Review: More of a YA book
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 09 11, 2013
I received this book as an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley for an honest review.(Author) A practical soon-to-be college freshman who seems to have everything--until a special guy shows her what she's been missing.In the wealthy town of Sundale, Kelli Pinkins has hatched the perfect plan to capitalize on her sweet reputation. For a generous fee, she will be every trust-fund baby's dream: a Friday-night alibi, the "girlfriend" or "BFF" that parents dream about. With college approaching in the fall, Kelli's services are in demand more than ever, which means that her social life is nonexistent. But Kelli is A-okay with that. She's raking in cash for school. Besides, relationships are tricky, and sometimes very messy. She'd rather be at home on Xbox LIVE, anyway. Then the unexpected happens: She meets college stud Chase Maroney.Chase isn't like the preppy, privileged guys Kelli usually meets in Sundale. For starters, he's twentysomething, always wears black, and he shoots back one-liners as fast as she can dish them out. But Kelli's attempts to drive Chase away falter when she realizes that he treats her like he really knows her, like he cares about knowing her. When Kelli finally gives in to the delicious kiss she's been fighting for so long, she faces a tough decision: make Chase a real-life boyfriend and risk her heart . . . or keep her clients and lose her first true love.Review:Judging by the first line in blurb, I was expecting this to be a New Adult book. It was a far cry from NA and I don't like that "soon to be college freshman" was used to describe the setting of the book, as it was misleading. No where does Kelli plan anything out for college, talk about moving away for college, or even discuss college. This is very much a YA book and I'm not even sure I would go as far to classify this as a mature YA book.Once you get past that initial shying away of the text, you're able to figure out that it's actually an okay coming-to-age kind of story. Kelli Pinkins has made her high school life all about being that perfect girl. She goes to church regularly, works at a Christian book store, and has advanced through high school a whole semester ahead of her class. While her life is perfect on the outside, her mom and dad have a distant relationship with her and she's often left out of "family" events or from having any kind of real relationship with them. So she starts a little side business where she pretends to have real relationships with her high school classmates and becomes their friend/girlfriend for the night, so that said client can go out with their not-so-perfect girlfriend or friends and not get in trouble with their parents.It's a pretty typical storyline, and I'm sure you can see where it's going to go. But, as I've said many times before, just because it's cliche doesn't mean that the book can't be good! It's all in the writing and interpretation of the characters.And that's where the book falls apart.The writing is really an acquired taste. I honestly wasn't sure if I'd be able to push on past the first few pages once I realized that the book is written in a very relaxed conversational tone. Abbreviations and fake words pop up everywhere; even in dialog! It's written in a lax conversational, middle-teen tone and frequently includes phrases like:Fam, fa-zillionairism, 'cause, "become a hooker or something", superdelish, convo, sucktacular, Grr, Überclean, fake-a-roni, phooey, certifiably nutso ca-ra-zie, the perv, everybody to-ta-ly sucks, "We just kiss, kiss, kiss", Überyummy, yuckville, popcorny, Überclean, "We kiss, kiss, kiss until I'm the one pressed against the side of the pool.", "Ew, Sades! I haven't slept with Chase!" (I had fun highlighting them after a while...)No wonder Kelli isn't in college! 90% of the adjectives used were not real words! And every romantic interlude was described as "kiss, kiss, kiss"! Not very romantic or descriptive as I have no idea what fa-zillionairism means!I don't know anyone that's "entering college" that spells out "O-M-G" and words of the like in conversation and uses this list of sucktacular words (hmm, maybe I will use this to start describing reviews), but apparently that's what the YA audience likes to read (?) Though, I don't really believe that because I know that from the time I was 12 I enjoyed well written books and not mindless chattering dialog.I really didn't like Kelli! She was mean and self righteous. In the beginning of the book when her and Chase first meet, Chase barely says anything to her and she goes off on a name calling spree (i.e., Moron, jerk, full-of-himself, egotistic, perv...) - all because he made a smart comment about her pants. And then she goes on this rant about how he just wants in her pants (based on one comment) - yet calls Chase big-headed...ugh!Then there's this whole name calling thing that's meant to be "flirty banter" that later turns "endearing" - however, I don't know in what universe calling someone "Moron" all of the time is flirty, or romantic (a play on the name Maroney). Chase sometimes calls her "Stinky" (again a play on Pinkins), but it's not to the same degree or frequency as moron. When Kelli says it, it's demeaning sounding and never in fun, while Chase is always described as having a smile.About 60% through the book it finally gets better. The writing gets a face-lift and the slang talk is less frequent. The nice relationship between Chase and Kelli also develops. Where Kelli finally figures out that just because a guy gives her a compliment doesn't mean he's trying to bed her. Once that relationship develops it's a cute book that progresses nicely and you finally get some real background information on the characters.Overall, if you can get past the lax conversational intra and inter-dialog then you might enjoy the book as I felt that the overall writing style was the biggest put-off. I'm going to give this a 2 rating because I don't think the "age group" of the book matters as much as the content. I said before that I was trying to think of this review outside the context of NA, but as I conclude I know that YA/NA is only an age and should not reflect quality or style of the book. It would take a very peculiar taste for ANYONE to really get into this book.Ratings:Character development: ** (very basic and anti-climatic revelations)Writing quality: ** (a few too many made up words)Plot progression: ***+ (it clips along pretty good, but I got whiplash with the characters' feelings toward one another)Romance: **+ (clean, lacking connection and likability)