Tag: Julie Cross

Review: Breaking the Ice by Julie Cross

Posted February 7, 2018 by Rowena in Reviews | 1 Comment

Review: Breaking the Ice by Julie CrossReviewer: Rowena
Breaking the Ice (Juniper Falls, #2) by Julie Cross
Series: Juniper Falls #2
Also in this series: Off the Ice (Juniper Falls #1)
Publisher: Entangled, Entangled Teen
Publication Date: December 26th 2017
Genres: Young Adult
Pages: 300
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four-half-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

The second book in the Juniper Falls series from NY Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Julie Cross, perfect for fans of Miranda Kenneally and Abbi Glines.

Haley Stevenson seems like she’s got it all together: cheer captain, “Princess” of Juniper Falls, and voted Most Likely to Get Things Done. But below the surface, she’s struggling with a less-than-stellar GPA and still reeling from the loss of her first love. Repeating her Civics class during summer school is her chance to Get Things Done, not angst over boys. In fact, she’s sworn them off completely until college.

Fletcher Scott is happy to keep a low profile around Juniper Falls. He’s always been the invisible guy, warming the bench on the hockey team and moonlighting at a job that would make his grandma blush. Suddenly, though, he’s finding he wants more: more time on the ice, and more time with his infuriatingly perfect summer-school study partner.

But leave it to a girl who requires perfection to shake up a boy who’s ready to break all the rules.

Breaking the Ice is the second book in Julie Cross’s Juniper Falls series. It follows Haley Stevenson as she tries to come to terms with who she was and who she wants to be. She doesn’t have time for boys and after the disastrous way her last relationship ended, she’s swearing off boys until college…too bad, Fletcher Scott comes into her life and changes of all her well thought out plans.

Fletcher Scott keeps to himself and doesn’t want to socialize with anyone. He keeps to himself and lives his life. He has a job that makes good money, gets good grades and doesn’t have a problem getting girls but when he takes a Civics class in the summer and Haley Stevenson sits in front of him, things get really interesting. More interesting than he knows how to deal with.

Haley and Fletch are from two totally different worlds and the more time they spend together, the more they feel for each other. Their romance was complicated because there were things about Fletch that Haley didn’t know, things that could hurt Fletch and trying to get to know him was like trying to break out of prison because he was a steel vault. Fletch doesn’t trust easy and he’s got his reasons. Finding common ground where they both get what they want was hard but staying apart was never going to work either.

What a fantastic book this was. From beginning to end, I was locked into Fletch and Haley’s story. I read this book in a day because I couldn’t put it down. Between Haley’s issues and then Fletcher’s, seeing them battle their attraction, knowing that they wanted different things and just everything. It was such a well written, drama-filled young adult romance that hit me with feels at every single turn.

My heart completely melted for Fletcher, seeing him deal with all of the changes that Haley was bringing into his life and not wanting the change but not wanting to be without Haley. Sure, he was an asshole but he was an asshole for reasons that broke my heart. My heart soared for him when he started letting more and more people into his life. Gah, his whole life had me in tears and I was soooo happy for him when Haley proves to be one of the good ones.

Haley really came into her own in this book and it was great to see. To see her come to terms with the end of her and Tate and then reflect on the person she used to be and try to be the kind of person she wanted to be, it made for some great reading. I was super proud of her by the end of the book and when she realized that if she wanted any kind of life with Fletcher, she had to make some drastic changes to her lifestyle, I just loved it to pieces.

I enjoyed the first book in this series but Julie Cross knocked me on my ass with this one so this book is my favorite book of the series so far and I’m pretty stoked to see who will get their story told next. I really enjoyed Jamie, Leo, Mike and the others. The way that they rallied behind Fletch was so sweet. I seriously loved this book. If you’re into first love stories with younger characters than you should definitely read this book because, ahhhh, the feels…you’ll have them.

