
• Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.8" x 8.5"
• Age Range: 12 to 17 years
• Grade Range: Grades 7 to 12

Customer Reviews

She stole my heart...

I wasn't so sure about this book before I started it, not in my normal reading genre. I was pleasantly surprised and very moved by the story line and characters. Definitely worth your time!

What is beautiful?

I really liked this story of Terra, a high school senior, who is blond and beautiful, except for a disfiguring birthmark on her cheek, which she tries to cover up with layers of makeup. She has a boyfriend who is definitely not her soul mate but she stays with him because she doesn't think she could get anyone else and everyone tells her how lucky she is to have him. In addition to her own struggles, she is constantly trying to protect her mother from her father -- who is not physically abusive but worse, verbally abusive. The characters really came to life for me in this book and I enjoyed the story immensely. Terra is an artist and I loved hearing about the collages she was creating. Also, interesting was the information about geocatching and maps. In the end, the growth and changes in Terra and her mother were realistic as well as satisfying. I highly recommend this book for teens as well as adults.

Fantatic Journey of Self Discovery

Initially deterred by the abundance of mapping mentions, it took a while to see what lied beneath all the cartography trivia. But around 40 pages in, something shifted, and I was introduced to the raw story that was being obscured by all that detail. North of Beautiful made me gasp for breath while sucking in tears. Because Justina Chen Headley got it exactly right. Terra Cooper is a lost and broken girl, further damaged by the port wine stain splayed across her cheek. Intent on being perfection personified, Terra attempts to obscure her birthmark with a layer of make up and body to die for. A body she has worked rigorously for years to shape. But Terra's pain is more than skin deep, and her drive for obtaining the ultimate physical ideal isn't entirely due to her flawed face. Terra's father finds his pleasure belittling, intimidating and controlling his family. While he may not physically lash out, his verbal attacks do far worse, they manipulate the minds, change the personalities and break the spirits of those who he should find most dear. Terra and her mother are forever dodging his oral lashings in everyway achievable. For Terra, this includes being as close to flawless as possible. Never learning who she is, never able to be herself, or discover who she truly wants to become. Terra's home is a stack of cards, and the slightest wind could turn the tide from verbal abuse, to physical blows. Terra has spent her life walking on eggshells, praying to make it one more day, desperate to leave, but terrified to go due to what she would leave behind. Her mother. Then, one fateful day, Terra's direction changes course. She has a wreck and meets her salvation. Jacob is shiny beacon of truth, acceptance, understanding, and adventure. Everything that Terra needs. With his encouragement, Terra finds the missing pieces of herself, discovers who she is, and where she wants to go. North of Beautiful provides a fantastic journey of self discovery, first love, China, and the meaning of true beauty that is sure to resonate with all of our Iron Goddesses.

Stunning and wonderful...

Wow. My first read of 2010 is a winner! This YA novel is a jewel, a treasure of a book that will resonate with females from 5 to 50. Yes, it's ostensibly the story of a teenaged girl with a port wine stain on her face, but it's so much deeper than that. The reader follows Terra on a journey of self-discovery that includes revelations about the nature and meaning of true beauty. It's somewhat the story of a dysfunctional family with an abusive father, yes -- but also about a mother who's a compulsive eater, distant brothers, an inattentive boyfriend, a self-absorbed best girlfriend, and a self-loathing main character who spends her free time making up her face and creating collages in a local art studio. It's also about meeting that one special someone who "gets you". Terra meets Jacob after almost running him down outside of a coffeehouse. Thus begins the transformation of a lonely, controlled but ambitious girl into "iron goddess". Using map-making terminology throughout, North of Beautiful is an amazingly complex novel loaded with many interesting details. Terra, Jacob and their mothers embark on a trip to China that exceeds all expectations and transforms each of the travelers into the person he/she was ultimately meant to be. Just as Terra builds her collages, layer upon layer, the experiences each has in that country reveal the hidden beauty that every person carries inside. I loved this book. Stop reading this review right now and order it. Read it and love it as I did. Pass it on to everyone you know!

