A Bookish Girl

Couldn't get past the first couple of chapters - I read a ton of these student-teacher forbidden romance ebooks, but this one was so badly-written I had to delete it.

DNF, too much BDSM stuff for my taste.

DNF at 15%

I don't know why, but I'm just not interested in this. The writing style doesn't draw me in, and neither does the story so far. And life's too short!

Also, there were some irritating inconsistencies. The book is set in Johannesburg (which I was really intrigued by, since I'm from Joburg, and you rarely find novels set there), but the author used a mixture of South African and definitely not South African terms.

For instance: SMS instead of text - correct.
Gas station -incorrect. South Africans say petrol, not gas.
Apartment - incorrect. South Africans say flat, not apartment.

Subject matter wasn't for me. I'm sure the book is good; I'm just not interested.

4.5

3.5

This was completely terrible and yet I read all of it to see what would happen. At least Christina Lauren's writing has improved since they wrote this!

3.5 stars

This was cute and enjoyable, but the ending fell a bit flat for me. A book extolling the virtues of romcoms should have more butterflies and romantic tension along the way.

This was fine, but it didn't give me anything I wanted from a book with this plot and packaging. I was looking for a steamy secret/forbidden romance, with lots of “almost got caught” moments and a bit of spice. Instead, this is a very straightforward romance, with barely any sexual tension, no sneaking around, no almost getting caught, and no sex scenes. Which confused me, because books with this sort of cover always have sex scenes.

4.5 stars

For the first third or so, I was going, “Oh no, this is written like bad fanfiction, but I have to keep reading to see what happens!” (This is how 50 Shades got me as well, though this is MUCH better written than 50 Shades). And then the story and sexual tension got so more-ish I almost forgot about the bad writing? I don't know what it was, somehow this author has really average writing skills, but really great storytelling skills.

2/5 for the writing, 4/5 for the story and unputdownable-ness, so 3/5 average.

I didn't love this quite as much as I'll Give You the Sun, but there's no way I could give a book this beautifully written and magical and evocative fewer than five stars.

Nice enough story, but the writing really wasn't great. And that kept being highlighted by the fact that the book the main characters are writing is supposedly so good, according to their lecturer and peers, but it's so blatantly not. Awkward.

This isn't quite as good as “Not Another Love Song”, but it's still very readable and more-ish. I think my main problem was that the book is told in the present from Ama's POV, and in the past from Elliot's POV, and the Ama in the past vs the present didn't quite gel for me. They didn't seem like the same character. But I still enjoyed this very much.

Bloody loved this! I could barely put it down when I had to go to sleep.

Not quite as good as Well Met, but I still loved it.

LOVED IT!

4.5 rounded up. I adored most of it, but I wasn't a big fan of the direction it took towards the end (although of course everything turned out well).

4.5 stars. I could just have done with a smidge more romance, but overall this was readable as hell and thoroughly lovely.

3.5 stars

There's a good story in here. Unfortunately it was marred by an unbelievable number of basic spelling, punctuation, and grammatical errors. It's such a shame, because story and character-wise, it's a really good example of the genre. I just wish the author had bothered to get a proofreader (or knew how to do it themselves). If it had been exactly as is but without any of the mistakes, it would have been 3.5 stars.

4.5 stars

I enjoy Catherine Walsh's writing and characters, but I just don't find friend-to-lovers an interesting enough premise for an entire book.

Meh. Average. I kept reading to see what happened, but the writing was really not great. I won't be reading another book by her.

Cute story, perhaps a little longer than it needed to be in the middle, but I enjoyed it. The author's sparse use of commas really bothered me, though. They exist for a reason, Alexis! Don't be afraid to use them!