Always You by Missy Johnson

Title: Always You
Author: Missy Johnson
Genres: Romance/Drama/Young Adult

Maturity Rating: 13+
Some graphic sensuality, but okay for a mature teen reader
Overall Rating:

My Quickie Synopsis: Wrenn is taken in by her aunt when tragedy befalls her family; her aunt also happens to be the headmistress of her new all girls school. Still acclimating to her new surroundings, Wrenn is blindsided by her substitute teacher Dalton Reed. He's everything she never knew she wanted and more, but Dalton's secrets and position of authority threaten to derail their relationship before it even begins.

Enjoyment Factor:
And here we go again; here is yet another book that claims it's new adult, but screams young adult fiction again and again. Our main heroine is in high school and our main hero is her hot, young, substitute teacher. No matter how you look at it, the relationship is sketchy as hell. Yes, she's of legal age, and yes, the age difference is acceptable; however, this particular love story just doesn't ring true. Why would a man who has spent the better part of his life avoiding commitment suddenly give in to having a go with a girl who could potentially ruin his career?

This is a joke...right?

Even if I could overlook that glaring inconsistency in the name of super duper insta-love syndrome, I can't get over how painfully immature Wrenn is. Honestly, it killed the book for me. The way Wrenn reacted when she confronted Dalton about his secret was juvenile, and I can't believe that Dalton just took it. To top it off, the girl has no filter. She flat out asked a character what it was like to watch her husband suffer. There was no easing into the question, and there was no softening context. The girl is just plain rude and selfish; I don't see why a character like Dalton would become hung up over her just because of her blunt, simplistic world views. It's still not ranking with the worst books that I've ever read though, so it gets a two star enjoyment rating; I know there's an audience for this, but it just wasn't my cup of tea.

Technical Rating:

Character Building:
For as much as I disliked the heroine, I can't say that she was an underdeveloped character. As a matter of fact, all of the characters had depth to them, with the possible exception of Paige. But, thankfully, the story wasn't about her, so I'll let that one slide. I think my favorite character though had to be Wrenn's best friend. She was a good dose of quirky in a desolate landscape of romantic angst.

Plot Strength:
The premise of the story is actually pretty good; taboo romance, hot-for-teacher action, and heavy secrets should all make great ingredients for a steamy good read. But there was no follow-through! If this were a cake, the story would be the equivalent of mixing all the ingredients but never actually putting it in the oven. There was an overall lack of cohesiveness in the plot elements that made it feel like I was being bounced around from scene to scene.

Sincerity:
I find myself struggling on how to rate this category; on one hand, I still fail to see how the characters would ever end up together. However, if I maintain a healthy distance from my own reservations, I see the glimmer of a possibility. Perhaps she's so broken and he's so dense that they actually work together. I can partially accept that.

Editing:
I honestly think that the editor went through the first half of the book and said to themselves that it was decent and then proceeded to ignore the latter half of the novel. If I went back to re-read this, I could probably point out the exact page that marked the beginning of the editor's holiday. It was jarring; there I was sailing through the book and then suddenly I was hit with rough waters. It's not a pleasant feeling.

Pacing:
The accusations that Paige made were so quickly brushed off that it made my head spin. What was the point of even dropping that bomb if you weren't going to dedicate serious time to exploring it? I'll make another analogy since I'm on a roll: It's like making a tutorial that only shows the beginning and the end steps. Pointless. Outside of that warp-speed fast-forward, I think the pacing was adequately handled, so a half star it is!

My Icing on Top:
I'm going to be honest here; the secret that Dalton has is one that was similar to a secret my own boyfriend had to share. All I felt was heartbreak when Wrenn started to throw a tantrum over it; I couldn't fathom being so cruel. Did that affect my enjoyment rating? Absolutely. But I tried to not let that bleed into my technical rating. This isn't an awful book, but it is awfully predictable. It's an average tale of two people with less than stellar pasts who come together in a somewhat taboo romance. Consider Always You to be a midnight snack of books; it can be your guilty pleasure, your little secret, until you get to read a more fulfilling story at a later point in time. But don't come complaining to me about remorse; I told you so!

Check out my informal review on Goodreads!

Happy reading!

