An entertaining, nicely nuanced depiction of teen relationships and challenges.
A bookish Star Trek fan, stung by a summer liaison, meets an attractive computer whiz during a search for a boyfriend who won’t break her heart in this YA novel.
On the first day of her junior year in high school, Vivian “Viv” Galdi feels nervous and excited, having spent her summer indulging in secret make-out sessions with Jake Fontaine, the sexy surfer classmate on whom she’s had a longtime crush. Arriving at school with her artsy best friend, Jaz, however, Viv soon experiences a letdown: Jake ignores her and flirts with a beautiful “dreadhead.” Also catching the friends’ interest is the arrival of a new classmate, a Clark Kent–looking Vespa rider whom they dub a “totally hot McNerd.” Jake soon lets Viv know that she was just a summer fling, a rejection that leads her to find a “replacement crush” with whom she’ll feel no “zing.” Viv, Jaz, and another pal, Amy, map out possibilities in a journal, but it’s difficult to stick to the plan, especially when the appealing McNerd turns out to be the computer expert named Dallas that Viv’s bookstore owner and mystery author mother has hired to help her daughter with database and inventory work at the shop. By novel’s end, Viv, whose many shared interests with Dallas include a love of Star Trek, sheds aspirations of Spock-like rationality and puts her heart on the line in a posting on her romance novel blog. She also enlists a visiting pop star to help make her case at her California seaside town’s talent show and homeless shelter fundraiser. Roberts (Playing the Player, 2015) has written another smart, charming teen romance, this one featuring plenty of amusing commentary on the genre itself, including Viv and Dallas riffing on romance hero categories. While the conclusion of this novel isn’t hard to predict (as Jaz herself snarkily comments several times in the narrative), Roberts puts a lot of well-woven side details into this journey. These threads include chronicling Viv’s connection with the local homeless contingent and having the dreadhead and another surfer character rise surprisingly above stereotype.
An entertaining, nicely nuanced depiction of teen relationships and challenges.Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-63375-504-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Entangled Teen
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship.
A battered girl and an injured rugby star spark up an ill-advised romance at an Irish secondary school.
Beautiful, waiflike, 15-year-old Shannon has lived her entire life in Ballylaggin. Alternately bullied at school and beaten by her ne’er-do-well father, she’s hopeful for a fresh start at Tommen, a private school. Seventeen-year-old Johnny, who has a hair-trigger temper and a severe groin injury, is used to Dublin’s elite-level rugby but, since his family’s move to County Cork, is now stuck captaining Tommen’s middling team. When Johnny angrily kicks a ball and knocks Shannon unconscious (“a soft female groan came from her lips”), a tentative relationship is born. As the two grow closer, Johnny’s past and Shannon’s present become serious obstacles to their budding love, threatening Shannon’s safety. Shannon’s portrayal feels infantilized (“I looked down at the tiny little female under my arm”), while Johnny comes across as borderline obsessive (“I knew I shouldn’t be touching her, but how the hell could I not?”). Uneven pacing and choppy sentences lead to a sudden climax and an unsatisfyingly abrupt ending. Repetitive descriptions, abundant and misogynistic dialogue (Johnny, to his best friend: “who’s the bitch with a vagina now?”), and graphic violence also weigh down this lengthy tome (considerably trimmed down from its original, self-published length). The cast of lively, well-developed supporting characters, especially Johnny’s best friend and Shannon’s protective older brother, is a bright spot. Major characters read white.
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship. (author’s note, pronunciations, glossary, song moments, playlists) (Romance. 16-18)Pub Date: Nov. 28, 2023
ISBN: 9781728299945
Page Count: 626
Publisher: Bloom Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
Plenty of heat but not enough substance to keep the fire burning.
A romantically entangled stepbrother and stepsister in Los Angeles navigate their tumultuous history and take their relationship to new levels in this translated title by an Argentinian author.
Nick and Noah are madly in love: Their mutual attraction is established as the book opens with Noah’s 18th birthday party, during which she and Nick have an explicitly described sexual encounter behind the pool house. This fiery scene sets the stage for twists and turns in the lovers’ journey, including a separation when Noah is forced to go on a monthlong mother-daughter European tour. But reminders of their pasts (chronicled in the 2023 series opener, My Fault) threaten to undermine their stability. Nick’s wealthy estranged mother makes an unfortunate appearance, while Noah is haunted by the trauma of her father’s violent death. The blend of everyday complications (jealousy, parental disapproval) with frothy visions of high-society life is at once lacking in subtlety and intimately irresistible. The series initially gained popularity on Wattpad, and the novel follows the episodic structure typical of works on that site; sensual encounters occur at reliable intervals. Still, the characters and their milieu feel formulaic, and the writing is stilted. The differences between the two—Nick is five years older and has an office job; Noah has just finished high school—makes their suffocatingly possessive relationship feel particularly squirm-worthy. Nick and Noah and their families read white.
Plenty of heat but not enough substance to keep the fire burning. (Romance. 16-18)Pub Date: Dec. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9781728290768
Page Count: 450
Publisher: Bloom Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2023
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