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Rainbow Rowell

Eleanor & Park Kindle Edition

by Rainbow Rowell (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

10,252 ratings

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#1 New York Times Best Seller!

"Eleanor & Park reminded me not just what it's like to be young and in love with a girl, but also what it's like to be young and in love with a book."-John Green, The New York Times Book Review
Bono met his wife in high school, Park says.
So did Jerry Lee Lewis, Eleanor answers.
I'm not kidding, he says.
You should be, she says, we're 16.
What about Romeo and Juliet?
Shallow, confused, then dead.
I love you, Park says.
Wherefore art thou, Eleanor answers.
I'm not kidding, he says.
You should be.
Set over the course of one school year in 1986, this is the story of two star-crossed misfits-smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try. When Eleanor meets Park, you'll remember your own first love-and just how hard it pulled you under.

A New York Times Best Seller!
A 2014 Michael L. Printz Honor Book for Excellence in Young Adult Literature
Eleanor & Park is the winner of the 2013 Boston Globe Horn Book Award for Best Fiction Book.
A Publishers Weekly Best Children's Book of 2013
A New York Times Book Review Notable Children's Book of 2013
A Kirkus Reviews Best Teen Book of 2013
An NPR Best Book of 2013

Print length

335 pages
Language

English
Publisher

St. Martin's Griffin
Publication date

February 26, 2013
Reading age

13 - 18 years
Grade level

8 - 12
File size

575 KB
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Rainbow Rowell
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Popular Highlights in this book

What are popular highlights?

“I don’t think I even breathe when we’re not together,” she whispered.
Highlighted by 3,686 Kindle readers
She never felt like she belonged anywhere, except for when she was lying on her bed, pretending to be somewhere else.
Highlighted by 2,919 Kindle readers
“I just want to break that song into pieces,” she said, “and love them all to death.”
Highlighted by 1,510 Kindle readers

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Funny, hopeful, foul-mouthed, sexy and tear-jerking, this winning romance will captivate teen and adult readers alike" -- KIRKUS, starred review

"The pure, fear-laced, yet steadily maturing relationship Eleanor and Park develop is urgent and breathtaking and, of course, heartbreaking, too." -- BOOKLIST, starred review

"This sexy, smart, tender romance thrums with punk rock and true love." -- GAYLE FORMAN, author of If I Stay

"A breathless, achingly good read about love and outsiders." -- STEPHANIE PERKINS, author of Anna and the French Kiss

Amazon.com Review

An Amazon Best Book of the Month, March 2013: While Eleanor & Park is technically classified as YA lit and has a cutesy cover, don’t let the stigma of “books for teens” fool or deter you. It is written about teens, sure, but the themes are so universal that anyone who survived high school will relate to the lives of the two protagonists. Eleanor is the new girl in town and her wild red hair and patchwork outfits are not helping her blend in. She ends up sitting next to Park on the bus, whose tendencies towards comic books don’t jibe with the rest of his family’s love of sports. They sit in awkward silence every day until Park notices that Eleanor is reading his comics over his shoulder; he begins to slide them closer to her side of the seat and thus begins their love story. Their relationship grows gradually--making each other mixed tapes (it is 1986 after all) and discussing X-Men characters--until they both find themselves looking forward to the bus ride more than any other part of the day. Things aren’t easy: Eleanor is bullied at school and then goes home to a threatening family situation; Park’s parents do not approve of Eleanor’s awkward ways. Ultimately, though, this is a book about two people who just really, really like each other and who believe that they can overcome any obstacle standing in the way of their happiness. It’s a gem of a book. --Caley Anderson --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Eleanor & Park

By Rainbow Rowell

St. Martin's Press

Copyright © 2014 Rainbow Rowell
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-250-04499-0