-K

Very Bad Things (Briarcrest Academy #1) by Ilsa Madden-Mills

Title:  Very Bad Things
Series: Briarcrest Academy #1
Author: Ilsa Madden-Mills
Genre: Young Adult/Romance/Dark

Maturity Rating: 17+
*WARNING: TRAUMA TRIGGERS*
Overall Rating:

My Quickie Synopsis: Nora Blakely seems like she has the best of everything; she's talented, smart, beautiful and comes from a well-to-do family. But Nora is harboring excruciatingly dark secrets, and she's tired of having to put on a face of perfection. She's ready to give in to her darker side.

Enjoyment Factor:
This book had me seriously scratching my head over what constitutes being a new adult book. In my head, I always considered new adult as being anything that happens post high school up until the late twenties, early thirties range of adulthood. But this story, which was promoted as new adult fiction, focuses entirely on a girl who is still in high school. Sure, she's nineteen, but she's still in high school. There's still locker-side talk going on. This book read like a young adult fiction that desperately wanted to be in the big leagues of adult fiction but settled for calling itself new adult. I'm not buying it.

A cotton candy book playing with trauma triggers?

Mislabeled genres aside, this book just came across as weak. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't fantastic either. The main characters felt so extraordinarily cookie cutter and I just didn't connect with them the way I would have wanted to. I was actually more invested in what happened to the supporting characters; perhaps the author was more invested in them as well since she goes on to tell their stories in subsequent books.
My main problem with Very Bad Things is that it puts a nice veil on a very serious topic. Everything is handled so incredibly casually and with such shallow convictions that the story lost quite a bit of its much needed poignancy. Everyone deals with trauma in their own way, but I feel like Very Bad Things glamorizes the after-effects. Instead of actually dealing head on with what Nora was going through, everything seemed more like a long-coming rebellious phase that was due to an overbearing, evil mother.To make matters worse, there definitely was some rose-colored shading going on as well. I could understand if the author didn't want to focus much on Nora's traumatic past, but the fact of the matter is that she made it a huge plot point that was only brought up when it was convenient. If it weren't for this indelicate handling, I'd probably rate the book slightly higher. As it stands though, I do realize that there's an audience out there that would eat this up without batting an eye, so it gets a solid two stars from me!

Technical Rating:

Character Building:
I touched on this a bit in my initial response, but to reiterate, the main characters needed quite a bit of work. Both Nora and Leo are extraordinarily flat in their character builds; any complexities that they had felt like mere ornaments to their personalities instead of having actual intrinsic value. The supporting cast of characters were a bit more grounded, which was refreshing, but disappointing at the same time. If only the main characters had been developed as much!

Plot Strength:
I'm not sure if you'll recall when I explained what a cotton candy book is, but I'll redefine that here. A cotton candy book is one that looks amazing, sounds like it's interesting, but when you read it, you realize that even though it might fulfill a base desire, there isn't actually much there to it. Very Bad Things is one such book. There's no actual edge to this book, and the plot elements are as weak as the character builds of the main characters. The climax? Anticlimactic. The resolution? Loose at best. However, the elements are there so I gave it half a star.

Sincerity:
The supporting characters save Very Bad Things from getting a big fat zero in this category. The main characters are borderline unbelievable in their actions. A lot of pieces don't really add up when it comes to the pair, and I can't even chalk it up to fairy tale syndrome.

Editing:
I can't particularly recall anything that made me cringe or stumble, so full marks here.

Pacing:
The only time that I took real issue with the pacing was towards the end. Everything was speedily wrapped up for the HEA (Happily Ever After). I did skim a few parts, but to my recollection it had nothing to do with a slow paced story, I just was getting fed up with the main characters! So an okay pace overall, I give it a half star.

My Icing on Top:
In all fairness I read this from the anthology Devour, which I mentioned in a previous review. Unfortunately, the anthology is no longer available for purchase (it was a limited time kind of deal) so you'll have to settle for buying this lovely tale on its own. For the reasons stated above, this book was not my cup of tea. However, I do know that this will come as a happy diversion book for many readers out there. If you (like me) take issue with traumas taken lightly, don't read this book. But, if you're just looking for your next fluff piece that has decent insta-love, give Very Bad Things a shot.

Check out my informal review on Goodreads!

As always, happy reading!

-K