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Making Out #14
Aaron Lets Go
They've all grown up together on a tiny island. They think they know everything about one another...but they're only just beginning to find out the truth. Aaron lets go and gets into a fight at Ben's party because he's so desperate to win Claire's love again. Everything had been perfect until that moment's mistake with Kate. But now Claire has made her decision and it looks as if nothing will change her mind. Aaron lets go and gets into a fight at Ben's party because he's so desperate to win Claire's love again. Everything had been perfect until that moment's mistake with Kate. But now Claire has made her decision and it looks as if nothing will change her mind.
Paperback
First published July 26, 1996
196 people want to read
About the author
Katherine Applegate
275 books6,175 followers#1 New York Times bestselling author Katherine Applegate has written many books for young readers, including THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN, winner of the 2013 Newbery Medal.
Katherine’s picture books include THE BUFFALO STORM, illustrated by Jan Ormerod (Clarion Books); THE REMARKABLE TRUE STORY OF IVAN, THE SHOPPING MALL GORILLA, illustrated by G. Brian Karas (Clarion Books); SOMETIMES YOU FLY, illustrated by Jennifer Black Reinhardt (Clarion Books); and ODDER: AN OTTER’S STORY, illustrated by Charles Santoso (Feiwel & Friends).
She’s written or co-written three early chapter series for young readers: ROSCOE RILEY RULES, a seven-book series illustrated by Brian Biggs (HarperCollins); DOGGO AND PUPPER, a three-book series illustrated by Charlie Alder (Feiwel & Friends). With Gennifer Choldenko, she co-authored DOGTOWN and MOUSE AND HIS DOG, illustrated by Wallace West (Feiwel & Friends).
Books for middle-grade readers include HOME OF THE BRAVE (Feiwel & Friends); THE ONE AND ONLY series, illustrated by Patricia Castelao, including THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN, THE ONE AND ONLY BOB, THE ONE AND ONLY RUBY, and THE ONE AND ONLY FAMILY (HarperCollins); the ENDLING trilogy (HarperCollins); CRENSHAW (Feiwel & Friends); WISHTREE (Feiwel & Friends); WILLODEEN (Feiwel & Friends); ODDER (Feiwel & Friends); and the forthcoming POCKET BEAR (Feiwel & Friends).
With her husband, Michael Grant, Katherine co-wrote ANIMORPHS, a long-running series that has sold over 35 million books worldwide. They also wrote two other series, REMNANTS and EVERWORLD, and a young adult novel, EVE AND ADAM (Feiwel & Friends.)
Katherine’s work has been translated into dozens of languages, and her books have won accolades including the Christopher Medal, the Golden Kite Award, the Bank Street Josette Frank Award, the California Book Award Gold Medal, the Crystal Kite Award, the Green Earth Book Honor Award, the Charlotte Zolotow Honor Award, and the E.B. White Read Aloud Award. Many of her works have appeared on state master lists, Best of the Year lists, and Publishers Weekly, USA Today, and New York Times bestseller lists.
Katherine lives in Nevada with her husband and assorted pets. She is represented by Elena Giovinazzo at Heirloom Literary and Mary Pender at WME.
Katherine’s picture books include THE BUFFALO STORM, illustrated by Jan Ormerod (Clarion Books); THE REMARKABLE TRUE STORY OF IVAN, THE SHOPPING MALL GORILLA, illustrated by G. Brian Karas (Clarion Books); SOMETIMES YOU FLY, illustrated by Jennifer Black Reinhardt (Clarion Books); and ODDER: AN OTTER’S STORY, illustrated by Charles Santoso (Feiwel & Friends).
She’s written or co-written three early chapter series for young readers: ROSCOE RILEY RULES, a seven-book series illustrated by Brian Biggs (HarperCollins); DOGGO AND PUPPER, a three-book series illustrated by Charlie Alder (Feiwel & Friends). With Gennifer Choldenko, she co-authored DOGTOWN and MOUSE AND HIS DOG, illustrated by Wallace West (Feiwel & Friends).
Books for middle-grade readers include HOME OF THE BRAVE (Feiwel & Friends); THE ONE AND ONLY series, illustrated by Patricia Castelao, including THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN, THE ONE AND ONLY BOB, THE ONE AND ONLY RUBY, and THE ONE AND ONLY FAMILY (HarperCollins); the ENDLING trilogy (HarperCollins); CRENSHAW (Feiwel & Friends); WISHTREE (Feiwel & Friends); WILLODEEN (Feiwel & Friends); ODDER (Feiwel & Friends); and the forthcoming POCKET BEAR (Feiwel & Friends).
With her husband, Michael Grant, Katherine co-wrote ANIMORPHS, a long-running series that has sold over 35 million books worldwide. They also wrote two other series, REMNANTS and EVERWORLD, and a young adult novel, EVE AND ADAM (Feiwel & Friends.)