Excerpt

1

park

XTC was no good for drowning out the morons at the back of the bus.
Park pressed his headphones into his ears.
Tomorrow he was going to bring Skinny Puppy or the Misfits. Or maybe he’d make a special bus tape with as much screaming and wailing on it as possible.
He could get back to New Wave in November, after he got his driver’s license. His parents had already said Park could have his mom’s Impala, and he’d been saving up for a new tape deck. Once he started driving to school, he could listen to whatever he wanted or nothing at all, and he’d get to sleep in an extra twenty minutes.
“That doesn’t exist!” somebody shouted behind him.
“It so fucking does!” Steve shouted back. “Drunken Monkey style, man, it’s a real fucking thing. You can kill somebody with it.…”
“You’re full of shit.”
“You’re full of shit,” Steve said. “Park! Hey, Park.”
Park heard him, but didn’t answer. Sometimes, if you ignored Steve for a minute, he moved on to someone else. Knowing that was 80 percent of surviving with Steve as your neighbor. The other 20 percent was just keeping your head down.…
Which Park had momentarily forgotten. A ball of paper hit him in the back of the head.
“Those were my Human Growth and Development notes, dicklick,” Tina said.
“I’m sorry, baby,” Steve said. “I’ll teach you all about human growth and development—what do you need to know?”
“Teach her Drunken Monkey style,” somebody said.
“Park!” Steve shouted.
Park pulled down his headphones and turned to the back of the bus. Steve was holding court in the last seat. Even sitting, his head practically touched the roof. Steve always looked like he was surrounded by doll furniture. He’d looked like a grown man since the seventh grade, and that was before he grew a full beard. Slightly before.
Sometimes Park wondered if Steve was with Tina because she made him look even more like a monster. Most of the girls from the Flats were small, but Tina couldn’t be five feet. Massive hair included.
Once, back in middle school, some guy had tried to give Steve shit about how he better not get Tina pregnant because if he did, his giant babies would kill her. “They’ll bust out of her stomach like in Aliens,” the guy said. Steve broke his little finger on the guy’s face.
When Park’s dad heard, he said, “Somebody needs to teach that Murphy kid how to make a fist.” But Park hoped nobody would. The guy who Steve hit couldn’t open his eyes for a week.
Park tossed Tina her balled-up homework. She caught it.
“Park,” Steve said, “tell Mikey about Drunken Monkey karate.”
“I don’t know anything about it.” Park shrugged.
“But it exists, right?”
“I guess I’ve heard of it.”
“There,” Steve said. He looked for something to throw at Mikey, but couldn’t find anything. He pointed instead. “I fucking told you.”
“What the fuck does Sheridan know about kung fu?” Mikey said.
“Are you retarded?” Steve said. “His mom’s Chinese.”
Mikey looked at Park carefully. Park smiled and narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, I guess I see it,” Mikey said. “I always thought you were Mexican.”
“Shit, Mikey,” Steve said, “you’re such a fucking racist.”
“She’s not Chinese,” Tina said. “She’s Korean.”
“Who is?” Steve asked.
“Park’s mom.”
Park’s mom had been cutting Tina’s hair since grade school. They both had the exact same hairstyle: long spiral perms with tall feathered bangs.
“She’s fucking hot is what she is,” Steve said, cracking himself up. “No offense, Park.”
Park managed another smile and slunk back into his seat, putting his headphones back on and cranking up the volume. He could still hear Steve and Mikey, four seats behind him.
“But what’s the fucking point?” Mikey asked.
“Dude, would you want to fight a drunk monkey? They’re fucking huge. Like Every Which Way But Loose, man. Imagine that bastard losing his shit on you.”
Park noticed the new girl at about the same time everybody else did. She was standing at the front of the bus, next to the first available seat.
There was a kid sitting there by himself, a freshman. He put his bag down on the seat beside him, then looked the other way. All down the aisle, anybody who was sitting alone moved to the edge of their seats. Park heard Tina snicker; she lived for this stuff.
The new girl took a deep breath and stepped farther down the aisle. Nobody would look at her. Park tried not to, but it was kind of a train wreck/eclipse situation.
The girl just looked like exactly the sort of person this would happen to.
Not just new—but big and awkward. With crazy hair, bright red on top of curly. And she was dressed like … like she wanted people to look at her. Or maybe like she didn’t get what a mess she was. She had on a plaid shirt, a man’s shirt, with half a dozen weird necklaces hanging around her neck and scarves wrapped around her wrists. She reminded Park of a scarecrow or one of the trouble dolls his mom kept on her dresser. Like something that wouldn’t survive in the wild.
The bus stopped again, and a bunch more kids got on. They pushed past the girl, knocking into her, and dropped into their own seats.
That was the thing—everybody on the bus already had a seat. They’d all claimed one on the first day of school. People like Park, who were lucky enough to have a whole seat to themselves, weren’t going to give that up now. Especially not for someone like this.
Park looked back up at the girl. She was just standing there.
“Hey, you,” the bus driver yelled, “sit down!”
The girl started moving toward the back of the bus. Right into the belly of the beast. God, Park thought, stop. Turn around. He could feel Steve and Mikey licking their chops as she got closer. He tried again to look away.
Then the girl spotted an empty seat just across from Park. Her face lit with relief, and she hurried toward it.
“Hey,” Tina said sharply.
The girl kept moving.
“Hey,” Tina said, “Bozo.”
Steve started laughing. His friends fell in a few seconds behind him.
“You can’t sit there,” Tina said. “That’s Mikayla’s seat.”
The girl stopped and looked up at Tina, then looked back at the empty seat.
“Sit down,” the driver bellowed from the front.
“I have to sit somewhere,” the girl said to Tina in a firm, calm voice.
“Not my problem,” Tina snapped. The bus lurched, and the girl rocked back to keep from falling. Park tried to turn the volume up on his Walkman, but it was already all the way up. He looked back at the girl; it looked like she was starting to cry.
Before he’d even decided to do it, Park scooted toward the window.
“Sit down,” he said. It came out angrily. The girl turned to him, like she couldn’t tell whether he was another jerk or what. “Jesus-fuck,” Park said softly, nodding to the space next to him, “just sit down.”
The girl sat down. She didn’t say anything—thank God, she didn’t thank him—and she left six inches of space on the seat between them.
Park turned toward the Plexiglas window and waited for a world of suck to hit the fan.

