By Jovanna Brinck
Courier Columnist
Bittersweet by Sarah Ockler is about a seventeen-year-old girl named Hudson Avery, who is questioning whether or not to get back into her most beloved hobby, ice-skating.
This book starts three years before, when she was an eighth grader, competing in an ice-skating competition that could open so many doors into her skating career. However, while out on the ice, Hudson has so many other things on her mind. She just found out her dad has been cheating on her mother and he might leave soon. While performing her finale, she messes up and ruins her chances of becoming a professional ice-skater.
Three years later, Hudson works at her single mother’s diner to help her make ends meet. Her cupcakes are very popular around town and many people refer to her as the “Cupcake Queen” at school. She hasn’t thought about skating since her last performance in eighth grade.
This is until she gets emailed a letter regarding an ice-skating competition, in remembrance of her late ice-skating coach, that has a $50,000 reward for first place. The money could help out her family so much and pay for her college tuition, but she isn’t sure about getting out on the ice to compete yet.
Hudson occasionally skates at a small pond near her mother’s diner. One day a hockey player from her school notices her and asks her for help with his technique. This leads to her secretly coaching the entire hockey team to get them out of their ten-year losing streak. In return for helping them, Hudson gets some time in the arena to practice for her competition.
Trouble starts when she starts falling for two boys on the hockey team. With too much on her plate from school, work and skating, she doesn’t know if she can compete to her best abilities to get her the thing she wants most: to get out of her home state.
Bittersweet is mostly a light, fun read, but it has some serious issues intertwined in it. Also, I felt that the beginning went a little too slow, and therefore the overall book seemed too long. I didn’t really enjoy the love triangle, I mean, who really does? However, this book was entertaining enough to see past that.
This book isn’t one of the best I’ve ever read, but it is pretty interesting. People who like hockey or ice-skating would probably really enjoy this book. I also loved the cupcake theme added to this book; it was fun to read about the descriptions of all different types of cupcakes. If you’re anything like me, it will probably make you crave cupcakes by the time you’re done reading it.
