Top Ten Tuesday: Book boyfriends

Happy Top Ten Tuesday!  Today, we’re celebrating the romantic love interests that keep us coming back for more – our top ten book boyfriends.  Buckle up, because I have a lot to say on this topic!

Krista & Becca Ritchie have a knack for writing really great love interests.  Honestly, I could list any of their male leads as one of my favorite book boyfriends, but I narrowed it down to Connor Cobalt (Kiss the Sky), Luka Kotova (Infini), and Ryke Meadows (Hothouse Flower).  Both Connor Cobalt and Ryke Meadows are heavily featured in many of the Ritchies’ books but are introduced as love interests in the books above.

Seven Ways to Lose Your Heart is all about reconnecting with a childhood friend and falling in love.  As if it takes much more to win my heart than that… but Kennedy Harrison is a great love interest.  He’s flawed but still romantic.  He knows what he wants, but he’s not an over-the-top alpha.  He’s a realistic love interest.

Similar to the Ritchie sisters, R.S. Grey knows how to write the perfect guy.  In Anything You Can Do, Lucas Thatcher is Daisy Bell’s childhood rival – and new co-worker.  Working together as physicians at a small family practice, Lucas pushes Daisy’s buttons in just the right way.  In The Allure of Julian Lefray, Julian hires Josephine Keller to help him maintain his sister’s fashion line while she’s away.  There’s enough sexual tension to power the entirety of New York City, but they’re determined not to give in and jeopardize the company.

I fell in love with Arm Candy’s Davis Price in Jessica Lemmon’s previous book, Eye Candy. Davis is a sardonic stock analyst who is completely done with relationships.  In his own book, we see him start to open up to the possibility of love… and then really knock the socks off of his love interest (and me) with his absolute perfection.

Now, clearly, these three books are young adult romances.  They’re not so much book boyfriends for me now, but they’re boys I wish I could have known when I was an actual young adult.

In The Unexpected Everything, Andie’s summer is turned upside down when her father’s political scandal causes her to lose her place in a competitive summer program.  Stuck at home and desperate to get out of the house, she takes a job as a dog walker and befriends Clark, a young, shy, bestselling author.  Clark has a great personality, sure, but imagine finding out that your summer crush is a bestselling author!

The Big F’s leading lady, Danielle, has a similarly upturned life.  When she unexpectedly fails a class during her senior year of high school, her admission to her dream school is revoked.  She enrolls at a community college to get her life back on track and develops surprising feelings for her seemingly grumpy co-worker, Porter.  Not only is Porter a total dreamboat, but he also helps Dani stay on the straight and narrow when it comes to her classes.

Kate’s been crushing on the school’s football star for years.  Now, in her senior year of high school, she’s made it her mission to go to prom with him.  The plan?  Have her friend Cooper teach her how to flirt her way into Mick’s heart.  Operation Prom Date is a go, but what happens when Kate realizes that Cooper is better than Mick in every possible way?

Who are your favorite love interests?

Best of 2016: Galleys

I read a lot of review copies in 2016.  I had 32 total galleys between Netgalley, Edelweiss, and author mailing lists. At one point during the year, I stressed myself out pretty badly by accidentally signing up for an author’s ARC team.  I’m still not even sure how it happened!  I was getting flooded with (rather rude) emails with PDFs attached, demanding that I read and review within the week.  Needless to say, I cut all ties with that author and even ended up taking a little break from reviewing.  But overall, I read a ton of really great books from really awesome authors.  Here are my top fifteen, in absolutely no order whatsoever.

Goodreads links:

off the hook // seven ways to lose your heart // a list of cages // lured in // beyond the stars // you know me well // the summer before forever // ink and bone // the last boy and girl in the world // just a girl // something i need // arrows // addicted to you // lust is the thorn // all the feels

Top Ten Tuesday: Underrated or hidden gem books

Happy Top Ten Tuesday!  Whether it be higher ratings, more exposure, or just more appreciation, today’s theme is all about those books that just deserved better.  I had to go back to 2015 for this topic since I didn’t read too many underrated books in the last year.

Take a look through my choices and let me know which underrated books you’ve enjoyed recently, or if you disagree with any of my picks.

Sometimes people don’t want to read books because of the themes.  Sometimes they even go so far as to rate them really low without even reading them.  I don’t understand this, but it’s pretty common on Goodreads.  So here are four books about social issues that I think deserve either a much higher average rating or much more exposure.

What We Saw is a retelling of sorts. Much like the Steubenville rape case, the teens in this book have witnessed the sexual assault of their classmate while standing by and doing nothing.  Was it her fault?  She was drinking, after all. She had been flirting with the boys. But she never said yes. The teens in this book dissect the issue of consent in what I think is honestly a brilliant way.

Joyride doesn’t seem like it’s going to be one of those “issue books,” but then it sneaks in there. I think that this book is even more relevant now than it was back when I read it in 2015, with our President-elect’s impending inauguration on Friday.  This book is about two siblings trying to fly under the radar after their parents’ deportation. Although the children are both citizens, without an adult to raise them, they run the risk of being sent to foster care until they’re of age.