Copyright © 2013 by Rainbow Rowell

(Continues...)Excerpted from Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell. Copyright © 2014 by Rainbow Rowell. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

About the Author

RAINBOW ROWELL lives in Omaha, Nebraska, with her husband and two sons. She's also the author of Carry On, Landline, Fangirl, Eleanor & Park, and Attachments. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Right from the start of this tender debut, readers can almost hear the clock winding down on Eleanor and Park. After a less than auspicious start, the pair quietly builds a relationship while riding the bus to school every day, wordlessly sharing comics and eventually music on the commute. Their worlds couldn’t be more different. Park’s family is idyllic: his Vietnam vet father and Korean immigrant mother are genuinely loving. Meanwhile, Eleanor and her younger siblings live in poverty under the constant threat of Richie, their abusive and controlling stepfather, while their mother inexplicably caters to his whims. The couple’s personal battles are also dark mirror images. Park struggles with the realities of falling for the school outcast; in one of the more subtle explorations of race and the other in recent YA fiction, he clashes with his father over the definition of manhood. Eleanor’s fight is much more external, learning to trust her feelings about Park and navigating the sexual threat in Richie’s watchful gaze. In rapidly alternating narrative voices, Eleanor and Park try to express their all-consuming love. You make me feel like a cannibal, Eleanor says. The pure, fear-laced, yet steadily maturing relationship they develop is urgent, moving, and, of course, heartbreaking, too. Grades 9-12. --Courtney Jones --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From School Library Journal

