Beautifully Mine
Ratings36
Average rating3.7
This book is my favourite book of all time! And I'm pretty sure it's going to stay that way. Travis was my first book boyfriend ever. I fell in love with the story when I read it for the first time at seventeen and my feelings haven't changed since then. Whenever I feel sad this is my go-to book. It always brings me so much joy and I'm forever going to be rereading it.
~WRITING - PLOT - PACE~
So this turned out to be quite an enjoyable little book. I had originally signed up for it because after reading the blurb I thought it would be a good candidate for my “stepping out” challenge. It sounded like it would be messy, angsty, and full of things I usually avoid like the plague. Especially considering the subject matter (drug addiction). Surprisingly, it wasn't very angsty at all. shrug However, I didn't find this a disappointment in the least. It was very well written. It was well paced, and I never grew bored or felt the need to skim. It is told in a dual POV format, and we also have some jumps back and forth from past to present. This can be problematic sometimes for me, but it worked very well in this case. Plus, the book isn't bogged down with them. The plot was engaging, sweet, and heartbreaking at times. I would have liked to have seen a bit more of Connor and Ava's relationship over the course of the ten years. I just couldn't completely feel Ava's pain because when the book starts Connor has been clean eighteen months (I think). I am going to assume we maybe see more of that type of thing in the first book? Last, this was all wrapped up in a decent happy for now.
~HERO~
CONNOR...Connor was pretty much the perfect book boyfriend. He was sweet. He owned his mistakes. He was trying to get his shit together. My heart ached for all him and Killian had been through, and his love for Ava knew no bounds. I loved him.
~HEROINE~
AVA...I loved Ava just as much as Connor. I was expecting a heroine that pushed away a lot, but she opened her arms as a friend and then more, pretty quickly. She was also feisty. She was strong. She was sweet, and she loved Connor even when he couldn't love himself.
~SECONDARY CHARACTERS~
This book wasn't too heavy on secondary characters. Killian and Eden (the couple from book one) being the two primary ones. That said, I am super interested in Tate. As well as Kiera, and Zeke.
~HEAT LEVEL~
LOW. This wasn't an overly spicy book. We get a couple of sex scenes, but they were milder in nature, but it worked.
~ANGST LEVEL - SEXUAL HISTORIES~
LOW...again, I was expecting something a bit more angsty here. As to sexual histories, well I am a bit confused on this matter myself. Connor and Ava had known each other for ten years. First as friends from the ages of 14-16, then as boyfriend and girlfriend until she broke up with him 18 months before this book started. They were each other's first, and I assumed that from 16 years of age until they broke up they had been a couple with no sexual encounters with other people. Now, when they break up the heroine does move on and has a f-ck buddy (Zeke – They end things quite quickly at the start of the book), and the hero stays celibate. What confuses me if that they have the “condom” talk and both mention they have always used condoms with other people. So I can only assume that over the course of those eight years they were an on and off couple with each sleeping with other people? Again, perhaps this information is more clear in the first book of the series? In any case, there wasn't really any OW or OM drama (Zeke don't count since he was a nice guy and didn't cause any issues for the couple).
~IN THE END~
Did I enjoy it? Yes.
Was it perfect? Almost. I wanted a little more angst and emotion in regards to Connor's addiction and how it affected Ava over the years.
Would I recommend it? Yes, undoubtedly. That said, although this could technically be read as a standalone it would be MY recommendation to read book one first. I have a feeling that there is a lot of backstory pertaining to this couple in that book.
Who would enjoy this book? Readers who don't like a lot of drama or angst.
Sedikit lebih baik dari Beautiful Disaster, krn setidaknya Travis tdk plin plan atau pura2 gk ngerti sama sikap Travis. Isinya sebagian besar sama dgn Beautiful Disaster krn ini dari sudut pandang Travis, ada sedikit momen2 dimana menceritakan Travis saat Abby gk ada.
This book is Beautiful Disaster in Travis's POV, so basically the same exact story but more swearing. There are a few new tidbits of information but not enough to relive Travis and Abby's up and down, drama-filled story.
UGH I wish I could give this 0 stars. Like, if [b:Beautiful Disaster 11505797 Beautiful Disaster (Beautiful, #1) Jamie McGuire https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1358259032s/11505797.jpg 16441531] was 1 star... this is 0. It's the exact same shitty story as Beautiful Disaster, but told from Travis's POV. First of all, there is way too much overlap with Beautiful Disaster for this to be a separate book. And since Travis tends to yell his feelings at any given moment, it's not even like there was a ton of hidden insight. I didn't even really enjoy hate reading it. I skimmed it a lot, and definitely do not recommend this at all. Like, don't even touch it. Don't make eye contact with it. Let's leave it on the shelf to think about what it has done.“I know we're fucked up, alright? I'm impulsive, and hot tempered, and you get under my skin like no one else. You act like you hate me one minute, and then need me the next. I never get anything right, and I don't deserve you...but I fucking love you, Abby. I love you more than I loved anyone or anything ever. When you're around, I don't need booze, or money, or the fighting, or the one-night stands...” He said that in the first book, from Abby's POV. And again, word for word, in this one. So repetitive. I skimmed this a lot (but still found plenty of bullshit to tweet about, of course).UGH I just saw this got voted onto a GoodReads list called “Best Book Boyfriends.” NO STOP. This book is like 300 pages of domestic abuse red flags. And I'm not talking like Twilight style “breaks into her house to watch her sleep”, I'm talking emotionally controlling, short temper, physically drags her off the dance floor when she dances with another guy (AFTER SHE BROKE UP WITH HIM). It's cuckoo-bananas. Plus Travis thinks of every other girl in the book as a slut. His philosophy: “Did women deserve to be treated like sluts? No. Did sluts deserve to be treated like sluts? Yes.” (Direct quote. GOD I HATE HIM.)Uh one addition this had was it kept talking about how Abby reminds Travis (and his family) of his dead mom? Sex...y? FUCKING GROSS, DO NOT EVEN UNDERSTAND THE APPEAL OF THESE AT ALL.Also I ordered them for our teen collection because they were popular and in that “new adulty” borderline, but after reading these garbage books I'm sending them to adult. The language and sex isn't that explicit, and I could see the case for them being in teen, but I JUST CAN'T. If teens want to read this shit (and so far it seems like they're not, at least not at my library–it's adults who are getting it), they are going to have to walk across the aisle and get them from adult. Again–I don't generally care for hyperbole like “Twilight will give girls unhealthy relationship expectations!” but I really don't want any teens to stumble upon it accidentally because it is truly next level bullshit.On a final note, from the epilogue I learned that in the future these two douchebags reproduce and have twins named James and Jessica... TRAVIS AND ABBY ARE TEAM ROCKET'S PARENTS.