Katherine’s work has been translated into dozens of languages, and her books have won accolades including the Christopher Medal, the Golden Kite Award, the Bank Street Josette Frank Award, the California Book Award Gold Medal, the Crystal Kite Award, the Green Earth Book Honor Award, the Charlotte Zolotow Honor Award, and the E.B. White Read Aloud Award. Many of her works have appeared on state master lists, Best of the Year lists, and Publishers Weekly, USA Today, and New York Times bestseller lists.
Katherine lives in Nevada with her husband and assorted pets. She is represented by Elena Giovinazzo at Heirloom Literary and Mary Pender at WME.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
March 29, 2015
Book 14 finished means I’m halfway through my grand re-read of the magnificent Making Out series. And look we’ve got MY FAVOURITE GUY Aaron on the cover:
These are my copies of the books. They’re probably the dirtiest items in my whole house. You can see how book 13’s had its top sliced off, and Book 10 looks like I’ve been chewing on it which I’m almost certain I haven’t been.
I like this book because it’s the one where Benjamin and Lara start to cement their friendship, which I like because it’s based on art and siblinghood and it helps Benjamin with his whole deal.
Nina and Benjamin are still broken up and there are some surprisingly funny comic relief scenes where Nina is trying to make Benjamin jealous by flirting with Jake, who could not be more baffled or less interested. At one point Claire goes over to Benjamin’s to try and smooth things over between him and Nina. Claire KISSES Benjamin, because why wouldn’t she? And of course Zoey is lurking nearby and sees everything. I wonder if that’ll come back to bite Claire in the ass? Surely not. Claire is the Puppet Master of Chatham Island, her friends and family merely her playthings! Mwooo-ha-ha-ha!
Speaking of Claire, she’s trying her best to get over Aaron by conspiring with him to split up their blissfully happy parents. I’m not sure what her plan is at the moment, but it involves a lot of phone conversations like this:
AARON: Claire you’re so beautiful.
CLAIRE: I know that but this is business Aaron. We’re the best manipulators in this whole damn place, we need to combine our powers and break up our parents.
AARON: I can’t manipulate when all I can think about is your lustrous hair.
CLAIRE: MINE IS THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE!
Aisha and her Westeros Scholarship rival have a make-out session in the library late one night while the other patrons look on and applaud (yeah it was pretty weird). Meanwhile Christopher has sent a letter from Army, talking about how he still loves Aisha. D’oh! What’s Aisha to do? I hope she doesn’t go wild again like in book 8, Aisha Goes Wild. Mostly because having another concussion won’t help her win any scholarships.
There’s nothing much going on with Zoey and Lucas at the moment. The book culminates in an extremely ill-judged surprise birthday party for Benjamin’s 20th, organised by Zoey who does not invite Lara which I find unbelievably petty. Aaron shows up uninvited and Lucas throws a punch at him that ends up knocking out Kate. Jake takes Kate outside to wake her up (Lara is lurking nearby, which is a thing people do in these books) and stanches the flow of blood from her nose with a strip he’s ripped off the bottom of his shirt. This is important for later books.
Fave moments:
-Claire is driving home from the ill-fated Valentine’s party from the end of book 13, and picks up a hitchhiker who turns out to be Kate. Kate is carrying a can of Binaca like Elaine has in Seinfeld!
-Nina tries to figure out what to say to comfort Claire after the Aaron and Kate debacle:
“”Claire, I’m sorry that your boyfriend turned out to be as big a jerk as you are, “ she said aloud. No, that wasn’t the approach she was going for.”
These are my copies of the books. They’re probably the dirtiest items in my whole house. You can see how book 13’s had its top sliced off, and Book 10 looks like I’ve been chewing on it which I’m almost certain I haven’t been.
I like this book because it’s the one where Benjamin and Lara start to cement their friendship, which I like because it’s based on art and siblinghood and it helps Benjamin with his whole deal.
Nina and Benjamin are still broken up and there are some surprisingly funny comic relief scenes where Nina is trying to make Benjamin jealous by flirting with Jake, who could not be more baffled or less interested. At one point Claire goes over to Benjamin’s to try and smooth things over between him and Nina. Claire KISSES Benjamin, because why wouldn’t she? And of course Zoey is lurking nearby and sees everything. I wonder if that’ll come back to bite Claire in the ass? Surely not. Claire is the Puppet Master of Chatham Island, her friends and family merely her playthings! Mwooo-ha-ha-ha!
Speaking of Claire, she’s trying her best to get over Aaron by conspiring with him to split up their blissfully happy parents. I’m not sure what her plan is at the moment, but it involves a lot of phone conversations like this:
AARON: Claire you’re so beautiful.
CLAIRE: I know that but this is business Aaron. We’re the best manipulators in this whole damn place, we need to combine our powers and break up our parents.