Gr 9 Up-Eleanor, 15, is the new girl at school and bullied because she's overweight and dresses in a flamboyant manner. Park is a half-Korean boy who has lived in Omaha, Nebraska, all his life but still feels like an outsider. This is a story of first love, which very slowly builds from the first day Eleanor sits next to Park on the school bus. First they ignore each other, and then they slowly become friends through their love of comic books and 1980s alternative music. Park is the only good thing in Eleanor's life. Her home life is a miserable exercise in trying to stay out of her abusive stepfather's way, and finding new ways to wear the same clothes repeatedly since there is no money for anything extra. Park adores everything about Eleanor, and she finds refuge at his house after school with his understanding parents. Things finally explode at Eleanor's house and Eleanor and Park's relationship is truly tested. The narrative points of view alternate between Eleanor and Park, adding dimension to Rowell's story (St. Martin's Griffin, 2013), and narrators Rebecca Lowman and Sunil Malhtra competently voice the pair. Give this to teenage girls who crave romance.-Julie Paladino, East Chapel Hill High School, NCα(c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Review

"Funny, hopeful, foul-mouthed, sexy and tear-jerking, this winning romance will captivate teen and adult readers alike" -- KIRKUS, starred review

"The pure, fear-laced, yet steadily maturing relationship Eleanor and Park develop is urgent and breathtaking and, of course, heartbreaking, too." -- BOOKLIST, starred review

"This sexy, smart, tender romance thrums with punk rock and true love." -- GAYLE FORMAN, author of If I Stay

"A breathless, achingly good read about love and outsiders." -- STEPHANIE PERKINS, author of Anna and the French Kiss

--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B008SAZHLQ
Publisher ‏ : ‎ St. Martin's Griffin; Special ed. edition (February 26, 2013)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ February 26, 2013
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 575 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 335 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #55,306 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #43 in Teen & Young Adult Historical Romance eBooks
- #137 in Teen & Young Adult Fiction on Dating & Sex (Kindle Store)
- #145 in Teen & Young Adult Historical Romance

Customer Reviews:
10,252 ratings

About the author

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Rainbow Rowell

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Rainbow Rowell writes all kinds of stuff.

Sometimes she writes about adults (ATTACHMENTS, LANDLINE). Sometimes she writes about teenagers (ELEANOR & PARK, FANGIRL). Sometimes — actually, a lot of the time — she writes about lovesick vampires and guys with dragon wings (THE SIMON SNOW TRILOGY).

Recently, she's been writing comics, including her first graphic novel, PUMPKINHEADS, and the monthly SHE-HULK comic for Marvel.

She lives in Omaha, Nebraska.

Customer reviews

5 star		73%
4 star		16%
3 star		6%
2 star		2%
1 star		2%

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Top reviews from the United States

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Bonnie N. Tilton

I adore this wonderful book.

Reviewed in the United States on September 24, 2016

Verified Purchase

I am still wiping my eyes. They refuse to stop weeping. I do not know what ages this book was written for, but I am 81, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I wish I could add an extra star or two. Thank you.

338 people found this helpful

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Rachel Reads Ravenously

<3

Reviewed in the United States on October 20, 2017

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5 stars

“Holding Eleanor's hand was like holding a butterfly. Or a heartbeat. Like holding something complete, and completely alive.”

Can you all believe I had never read this book until now? Yeah, neither can I. Because that is CRAZY! To be fair, I put it off a lot. In a weird way that doesn't make sense, I didn't want to ruin Fangirl. And this book didn't, I still love Fangirl, I just have a different kind of love for Eleanor and Park.

This book is about two outcast teens who become friends when they are forced to sit next to each other on the bus to and from school. At first, they don't really understand each other, but as time goes by, they want to get to know each other and develop an amazing friendship, and then romance.

“What are the chances you’d ever meet someone like that? he wondered. Someone you could love forever, someone who would forever love you back? And what did you do when that person was born half a world away? The math seemed impossible.”

This is going to be a shorter review because I think everyone has already said all the things about this book. But MY HEART. This book made me wish that men like Park existed in real life, because no man could measure up to this guy. And Eleanor, I bled for that girl. I just wanted to hug her and tell her she was beautiful and that someone cared.

Anyways, if you are stupid like me and haven't read this book, you need to correct this giant mistake asap. You won't regret this one!

