Rowena’s review of More than This (More Than #1) by Jay McLean.
When Mikayla imagined her prom night, she envisioned a fairy-tale evening full of romance. So when betrayal and tragedy come in quick succession, Mikayla is completely destroyed. Suddenly, everything she loved and everyone she relied on are tragically, irrevocably gone.
Jake, a handsome boy she just met, happens to witness her loss. With no one to turn to, Mikayla is forced to depend on this near stranger and his family, and he in turn is determined to take care of her. But Mikayla—thrust into adulthood with no one to guide her—is desperate to contain her grief and hide what she considers to be her weakness. Mikayla and Jake both want more, but despite their growing closeness and intense chemistry, she tries to keep her distance and protect her heart. As he does everything in his power to win her trust, Mikayla must choose between remaining alone and safe or letting love in.
I’m not even sure where to start with this review. I went into this book a bit cautious because I read Tracy’s short review on Goodreads but I still gave it a shot because the book sounded like something I’d enjoy.
When we first meet Mikayla Jones, she’s a senior in high school getting ready for her senior prom. She’s got a pretty fantastic family, a family with a great sense of humor. She’s got a great boyfriend that she adores and a best friend that she’s had since the fifth grade. The night of prom, her entire life goes to crap. Dealing with betrayal and tragedy isn’t something that she thought she’d be dealing with at such a young age but what’s even more surprising is that the one person that has been there for her throughout it all is the guy she met the same night she found out about James (the cheating ex-boyfriend) and Megan (the crappy best friend).
His name is Jake Andrews.
Jake takes Kayla in and shoulders her burdens with her. He becomes her everything and bit by slow bit, they fall in love. The beginning of this story grabbed my attention and I was really enjoying the pacing of the story and just everything but then the longer Jake and Kayla kept their feelings to themselves, the more Kayla would cry and push Jake away, the more I wanted to pull my hair out.
I can’t even imagine having to live through what Kayla lived through in this book alone. I mean, she lost her entire family on the same night that she found out that the boyfriend she adored was screwing her best friend. Sure, she meets an even better guy who holds her hand through everything and is there for her but there were times when I thought I’d give up on Kayla. She cried a lot and yes, I get that her entire family died and if she was grieving and crying over them then that would be one thing but the stuff that drove me up the wall is when Jake would try to figure out what she feels for him and she would cry. Every time her and Jake had a disagreement, she cried. I hated that I felt like such a bitch for being fed up with Kayla at times. She lost everything and I’m supposed to be understanding but goodness, she cried over everything.
Her reasons for holding Jake at arms length (and still teasing the crap out of him) were good reasons and I would have been okay with them had she shared those reasons with Jake. But no, she would tease the hell out of him and then be like, “Nope. Not tonight. Not like this.” He never really understood where he stood with her and it got to be a bit much.
Jake was a great hero but he came with his own set of faults that drove me crazy too. He was just as bad as teasing the crap out of her and then being like, “Not now. Not here.” OMG, I wanted to smack the both of them throughout most of the second half of the book.
There were things that I really liked about this book. The writing was great and the characters were interesting but the story drove me up the wall. In the beginning of the book, I was really enjoying pretty much everything. The story, the characters and just everything but as the story progressed, my enjoyment of the book gave way to frustration and a lot of that had to do with the story itself.
Near the end, when Megan finally comes back into the story (and I should add that I’m glad that there was closure with Megan. I was so glad that she didn’t just fall of the face of the earth after she got caught sleeping with James), I was really frustrated with where everything lands. Kayla had already been dealt a pretty shitty life card, did she really need for all of that other crap with Megan? Was it really necessary to put all of that other crap on Megan’s shoulders? Wasn’t the betrayal enough? I felt like it was. Megan already lost everything, did she really need to keep losing shit?
Overall, my frustrations weren’t enough to make me give up on the series. I enjoyed the first part of the book a great deal and I really came to love Logan and the rest of the crew so I’m not throwing in the towel yet. I really want to read Cam and Lucy’s book. I LOVE LUCY! But my frustrations did make it hard for me to rate this book any higher than a 3. Still, it was an enjoyable read.
Grade: 3 out of 5
This book is available from Jay McLean. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