It’s pretty common knowledge that a lot of adults are freaked out by the idea of teenagers having sex, even if they themselves had a lot of sex when they were teenagers. The thing is, I think it’s really important to expose teenagers to sex-positive attitudes so they don’t see their feelings as dirty or wrong, and so that they know how to handle them.

Cherry is about four teenage friends who make a pact to lose their virginity.  But that’s not really what it’s about.  It’s more about an open, honest, frank discussion between four girls about consent, masturbation, LGBT relationships, and figuring out when you’re ready for that next step.

Firsts, on the other hand, is about a teenage girl who does her male classmates a “favor” by helping them get over their first, fumbling, awkward time between the sheets, in hopes that they might give their girlfriends a nice first time. This book has a whole discussion of this behavior without ever settling on a position.  Is it good?  Is it bad?  It’s up to the reader to decide.

Originally I was just looking for books with a low average rating, but then I stumbled across some books with despicably low review counts.  I thought I might as well include these obviously hidden gems.

You’re probably really sick of me talking about Seven Ways to Lose Your Heart. I mean, it’s been on like every list I’ve posted for the last two months. (I’m probably exaggerating, but at this point, I’m not even sure.)  I just can’t believe that a book this amazing only has 45 ratings on Goodreads. Please, please, please go read this book. It’s so good!

The Queen of Bright and Shiny Things was one of my favorites of 2015. I remember very little of the plot, but I do remember very clearly how it made me feel. More people deserve to feel that way, and I am shocked that this book only has about 2500 ratings on Goodreads.

From the cover, you’d think that The List is one of those stereotypical new adult books in which the girl falls for a dark, daring, mysterious jerk.  It’s really not.  It’s about an extremely sheltered young woman who heads to college and is encouraged by her roommate to try new things. Somehow, less than 300 people have read this gem of a book. I blame the cliched cover.

Finally, here are four books that deserve much better average ratings than they have.  I think this is the true spirit of today’s topic, but I haven’t read too many books recently that I thought deserved much higher ratings than they got.

The Last Boy and Girl in the World is a great story of a town that floods and how its teenage residents deal with it.  When I read this ARC, it seemed like everybody was hyping it up.  I thought the book was amazing, but somehow it only has 1700 ratings and a paltry 3.4 average on Goodreads. It deserves better.

Clearly, the problem with Armada is that everybody expected and anticipated a sequel to Ready Player One. And I get that, I really do.  But Cline made it clear that Armada was its own story, and I think that a lot of people were disappointed by that.  Yes, RPO was great. But so is Armada, in its own way.  It’s certainly better than its 3.4 average rating would have you believe.

And, lastly, we have You Know Me Well.  One of my favorites of 2016, it’s about a teenage boy and girl near the end of their high school experience who unexpectedly meet up over a weekend and find they have much more in common than they would have thought. And it’s not a romance! I just can’t believe that a book by an author as well-known as David Levithan only has 4700 ratings.  And not only that, but also that a book this great doesn’t have at least a 4-star average.

   Goodreads   Amazon

Okay, this book was just so cute. It was exactly what I needed after a steady stream of books that were just okay.

Kennedy and Annabel Lee used to be best friends, practically inseparable throughout their childhood. Always daring each other to be bigger and better and braver than everyone else. But then Annabel was in an awful car accident. Her brother died. She escaped, but with emotional and physical scars. Kennedy was nowhere to be found when she needed him the most.

It’s now a decade later. Annabel is taking care of her parents, her sick grandmother, and her two younger siblings. If she can manage to put herself first for once, she’ll leave for college in a few weeks. In the meantime, she and Kennedy have found themselves in the same photography class at the local community college. Years of separation have made things awkward, but Kennedy desperately wants to apologize for how he treated Annabel all those years ago.

I thought this book could go one of two ways. It could either be my favorite book of the year, or it could be trite, cheesy, and awful. I think it’s pretty obvious from my glowing five-star rating which one it ended up being.

I love books about childhood friends. I love books about people reconnecting. I love books that are cute and don’t have love triangles or cheating or unnecessary drama. And that’s the thing. This book is everything I love wrapped up in a cute story about childhood friends who reconnect on a road trip to a music festival.

It happens fast. But not too fast. Realistically fast, I think. Because it seemed to me that, even if she didn’t know it, Annabel was waiting all those years for Kennedy to come back to her. And Kennedy was waiting for his opportunity to apologize.

I loved their dares and their honesty and how open they were with each other. My laptop’s grammar check thinks that I mean “I loved their dates,” but no, I really do mean their dares. Because this book is based on Annabel and Kennedy’s deal that she’ll let him dare her to do seven things if he applies to seven writing internships. Because dares have always been their thing. And through those seven dares, they end up closer than ever. They make each other better.

I loved this book so much, and I can’t wait to see more from this author.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Final rating: ★★★★★