“I don't like you, Park," she said, sounding for a second like she actually meant it. "I..." - her voice nearly disappeared - "think I live for you."
He closed his eyes and pressed his head back into his pillow.
"I don't think I even breathe when we're not together," she whispered. "Which means, when I see you on Monday morning, it's been like sixty hours since I've taken a breath. That's probably why I'm so crabby, and why I snap at you. All I do when we're apart is think about you, and all I do when we're together is panic. Because every second feels so important. And because I'm so out of control, I can't help myself. I'm not even mine anymore, I'm yours, and what if you decide that you don't want me? How could you want me like I want you?"
He was quiet. He wanted everything she'd just said to be the last thing he heard. He wanted to fall asleep with 'I want you' in his ears.”

69 people found this helpful

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fitzg

Racism in the book

Reviewed in the United States on July 19, 2018

Verified Purchase

I love a love story. I’m not done reading the book as yet. But so far...it’s cute. Now here’s why I’m writing an early review..... the author is a middle-class White women and this story has a racist undertone not gonna lie. My issue is that I’m not sure if Rockwell herself has any experience with folks of Color or not(considering she is very much from middle American aka....Nebraska) but her descriptions of Black or of other races besides White is very disappointing. The “Black Girls” in the book names are just that “Black Girls”. Character descriptions are very stereotypical and vague. They have no name or backstory aka no place in this White woman’s love story basically. Park one of the main characters “looks Asian” again very distasteful and stereotypical. My close friend is of East Asian decent.She “doesn’t look Asian”. But she is.Park is half Korean. So ha! He doesn’t look Chinese? Which is also a stereotype..... a very played out one. Main character is a fat red head White girl whom by the way Rainbow wrote her character, we are made to feel really really bad for her. Which feeds Into the “White Woman or girl” narrative of always being a victim. Park who is of color does not have it as bad as Eleanor a White girl. Who is written as remarkably poor. Even though she has privilege to be judged by her character not just a “Black Girl” 😑or perhaps “looking Asian” aka she has the luxury of being acknowledged and or existing. So all this to say if you don’t know any people of color hunny write just a White story. Don’t include us by the way you perceive us. It’s offensive as well distasteful. This really made me cringe while reading. And at one point one of the White characters says “Jungle Fever” is a Black thing”. Listen don’t reference a Spike lee film in such a distasteful manner. Smfh Especially when the author most likely has not viewed Do The Right Thing. A film about intolerance. And ultimately the reality was no one really did the right thing. Oh and let me not get started on how she wrote the Asian character’s mother very very very stereotypical. Not a good look. Don’t include us in your story on your racist terms. Stick to what you know.

149 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Rachel (Confessions of a Book Geek)

Ultimately left unsatisfied. Overhyped.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 12, 2017

Verified Purchase

Perhaps it was the ridiculous amount of hype surrounding this book, or the author in general, that resulted in me expecting a serious masterpiece, and which ultimately left me feeling a little... unsatisfied. The novel was reasonably well-written, with diverse characters, and it had some serious tug-on-the-heart-strings moments. But the ending was infuriating, the plot wasn't without its problems, and overall it didn't blow me away like I was willing it to.

While the book does have a slow-burning cute romance, and a hefty amount of more serious family issues, I really struggled with the fact that for me, the majority of the romance was so unbelievable.

19 people found this helpful

Emma

Read in one sitting!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 3, 2018

Verified Purchase

I read this book on a plane journey and literally read it from start to finish without putting it down.

It is a YA novel about a teen romance, so something we have all seen before, but it was somehow very different from the average novel of this genre. Eleanor and Park are both so well written they seem completely real, and it feels like their relationship could and would happen in real life. The way they communiate on their bus journeys was just so touching, and was so authntic as to how teenage romances are in the beginning.