Beautifuk

If you look at Terra, you'd think that she has the perfect life. She's tall, blonde and has popular boyfriend. But as soon as you take a glance at her face, you see, on her left cheek, a port-wine stain. All of Terra's life has been spent trying to cover it up, through makeup and unsuccessful laser treatments. Another blemish on her life is inner. Her father routinely abuses her family; degrading her mother to the point where her spirit has been broken. Because of her controlling and verbally abusive father, Terra's only dream is to escape her family and go to college at Williams and learn art. Except, of course, Terra's father decides that art is a waste of time and refuses to allow Terra to attend her first-choice college. He insists that she attend the university of his choice. Heartbroken, Terra is unable to figure out what to do... That's when, after nearly running him over, Terra meets Jacob. A strange Goth Chinese boy, Jacob doesn't care what anyone thinks and is able to see past the perfect illusion that Terra tries to hide beneath. And then, when Terra's absentee brother send her tickets for her mother and her to go to China, she leaps at the chance. Jacob and his adoptive mother choose to accompany them, with their mission of finding the orphanage where she adopted Jacob from. It is on that trip where Terra learns more about the world, her family and what it'd take to set her free. So, as earlier established, I really enjoyed North of Beautiful. I've read Justina Chen Headley's other books and enjoyed them, but none of them measured up to North of Beautiful. Everything in the novel is layed out perfectly. I particularly enjoyed the mentions of maps and geocaches in the novel. I found them to be symbolic, revealing the changes in Terra as the novel went on. Terra's family situation in North of Beautiful is painful to read about, at times. Terra's father, while not physically abusive, is horrible. Terra and her mother's sense of entrapment is clear. While this type of set-up is not unique in the YA genre, the way that it is approached in North of Beautiful is. The travel aspect, Terra's port-wine stain and the simultaneous self-discovery of Terra's mother make North of Beautiful engrossing. None of the main characters are stereotypical. There's a back-story to every one of them, ranging from Jacob's adoption and purpose behind his "goth appearance' to his mother's desire to go to China to escape the wedding of her ex-husband. Terra is a character one can easily relate with. Her situation contains aspects that many teens can relate to, including family issues, a desire to escape and make your own path and other teenage issues regarding friendships and relationships. To add on to the appeal of North of Beautiful, Terra's narrative voice in North of Beautiful is unique, Justina Chen Headley's writing is wonderful. Her prose is smooth, filled with subtle metaphors and is a complete delight to well-read eyes. Clearly, I adored Nor

One of the best YA books I have ever read

The first thing that came to mind after I finished this book was, Wow why haven't I read any books by this author before? This story was such a wonderful read that I couldn't stop once I got started. It wasn't just a YA novel, it was a story that anyone could read, enjoy, and learn from. Terra is a character that will stay with you forever. You felt her pain, as she has to live with this mark on her face, and how she tries to hide it in the beginning to the point where no one knows about it anymore except her and her family. Her struggle with accepting herself is the basis of the book, and the reader is taken along for the heart wrenching yet soul finding ride. Her mother's story is equally as powerful as Terra watches her mother break out of the shell created by Terra's father. Oh man, I really hated Terra's father. Seriously, while I was reading this book I was hoping that he would be killed or something equally as horrible by the end of the book. It's one of the few times where I have felt so strongly against a character. Any kind of abuse is horrible but verbal abuse can be even more painful than physical. There are no bruises or broken bones, but your spirit and soul can be destroyed by words even more than fists. He had to go down as one of the most hated characters for me ever. I really enjoyed all the geography bits and the geocaching scenes throughout the book. My fiance is a geographical analyst, so all this stuff is right up his alley. I also loved the scenes in China as I would love to visit the country one day. But as like Jacob, I would probably get the same reactions he received, where people assumed he was the one who spoke the language simply because he looked like everyone else. The descriptions of the city made me feel like I was really there. The scene that stuck out to me the most was when Terra meets the little girl at the orphanage. It honestly made me want to cry and when you read it, you might feel the same way too. Another thing that struck me about this book was that this was one of the very few times I have seen a book that has a relationship between a Caucasian girl and an Asian guy. Even more astounding was that the Asian guy was NOT the normal stereotype of an engineer or a doctor or one with aspirations to be one of the two. Yes he was adopted but he was just a regular normal teenage guy who happened to be Asian. It's very rare to read about this in a book, as it's not the norm even in real life. I was very glad to see the stereotype be broken though. I'm going to have to go back and read the rest of Justina's books now after reading this one. This one was a joy to read and honestly one of the best YA books I've ever read. Such a poignant and beautiful story. HIGHLY recommended.