AARON: I can’t manipulate when all I can think about is your lustrous hair.
CLAIRE: MINE IS THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE!
Aisha and her Westeros Scholarship rival have a make-out session in the library late one night while the other patrons look on and applaud (yeah it was pretty weird). Meanwhile Christopher has sent a letter from Army, talking about how he still loves Aisha. D’oh! What’s Aisha to do? I hope she doesn’t go wild again like in book 8, Aisha Goes Wild. Mostly because having another concussion won’t help her win any scholarships.
There’s nothing much going on with Zoey and Lucas at the moment. The book culminates in an extremely ill-judged surprise birthday party for Benjamin’s 20th, organised by Zoey who does not invite Lara which I find unbelievably petty. Aaron shows up uninvited and Lucas throws a punch at him that ends up knocking out Kate. Jake takes Kate outside to wake her up (Lara is lurking nearby, which is a thing people do in these books) and stanches the flow of blood from her nose with a strip he’s ripped off the bottom of his shirt. This is important for later books.
Fave moments:
-Claire is driving home from the ill-fated Valentine’s party from the end of book 13, and picks up a hitchhiker who turns out to be Kate. Kate is carrying a can of Binaca like Elaine has in Seinfeld!
-Nina tries to figure out what to say to comfort Claire after the Aaron and Kate debacle:
“”Claire, I’m sorry that your boyfriend turned out to be as big a jerk as you are, “ she said aloud. No, that wasn’t the approach she was going for.”
October 7, 2018
A-aron is an A-hole!
Lara's creepy behaviour makes the book feel like a psycho stalker thriller!
I'm actually rooting for Jake!
Nina coming onto a confused unaware Jake to make unaware Benjamin jealous is the funniest thing! 😂
And as always, Claire gets too close to someone else's boyfriend 😒 (her sister's to be exact). I'm sick of her hanging onto her past relationships! She's always going on about her ex's and the things that are still between them even though they're all in other relationships with her "friends". She actually thinks the world revolves around her which is probably why I felt no sympathy for her in her current situation.
Halfway through the series. I hope we get some different narratives.
Lara's creepy behaviour makes the book feel like a psycho stalker thriller!
I'm actually rooting for Jake!
Nina coming onto a confused unaware Jake to make unaware Benjamin jealous is the funniest thing! 😂
And as always, Claire gets too close to someone else's boyfriend 😒 (her sister's to be exact). I'm sick of her hanging onto her past relationships! She's always going on about her ex's and the things that are still between them even though they're all in other relationships with her "friends". She actually thinks the world revolves around her which is probably why I felt no sympathy for her in her current situation.
Halfway through the series. I hope we get some different narratives.
April 16, 2023
* Claire leaves without confronting Aaron, and goes back to her hotel where she spends most of the night crying. The next morning she goes home, telling herself that Aaron wasn't good enough for her and she's not taking him back. On the way home she stops for a hitchhiker, who turns out to be Kate. Kate tells her that she slept with Aaron, before realising who Claire is. Claire dumps her at the side of the road.
* Nina is upset about her breakup with Benjamin, but after reading Cosmopolitan magazine, decides the thing to do is to flirt with Jake to make Benjamin jealous. This doesn't work though.
* Benjamin starts to get a little bit closer to Lara, who is still drinking but agrees to read to Benjamin since he's dumped Nina.
* Lara tries to get Jake to drink, and he decides to move to his brother's old room so that she can't come to his bedroom window anymore.
* Aisha continues studying to try and win her scholarship but isn't quite sure what to think when he rival Daniel kisses her. She sends Christopher a late Valentine's day card.
* Christopher sends Aisha a letter saying that he still loves her too, and can't wait to see her again.
* Jake keeps going to AA meetings and begins to have feelings for Louise when she stands up and tells everyone her story.
* Aaron continues to try to get back together with Claire, even when she tells him she wants to get their parents to break up.
* Kate apologises to Claire about Aaron.
* Zoey and Lucas seem to be okay 😲 Zoey plans a surprise birthday party for Benjamin, which Benjamin isn't happy about. Aaron turns up at the party, Claire tells him she doesn't want to get back together with him. Kate tries talking to Aaron, but Aaron says he wants nothing to do with her. Claire tells him to apologise to Kate and he refuses, so Lucas steps in. Lucas tries to punch Aaron, but accidentally hits Kate instead. Kate passes out, and Aisha calls for an ambulance.
* Jake notices Lara in the bushes near Zoey's house, so leaves out the back door.
* Nina is upset about her breakup with Benjamin, but after reading Cosmopolitan magazine, decides the thing to do is to flirt with Jake to make Benjamin jealous. This doesn't work though.
* Benjamin starts to get a little bit closer to Lara, who is still drinking but agrees to read to Benjamin since he's dumped Nina.