It also meant a lot that the main characters were more diverse than the norm. In YA fiction, I have never come across a female protagonist who was described as fat, unless the story involved her losing weight in order to achieve her happily ever after. This is not the case with Eleanor. She is not thin, and that's just how it is. She still gets the guy, and still deserves to be happy and in love - a mesaage that young girls could do with hearing much more often. Park is also the first Korean leading man that I have read about, and there is a passage in the book that refers to how asian men are often overlooked, so it is good to see a character like this in the limelight, discussing openly what it is like to grow up in a household like his.

There are some painful experiences for the characters in this book, along with some moments of sheer happiness and excitement, and as a reader I felt like I lived through all of these moments with them. Eleanor has a tough life, but she finds an escape with Park, and this means that the book remains hopeful, even through the dark moments.

This is a wonderful YA book, the best I have read in a while.

6 people found this helpful

Téa

there are quite a few 'big' swears including 'f' and 'the bad c' words and some sensitive subjects touched on

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 9, 2017

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I read this prior to giving it to my daughter (it was meant for her). There is a warning on the back about not being suitable for younger readers; there are quite a few 'big' swears including 'f' and 'the bad c' words and some sensitive subjects touched on. However, it is not gratuitous at all and whilst you wouldn't get the swear words on Hollyoaks, they have covered similar sensitive topics before the watershed. I am happy for my 12 year old to read it as she is sensible enough to talk to me about it if she has questions and having both read it we can talk about what we thought. We shed tears over different parts! I found it engaging, as an 80s child some parts were amusing to me that will go over my daughter's head. I think that the touchy subjects that have caused controversy have been raised sensitively; it's a difficult balance to write for a young adult audience and I respect what the author has achieved. I always encourage questions and discussion, I don't wrap my daughter in cotton wool, it will depend on the maturity of each young person as to whether this book is suitable for them but please don't veto it on the basis of the hype.

9 people found this helpful

Astrid

Beautiful book - just unsure about the ending.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 4, 2016

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Wow. This book started off fast paced and beautifully. I couldn't put it down, I devoured it in a few days (and the times I wasn't reading it I was wanting to read it and it was all I could think about). The story focuses on Eleanor, a chubby girl with curly red hair who is very insecure, and Park, an Asian boy who loves superheros and keeps himself to himself. She has to sit next to him on the bus on her first day of school (when the bus hierarchy has already been established), and their love blossoms. She is bullied by the other kids, but she takes it in her stride and tries her best to ignore it. I love how fast paced the book is, however, it feels right. With a lot of fast paced books, they can feel rushed as if the author just wants to finish. This one didn't feel like that, it fit in with the story well. I love Eleanor and Park's romance, and can relate to Eleanor a fair bit (being an insecure chubby female myself).

I'm not sure how I feel about the ending of this book (it is left in a way that you, the reader, decide the ending). I like closure, and this book didn't give it to me. So I'm not sure if I like that. It was, however, a fitting end for the book. I'm just not sure if I'm happy it ended in the way it did, or extremely angry. That's why I've given this book 4/5, because I can't decide.

I'd recommend this book to people who like YA coming of age/romance books, such as The Fault in Our Stars - which is what made me read the book initially, John Greene's recommendation.

Beautiful story. Memorable. Made me laugh and cry a lot, and I'm sure it'll stay with me for a while. I'm just kind of hoping eventually, just maybe, the author will decide to follow up on the ending and let us know how Eleanor and Park are getting on.

- Also posted on my Goodreads account -

11 people found this helpful

Pamela Scott

Tender and beautiful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 3, 2018

Verified Purchase

Oh my God, I loved this book so much, it took my little heart and snapped it into pieces. Eleanor is an amazing character. I felt just like her in school, the weird girl who stuck out like a sore thumb no matter how she tried to be invisible. I loved Park as well. The relationship that develops between them, starting off as barely even friendship and turning into first love is sweet, beautifully written and heart-breaking at times. I love things develop between them with Park giving her comic books to read and neither of them really speaking to each other. It’s not all sweet and mushy. Eleanor & Park takes dark tone towards the end as Eleanor discovers just why her step-father is so awful. Eleanor & Park is amazing. I cried and laughed a lot.

5 people found this helpful

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