Juniper Falls Series

Grade: 5 out of 5

four-half-stars


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Review: Off the Ice by Julie Cross

Posted March 16, 2017 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Review: Off the Ice by Julie CrossReviewer: Rowena
Off the Ice (Juniper Falls #1) by Julie Cross
Series: Juniper Falls #1
Also in this series: Breaking the Ice (Juniper Falls, #2)
Publisher: Entangled, Entangled Teen
Publication Date: February 28th 2017
Genres: Young Adult
Pages: 320
Add It: Goodreads
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four-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

All is fair in love and hockey…

Claire O’Connor is back in Juniper Falls, but that doesn’t mean she wants to be. One semester off, that’s what she promised herself. Just long enough to take care of her father and keep the family business—a hockey bar beside the ice rink—afloat. After that, she’s getting the hell out.

Again.

Enter Tate Tanley. What happened between them the night before she left town resurfaces the second they lay eyes on each other. But the guy she remembers has been replaced by a total hottie. When Tate is unexpectedly called in to take over for the hockey team’s star goalie, suddenly he’s in the spotlight and on his way to becoming just another egotistical varsity hockey player. And Claire’s sworn off Juniper Falls hockey players for good.

It’s the absolute worst time to fall in love.

For Tate and Claire, hockey isn’t just a game. And they both might not survive a body check to the heart.

Tate and Claire grew up together in the small town of Juniper Falls. Claire is Tate’s older sisters best friend and she’s been away at college. When her father gets really sick, she returns to town a lot sooner than she thought to help out at the family business. She’s not expecting for so much to change. From her to her best friend’s younger brother, Tate. Sure he’s only a year younger than her but seeing him now, he’s grown up. He got muscles and he got taller and he got hot. Claire wasn’t expecting to start liking him but well…it happens.

Tate has always felt something for Claire. He’s always had a soft spot for her so when he breaks up with his girlfriend, he wants to move right on to Claire. It’s not easy but nothing in Tate’s life has ever been easy. He’s got an abusive father, a mother who married the town exterminator and he’s never felt more alone at home. He carries the truth about his father’s abuse to himself because …I don’t know why, it’s probably a teenage boy thing but I never really understood why he kept it to himself. He’s got a lot going on and I enjoyed seeing his character grow over the course of the book.

I haven’t read very many books by Julie Cross so I can’t really tell if this is more of the same that you’d get from her but this was an enjoyable book. The characters felt real and their problems were familiar and real so I appreciated that but as much as I enjoyed it, I wanted more from both Tate and Claire.

I wanted Claire to be above the rumors in the small town. I wanted her to not be so caught up in what everyone was saying and live her life the way that she wanted to live it. I thought it took her too long to come around. The longer she kept Tate at arms length because of what she thought everyone was saying, the more I wanted to pull her hair and slap some sense into her.

Tate was another story. I wanted him to be smarter. I wanted him to open up to someone other than Claire far sooner than he did but I’m glad that it ended the way that it did because there was major growth in his character in the end. I was happy with the way that he really came into his own by the end and he was the guy that I hoped he would be when I first met him.

I’m assuming the next book will either be Leo’s book or Jamie’s. I’m down for either one. All in all, this was a good book that I had some issues with but not enough that my enjoyment of the book was ruined.

3.75 out of 5

four-stars


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Review: You Before Anyone Else by Julie Cross and Mark Perini

Posted August 12, 2016 by Rowena in Reviews | 2 Comments

Review: You Before Anyone Else by Julie Cross and Mark PeriniReviewer: Rowena
You Before Anyone Else by Julie Cross, Mark Perini
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Publication Date: August 2, 2016
Genres: New Adult
Pages: 400
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four-stars

Model Finley needs someone to help her shed her "good girl" persona, so she'll try Eddie on for size.

New York City model Finley is fed up with hearing the same feedback at castings: she needs to take some serious action to wipe the "good girl" stamp from her resume if she wants to launch to stardom.

Enter Eddie Wells. He's shallow, predictable…and just as lost as Finley feels. Deep down, Finley is drawn to Eddie's bravado, his intensity. Except Eddie is hiding something. A big something. And when it surfaces, both loving and leaving Finley will become so much harder.

