Review: Sweet story
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 26, 2014
I liked this book. Olivia is an "ordinary" girl (though evidently, all it takes is a haircut and make up to make her into a "star") who moves, after a break up, to L.A. from Pittsburgh to change her life and live her dreams.When she meets hot, famous, rocker, Berkeley, she practically trips over herself, getting her foot into her mouth--it's that embarrassing. But he remembers her. They meet a couple more times and finally start seeing each other.They're really sweet together but the very public life he leads, quickly intrudes on their relationship. Olivia has to learn to trust in what they feel for each other if they ever have a chance of a forever together.The relationship was a kind of an insta-love thing, but it wasn't annoying, as it did take a while (weeks, months!) for them to officially get together. I also liked that she wasn't an actress or singer or anything else in the business. She was a new hire at a lingerie company and just learning the ropes there.Sometimes it felt like she was TOO much of a disaster magnet to be realistic but I let it go. She was cute and likable. Berkeley was hot and sweet and funny. The two of them together were great.(Sorry if cryptic here but trying to avoid spoilers:)However, after the tabloids printed awful photos from Hong Kong, Olivia made a statement which I thought was completely ridiculous. I understand wanting to avoid the press and maybe even the person who caused all the turmoil to keep yourself from further hurt. But before you make a public statement, you have to have all of the facts. At the very least, one of her friends should have listened to her messages to make sure they were presenting the correct front for the paparazzi. It was stupid, especially given that her friend worked in PR.Also, it was never explained when Berkeley told his PR person that Olivia was "a star. Effortless."I mean, I assumed he meant that she was a natural in front of the camera but his choice of words (or, rather, the author's choice of words) was strange and made me think something else would happen--an offer of an acting role? Who knows. I'm glad it didn't, actually. Once again--it was a good thing she had nothing to do with the industry. Otherwise, she would have seemed too fake and the story lost some of its "realism" for me.There were a couple of missed chances for conflict (when Berkeley finds out Olivia "crashed" an Oscar party, more Lisa drama, Christina's motivation for her actions) but it didn't matter much to the relationship part of the story.Also the whole book takes place in L.A. and it was obvious, even before I checked the author's bio, that she lived or grew up here (I am in L.A. too!). Pretty accurate locations thought the book. Although, I wouldn't say the Hills are the only place you find celebrities living. Plenty of non-celebs and average-sized homes all over the Hills. It's not like the flats of L.A. are the slums and the hills are only filled with $20M mansions. And I've lived in the flats and the hills--including Beachwood Canyon.But I'll never believe a celebrity would go to the Grove for lunch, even on a weekday. Even *I* avoid the Grove to stay away from the tourists--ESPECIALLY on weekends! And I'm not an A-list rock star. Granted, you can find celebs almost anywhere here. But if you're really famous AND currently in the middle of a media storm, you don't bike around the city and go to the Grove. No way.These are minor points, along with a few others, with which only a Los Angeleno would quibble. Not important to the story, necessarily. It was just an odd mix of knowing L.A. and not knowing L.A.The only thing I didn't like: authors these days seem to be having a lot of trouble writing a decent epilogue. There's a happy ending here AND an epilogue. But the epilogue is very short AND Berkeley is not in it!!! WTF?!?I was pretty annoyed. For a story so rooted in the public eye, to not see any public reaction to their HEA, it was disappointing.This book's title does indicate the book is part of a series about this band. I REALLY hope the next book has a lot more of Berkeley and Olivia in it. Though I assume it will be about another band member (presumably Mike and maybe Olivia's friend, Blair) so odds are I will never get the closure I wanted for this couple--at least not in the first person perspective. Hopefully the next couple's epilogue will be more satisfying.Maybe the author will do a Brightside 1.5 and give us a bit more Berkeley/Olivia fun? Pleeeeease!?;)Anyway, I did like this book. Not as much drama as there could have been, what drama there was was kind of shallow and quickly resolved, but the two, main characters made up for it.