No Parking At the End Times Review!

No Parking At the End Times

Author: Bryan Bliss

Average Rating: 3.32/5.0

Personal Rating: 3.0/5.0

Page Count: 272

Publisher: Greenwillow Books

Release Date:  1 January 2015

According to Goodreads:

Abigail’s parents have made mistake after mistake, and now they've lost everything. She’s left to decide: Does she still believe in them? Or is it time to believe in herself? Fans of Sara Zarr, David Levithan, and Rainbow Rowell will connect with this moving debut.

Abigail doesn't know how her dad found Brother John. Maybe it was the billboards. Or the radio. What she does know is that he never should have made that first donation. Or the next, or the next. Her parents shouldn't have sold their house. Or packed Abigail and her twin brother, Aaron, into their old van to drive across the country to San Francisco, to be there with Brother John for the "end of the world."

Because of course the end didn't come. And now they're living in their van. And Aaron’s disappearing to who-knows-where every night. Their family is falling apart. All Abigail wants is to hold them together, to get them back to the place where things were right. But maybe it’s too big a task for one teenage girl. Bryan Bliss’s thoughtful, literary debut novel is about losing everything—and about what you will do for the people you love. 

My Opinion:

I don't know about you all, but these past few months have been one crazy ride. To be quite honest, I don't think I have been to the library more than 5 times to pick up books to read for fun this whole school year. So, I ended up going a couple weeks ago, and left there with a bunch (literally I had like 12 books) of random books that I was going to read for fun. That's what I love about the libraries. You can go in looking for one book and come out with five others that were not planned.

No Parking At the End Times was one of the 12 books I picked up on the first round. Since I can be honest with you guys I can say this book was mediocre for me. If you have read this and loved it let me know down in the comments. Maybe I'm not reading into things too much or just completely missed something, but I would love to see other opinions of the book. 

The book talks about how the parents of Abigail and Aaron sold all they owned and decided to move to California where Brother John lived. Through his radio talk shows and other correspondence, Brother John made Abigail and Aaron's parents and many others that the world was going to end on a particular day, and they could only be saved if they came to California and prayed with him. Brother John gave me the creeps from the very beginning. I understand that the family had fallen on hard times, but to sell everything you have left and leave your extended family behind to go follow a man you don't know at all besides listening to a radio show and seeing him on billboards seemed a bit extreme for me. If anything all of that screamed IT'S A SCAM to me. I got a feeling Abigail's mother didn't want to go or stay as long as they did, but remained faithful to her husband even during the times when I wanted to shake him by the shoulders and slap. I give her credit for being positive and remaining a loving mother and wife. The father was basically brainwashed by Brother John. 

Th ending was heartfelt, but unfortunately that couldn't erase the negative feelings I had towards this book. No Parking At the End Times does talk frequently about God and how one's belief will get you through whatever life throws at you. It's not thrown in your face in hopes to suffocate you, but it is definitely there on every page, so if that's not your cup of key then I'd pass this one up. 

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