I haven’t read too many books by Julie Cross but the ones that I did read, I enjoyed so I looked forward to digging into this one.

Finley is a model who can’t land any big time jobs because she’s too sweet and too cute and fashion designers are booking the edgy models, the hint of bad girl models for their photo shoots and it’s pissing Fin off because she needs work. In an effort to shake her good girl vibe off, she has a one night stand with Eddie Wells who is new to the model scene.

Eddie is supposed to be at Princeton but his pretty looks have landed him with a modeling job, an agent and a life that he needs to spend some time trying to figure out. He’s got a secret that he’s keeping and Fin knows that she should stay away but like I always say, the heart wants what it wants and Eddie and Fin want each other so it’s hard to stay away when you really don’t want to.

Seeing these two try to figure out their futures made for a really interesting read. I was prepared for a lot of shallow characters that smoked too much pot, drank too much of everything and got on my nerves but what I got was people getting their hustle on. Don’t get me wrong, there was plenty of partying going on but Finley and Eddie were too focused on their lives and their jobs to partake in anything offered at any of those parties that all the other models were going to.

I liked both Eddie and Finley. I liked them individually but I also really liked them together. I loved that Eddie didn’t kid himself when he would think about Finley. He kept track of how many times he accidentally (not even remotely accidental) bumped into Finley in their apartment building and I loved how much Finley cared about everything and everyone. She was a nurturer and I loved seeing her with her family. I also really liked seeing Eddie fit himself into Finley’s family too because his family sucked big donkey balls.

I loved how he went from having on support system in his life to having Fin and her brothers and her Dad. His problems made my heart hurt and I loved how him and Fin became a team and tackled their individual problems together. The love that blossomed between them was too cute for words. I loved how they supported each other in the big things but even in the small things. I just loved them to pieces.

I was a bit bummed with the way that things worked out in the end because they didn’t end the way that I was expecting it to end but still, this was a great story about two models finding themselves and love in New York City. It was a hit for me.

Grade: 4 out of 5

four-stars


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Review: Fifty First Times Anthology

Posted July 22, 2014 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Rowena’s review of Fifty First Times Anthology.

You always remember your first time…

Whether it’s the couple who decides not to go through with it, the two boys who finally aren’t ashamed, the newlyweds whose wedding night could very well be their last night together, the deaf pair who have no choice but to take body language to a new level–or, of course, the two young lovers fumbling and laughing, getting everything wrong. These are the memories that will never fade.

Join nineteen fantastic authors as they pull back the curtain and give you a peek inside that one intense moment in their characters’ lives when everything changes and nothing will ever be the same again.

Featuring stories from some of the hottest names in New Adult, Young Adult, and Romance including New York Times Bestselling authors J.Lynn/Jennifer Armentrout, Molly McAdams, Sophie Jordan, and Carrie Ryan.

NOTE: These stories are works of fiction. If you want to know about our first times, you’ll have to buy us a pet monkey first.

When I saw that J. Lynn had a story in this book, I was all about reading it.  I’m a fan of her Wait for You series and the story included in here was Britt and Ollie’s story of their first time.  I’m really hoping that this wasn’t it for them, that they were only a nice fling but after reading that the next book, Stay with Me, is not Britt’s book but Calla’s book, I’m glad.  Anyway, that is why I wanted to read this book but I read all of the stories in this book and there were some good ones and some that just didn’t do anything for me.

There were a lot of short stories in this book and I can’t think which book was my favorite.  I’m going to go through each story and jot down a few of my thoughts for each of them.

The Corner of First & Second by Gennifer Albin.

I liked this one.  It was cute story about two best friends who fell out of touch after a disastrous prom night who meet up after almost a year and reconnect.  I liked both Wes and Jac and thought their first time together was sweet.  This is probably one of my favorite reads in the entire anthology.

Daylight by Julie Cross

I’ve never read anything by Julie Cross but I’ve heard good things about her.  I wasn’t really feeling her addition to this anthology.  This short story is about a newlywed couple named Jack and Audrey. Audrey is the daughter of a preacher man and Jack is the mysterious tenant of the small apartment at the Church that her father preaches at.  They come into contact there and fall in love but I thought their story was too short to really get a feel for it so I didn’t really connect with either of the leads.  Oh, well.  I’m still curious about her other books.