* Lara tries to get Jake to drink, and he decides to move to his brother's old room so that she can't come to his bedroom window anymore.
* Aisha continues studying to try and win her scholarship but isn't quite sure what to think when he rival Daniel kisses her. She sends Christopher a late Valentine's day card.
* Christopher sends Aisha a letter saying that he still loves her too, and can't wait to see her again.
* Jake keeps going to AA meetings and begins to have feelings for Louise when she stands up and tells everyone her story.
* Aaron continues to try to get back together with Claire, even when she tells him she wants to get their parents to break up.
* Kate apologises to Claire about Aaron.
* Zoey and Lucas seem to be okay 😲 Zoey plans a surprise birthday party for Benjamin, which Benjamin isn't happy about. Aaron turns up at the party, Claire tells him she doesn't want to get back together with him. Kate tries talking to Aaron, but Aaron says he wants nothing to do with her. Claire tells him to apologise to Kate and he refuses, so Lucas steps in. Lucas tries to punch Aaron, but accidentally hits Kate instead. Kate passes out, and Aisha calls for an ambulance.
* Jake notices Lara in the bushes near Zoey's house, so leaves out the back door.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 30, 2021
Why is the English title "Aaron lets go"? He doesn't let go? Persistence is his whole thing? Or do they mean of Kate?? Given all the dumb plotting he and Claire get up to, it should've been "Aaron, let's go!"
I really liked Benjamin and Lara bonding over art and literature and emotionally dark places. Really interesting combination.
I wish Aisha got any interesting plotlines outside of dating. This one with her "rival" is tedious.
I really liked Benjamin and Lara bonding over art and literature and emotionally dark places. Really interesting combination.
I wish Aisha got any interesting plotlines outside of dating. This one with her "rival" is tedious.
January 23, 2017
I strongly dislike Aaron and the fact that Claire is turning into a shrew. Stop trying to ruin everyone's life and focus on graduation instead.
Was very (pleasantly) surprised to notice that I kind of root for Jake. At the very beginning of the MO saga, I couldn't care less about him. But now, he grew up, older, wiser. He seems to be the only genuine and authentic character, compared to other ludicruous story lines.
I still hate Benjamin for his attitude towards Nina but I can't help understand him at the bottom of it all, he is going through massive sh*t.
I can't wait to see how all of this is going to turn around in the next books !
Was very (pleasantly) surprised to notice that I kind of root for Jake. At the very beginning of the MO saga, I couldn't care less about him. But now, he grew up, older, wiser. He seems to be the only genuine and authentic character, compared to other ludicruous story lines.
I still hate Benjamin for his attitude towards Nina but I can't help understand him at the bottom of it all, he is going through massive sh*t.
I can't wait to see how all of this is going to turn around in the next books !
February 28, 2017
Feeling nostalgic for the books of my youth, I revisited Katherine Applegate and her Islanders omnibus editions (first released as the Making Out series way back in 1993. Yes, I am that old...).
While I found them to be overly-dramatic and a little bit cheesy on second reading, I think they would be loved by teenagers today. YA has taken a much-welcome step in the sphere of fantasy, science fiction and Dystopia, largely, in recent years so for teenagers looking for the traditional romance novels filled with teen-angst and buried secrets, these are a good series to turn to. A little bit Dawson's Creek in it's setting and it's drama, The Islanders is the perfect teen soap opera.
While I found them to be overly-dramatic and a little bit cheesy on second reading, I think they would be loved by teenagers today. YA has taken a much-welcome step in the sphere of fantasy, science fiction and Dystopia, largely, in recent years so for teenagers looking for the traditional romance novels filled with teen-angst and buried secrets, these are a good series to turn to. A little bit Dawson's Creek in it's setting and it's drama, The Islanders is the perfect teen soap opera.
June 22, 2022
The new people are adding lots of drama to the island and I love it
December 6, 2023
I remember being obsessed with this series when I was 14! I made my mom buy me all 29 books (in Germany a 29th book was published, there is no English translation) after borrowing the first one from my then-best friend.
Looking back, the plots got wilder and wilder with time: A lost half-sister, Claire's stalker, Ben miraculously being able to see again etc. I don't think I would enjoy it as much now as I did ten years ago, but it will only have a special place in my heart.
Looking back, the plots got wilder and wilder with time: A lost half-sister, Claire's stalker, Ben miraculously being able to see again etc. I don't think I would enjoy it as much now as I did ten years ago, but it will only have a special place in my heart.
November 7, 2013
i think it was a good book. i really like it because it had drama,romance , and it was funny.
December 18, 2015
*heart eyes*
January 9, 2017
diese Buchreihe hat mich während meiner Teeniezeit begleitet. ich habe sie so geliebt...
October 27, 2007
teaches you about relationships.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews