I don't intend to hurt the author or the book, but I do talk openly on this site about my reactions to books, good and bad. I respect the author's efforts to write and publish her book, and as an author myself, know the bummer of having someone not like it. Still, not everyone will like a book, and for me, I am torn up about this one.
Check it out, and lemme know what you think in the comments below.
The Bad Boy's Girl
~Author: Blair Holden
~Released: February 21st 2017
~Released: February 21st 2017
~Length: 395 Pages
~Genres: Young Adult, Romance
Tessa O’Connell is a girl as ordinary as they come-or so she thinks. Her aim for senior year is to keep her head down yet somehow manage to convince her childhood love Jay Stone to love her back. What she isn’t prepared for is for Jay’s brother, Cole to return to town and change the life she’s always been seemingly content to live. Tall, gorgeous as all hell and a bad boy with ocean blue eyes and the perfect edge of adorability, he was her greatest tormentor, her number one enemy.But the guy that’s come back is like no one Tessa’s ever come across. He challenges her, he tests her limits, he forces her to bring out the girl she’s long ago buried under a veil of mediocrity and most of all he compels her to consider that perhaps the boy that infuriates her to the point of no return might just her guardian angel. This new edition contains never before seen, exclusive content!
*Please remember, this is an UnPlugged review, meaning there are spoilers, and this is a candid review with raw, honest reactions.
For a professional PluggedIn review, sans spoilers, see my official blog post here!
Okay, let's start with the beginning.
The first three quarters of the book, I loved! The characters, the plot, the twists - agh! I was so into this book, it was primed to be one of my favorites. The real-life events like being attacked, the trauma of that, her raw emotions...I loved it all. It was fantastic.
Maybe that's why the last quarter of the book pissed me off so much?
Basically, the whole book went nuts in the last quarter, and it didn't make any sense. I swear the author said, "Well, this is all going so smoothly, it's such a good story...let's fuck it all up. Where's my hack-saw?"
My reaction?
Why? Just, why??! Why end it that way?! That's a TERRIBLE ending!!
Let me prep this, for just a sec. Cole loves the bejeezus out of Tessa. He's obsessed with her, and has been since they were kids. He did so many things to win her over, earn her trust, and was passionately stubborn about getting her to open up to him, and be with him.
It worked! They were together. They were perfect, and adorable, and it was just magic.
Then, it all goes to hell, and he turns into the devil.
He does all that crap to win her, and on top of that, it turns out all the pranks and nasty stuff he did to her growing up, was because he liked her. He's been in love with her for like a decade. That's amazing!!! That is deep! A person doesn't just abandon that overnight!
So, they have a fight, as all couples do. They have had a volatile relationship their whole lives, and neither are new to tension in the relationship. The fight shouldn't have pushed him or changed much at all. You spend that long working to win the girl of your dreams, you don't do something stupid and burn the whole thing to the ground. Especially Cole - he just didn't have that personality. He was one-track minded to get and keep what he wants, and he wouldn't let go like that.
What exactly happens?
Some chick comes out of no where, who was not in the rest of the story, and was barely introduced when she did randomly appear. He apparently knew her though, and he had always thought of as a little sister, while she was secretly in love with him.
I get the irony - she was him and he was Tessa, and yada yada yada, dramatic irony. The circle is complete, he was secretly in love with Tessa, while random chick was secretly in love with him. Gotta have that cliche triangle, right?
So, this chick proclaims her love for him, right after his fight with Tessa, where he had stormed out and to cool off.
He's shocked by the admission, and apparently it's enough to get him to basically loose his mind long enough to cheat with her! He then instantly regrets it and blows her off, to go back to Tessa, admitting what he'd done, and looses her completely?!!
WTF??!
WTF??!
He cheats on her. He fracking cheats on her!! Are you kidding me? I still can't believe that's the direction the author took. The entire buildup where they actually get together and it's all good, then that. Completely random shocker, and for what? To surprise people? To avoid one cliche by tossing in another? Seriously, what was the point of that? It added nothing to the story, and didn't even make sense! Character development is important, and keeping them on tracks that make sense is vital. A guy doesn't throw away decades of feelings over one of hundreds of fights.
Not only did it turn Cole into the biggest ass-hat ever, but it made him seem like a creepy perv - seriously, who cheats with someone who's been basically a little sister in his mind? That's just messed up! Sisters don't become lovers, especially in literally a matter of minutes. Who jumps their littler sister's bones?!