A Little Too Scarred by Lisa Desrochers

This story is about a girl who has returned from Afghanistan, disfigured from a bomb that went off near her and killed her friend.  Before she was injured, she started growing closer to a guy that she went to high school with, named Rick.  Rick is two years older than her and used to date her sister’s friend. She was excited to come back home and meet him but now that she’s scarred up, she’s embarrassed and is pulling away from Rick but Rick isn’t having it.  He’s got no idea why she’s pulling away from him but he doesn’t give up on her and his persistence won me over.  My heart went out to Rene in this story because of what she went through but there were times when I wish she had more faith in Rick.  In the end, I liked it.

Once Bitten by Cole Gibsen

This is a story of a couple who fell out of contact with each other with no word.  The girl was left behind and the guy is back and wants to make things right.  I wasn’t too forgiving of Tanner.  I didn’t think there were enough pages to convince me that he was truly sorry for leaving without a word and I thought that Avery fell into his arms too soon, which is what we get for this being a short story but it still didn’t win me over.

Crash by Sophie Jordan

Hunter’s story! We met Hunter in Foreplay, he’s the guy that Pepper had a huge crush on.  But he’s not the guy that she ends up with.  In this short story, we meet Brooke.  The stripper that Hunter meets on a night out with the boys.  I won’t lie, the entire time that I was reading this book, I was singing, “I’m in love with a stripper” by T-Pain and it did make me laugh but really? This story was cute.  I adored Hunter and I liked Brooke.  They were cute together.

Under the Seryn Moon by Melissa Landers

This is Lyra and Kai’s story.  Their countries are at war with each other and to regain peace in the land, their fathers marry their kids to each other to keep it all in the family.  This short story follows Lyra and Kai after their married.  Lyra is scared and feels all alone and Kai is a mysterious stranger to her.  This story was cute and the only historical in the bunch of stories.  I liked both Kai and Lyra and even though I wished for more page time for these two, the pages we were given were good ones.  I liked this one.

How to be a Heartbreaker by Lauren Layne

Story of Annie and the guy that you don’t think she’s going to end up with at first.  Oh man, this is another story that I really liked.  With each passing chapter, I was thirsty for more and I was surprised at how quickly I switched camps from one guy to the next one.  The guy she ended up with was such a good fit for her that I was grinning like a crazy lady after I finished this one.  So cute!

Two in the Morning by Roni Loren

This is my first gay romance short story.  Besides Jules and Robin’s story from Suz Brockmann’s Troubleshooters series and while I loved their story, gay romances haven’t been anything that I read on the regular.  This story was cute and sweet.  Two best friends.  One gay, and one not…or so we’re led to believe until we find out, he’s not so straight.  When these two finally get together in the end, I smiled because I couldn’t help but think, “FINALLY”  Bates was a good guy and I was thrilled for him that Malcolm was not only gay but returned his feelings. Big happy face!

Believe in Me by J Lynn

Britt and Ollie’s story.  The story of their first time.  Ooh, the feels!  I’ve been wanting Britt and Ollie to end up together since I read Cam and Avery got together in Wait for Me.  If you read Be with Me, then you’ll remember when Britt and Ollie meet up at a party that Tess and Jase are at.  It’s before Jase and Tess get together so at the party, Tess gets pretty drunk and catches Jase with that other girl, Stephanie. Well, this story shows us what’s going on with Britt and Ollie.  And just like I knew I would, I loved it. So freaking cute.  My only complaint is that they don’t get a full novel…or do they? I hope so.

Sharing Firsts by Molly McAdams

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started this book.  I went into it with very low expectations because I hated the other book that I read by McAdams.  I was not a fan of that book, at all.  But this story was heaps better than Taking Chances…but saying that, I don’t think McAdams is for me.  This book was just okay, I didn’t read the other book featuring Kinlee and Jace so I didn’t understand what was going on but I thought their fight was silly and the way that Jace is portrayed as completely pissed off one minute and then does that quick switcheroo to completely in love again didn’t feel believable.

Strike Out by Myra McIntyre

This was another story that was just okay for me.  I didn’t connect with Liza at all, I wasn’t a fan of the way that she lumped all baseball players together and held “being a baseball player” against Ben for no reason other than past experiences with players that are not Ben.  Ben’s been nothing but a gentleman to her and she treats him like shit.  So when she finally decides to give him a chance, I rolled my eyes because she didn’t grovel nearly enough in apology to suit me.  I thought Ben was too good for Liza and when it ended, I still thought that.

This is My Sign by Hannah Moskowitz

I didn’t understand this story, or poem at all.  It was about two deaf kids who lost their virginity to each other before one of the deaf kids goes away forever.  And that’s it.  Meh.

Going for Broke by Lyla Payne

I think this was my absolute favorite story of the bunch.  I thought what Tressa did was completely adorable and brave.  You could tell that she had grown up from the last time that she saw Noel and I thought it was completely cool that she wanted one last chance to come clean about her true feelings for him, without an agenda of any kind.  She loved him and was still in love with him and she just wanted him to know before he got married.  My heart broke, my heart soared and then sighed all while reading this book.  So cute!

For the Sake of Science by Mark Perini

This was another story that I wasn’t a fan of.  I couldn’t connect with the main character, Luke mostly because I didn’t understand what was going on.  The character development didn’t do a thing to make me connect or even care what was happening with Luke and at the end, I was left thinking, “Alright, next.”  So yeah, this one didn’t work for me.

Love in an Elevator by Carrie Ryan

This is a love story about two strangers who get stuck in an elevator for hours and …fall in love.  Yeah, it was so implausible that it was hard for me to get into the story.  They met in an elevator and she’s completely soaked from being sent for food in the rain, with a broken umbrella.  So in the elevator, she’s soaking wet and the hot stranger sharing the elevator with her offers her his button down, she accepts, takes off ALL of her clothes and sits in the elevator with a complete stranger in nothing but his shirt.  No bra, no skirt, no PANTIES and she finds NOTHING wrong with it.

Yeah, not buying it.  So yep, this wasn’t for me.

Bunga, Bunga by Andrew Shaffer

Another gay hook up story? I’m not sure they were in love by the end of their story but they did end up enjoying each other’s company and it was cool.  Not much to the story but I was happy for the main character since he finally got to nail the guy that he’s always wanted to.  Go him! I feel bad because I forgot his name.

With the Lights On by Alessandra Thomas

This is a story about a girl Anna, who has body issues and her relationship with her boyfriend, Tal.  Tal loves her but because of some stuff that went down in her past, she doesn’t really believe that he loves her.  Well, she does but she doesn’t understand why. She’s not a skinny bitch, she’s got curves and she’s unsure of those curves.  Over the course of this short story, we see Anna come to be okay with her body.  This was cute but too short and I didn’t think that the characters developed completely to make me fall in love with them.  Still, it was okay.

Field Emotions by Melissa West

Oh, this was another cute story.  It features Blake and Summer, who have been really good friends since high school.  Blake is the big football star at their college and Summer is a nerd who is not a fan of watching Blake get hurt on the field.  Summer thinks that Blake is a big player but he’s anything but.  Oh man, I love the whole best friend to lovers bit and I thought West did a great job with these two.  They were adorable and when they finally did the deed, I grinned like a maniac.  So freaking cute!

Grind by Tracy Wolff

This was a short story about two lovers who have been a part for the last three years and are now reunited.  Gage and Dyani.  Their story was short and sweet and even though I wished for more, I still thought this was a cute one.

Overall, there was a shit load of stories but I wasn’t mad that I read them all.  I enjoyed some and I didn’t enjoy others but overall, it was a good mix of stories and I’m glad that I picked this up for review.

Overall grade: 4 out of 5

This book is available from Avon Impulse.  You can purchase it here or here in e-format.  This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.


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