Unless he was harboring feelings as well, people don't just change years upon years of feeling a certain way with the snap of a finger.
Unless he was harboring feelings as well, people don't just change years upon years of feeling a certain way with the snap of a finger.
The whole thing made me angry, not only for Tessa, but to the poor girl who was in love with him and got tossed away after he anger-banged her. She finally works up the courage to tell the man she loves how she feels, he has a passionate few minutes with her, getting her hopes up, then basically tells her it will never work out, that he's in love with someone else, sorry, bye. Runs off, leaving her shattered and broken, only to go break the heart of the other woman as well.
The whole situation totally felt like she was just thrown in last minute to make some half-ass cliff-hanger ending, or if nothing else, end it with something other than a happy ending.
I get not wanting to be cliche. I do. But that just seemed so far past drastic, it's painful. Not only that, the cliche of a triangle didn't really fit, especially throwing it in last minute. The entire book was spent convincing not only Tessa, but the reader, that Cole was a good guy. The moral seemed to be find strength in yourself, and follow your heart, even if that means trusting this guy. That love can exist, even if it's in the most unlikely of places.
Instead, it basically made it a "What was the point of that. Gimme my two hours back, cuz you ruined your whole argument in the last half hour."
Instead, it basically made it a "What was the point of that. Gimme my two hours back, cuz you ruined your whole argument in the last half hour."
It didn't feel at all in line with the rest of the book, Cole as a character, and even Tessa didn't even seem like herself! The fight they had in the first place was odd, didn't make sense at all, and I felt like I missed something entirely. It was like invasion of the body snatchers!
The whole first part of the book had a particular voice, flow, and style. Then all the sudden, the author decided to completely switch gears, without warning, and turn it into some sort of soap opera that did not belong.
What's even more annoying, is this: had the entire last section been part of it's own story, it would have actually been interesting - it wasn't a bad plot.
What's even more annoying, is this: had the entire last section been part of it's own story, it would have actually been interesting - it wasn't a bad plot.
Thrown onto the end of this story though, just didn't fit. The characters' personalities and character traits completely changed, and the whole voice and flow was so different, it made no sense.
On top of that, the whole story had amateur mistakes, and obviously wasn't edited, or if it was, the editor wasn't very good. The grammar mistakes were glaringly obvious, the overall format and layout was unpolished and unfinished. The whole thing just seemed typed up from a notebook, and then immediately published. Being a Wattpad story, it probably was something along those lines, but I digress.
Normally, that doesn't bother me too badly on it's own, but when thrown in with everything else, it ends up being the gravy on a crap-tastic plate of disappointment.
Normally, that doesn't bother me too badly on it's own, but when thrown in with everything else, it ends up being the gravy on a crap-tastic plate of disappointment.
Personally, the story just completely tanked in the second half. There were other parts leading up to the final chapters of insanity that I didn't care for either, which made it a whole second half of "well, that sucked."
I really loved the first half, and I did fall in love with Cole a bit - he's awesome. Tessa seemed like someone I'd be friends with in real life, if not simply a similar version of myself at her age.
That all ended, and died a horrible death in the second half. It was painful. I was physically cringing and wanting to punch my pillow.
This is definitely not a book I'd recommend, unless you're prepared for the whiplash ending. I'd say read until they get together, then stop, drop the book, and walk away. Had it ended there, it would have been awesome, and would have had some sort of point, as any book should.
As it is, I read three quarters of a book where the point was fighting for love, confidence, and trust. The last quarter killed Tessa's idea that love was real, that trusting was safe, or that she was good enough. He killed her inside, and that's just not something I enjoy reading, after they'd actually managed to heal her and make her into something wonderful.
This sucks.
That all ended, and died a horrible death in the second half. It was painful. I was physically cringing and wanting to punch my pillow.
This is definitely not a book I'd recommend, unless you're prepared for the whiplash ending. I'd say read until they get together, then stop, drop the book, and walk away. Had it ended there, it would have been awesome, and would have had some sort of point, as any book should.
As it is, I read three quarters of a book where the point was fighting for love, confidence, and trust. The last quarter killed Tessa's idea that love was real, that trusting was safe, or that she was good enough. He killed her inside, and that's just not something I enjoy reading, after they'd actually managed to heal her and make her into something wonderful.
This sucks.
Have you read a book like this, where the ending just ruins you? Lemme know in the comments below - I'm going to go get some ice cream, and snuggle with my cat.
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