Author: Abbi Glines

Review: Until Friday Night by Abbi Glines

Posted August 28, 2015 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Review: Until Friday Night by Abbi GlinesReviewer: Rowena
Until Friday Night by Abbi Glines
Series: Field Party #1

Publication Date: August 25th 2015
Genres: Young Adult
Add It: Goodreads
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four-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

The first novel in a brand-new series—from New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Abbi Glines—about a small Southern town filled with cute boys in pickup trucks, Friday night football games, and crazy parties that stir up some major drama.

To everyone who knows him, West Ashby has always been that guy: the cocky, popular, way-too-handsome-for-his-own-good football god who led Lawton High to the state championships. But while West may be Big Man on Campus on the outside, on the inside he’s battling the grief that comes with watching his father slowly die of cancer.

Two years ago, Maggie Carleton’s life fell apart when her father murdered her mother. And after she told the police what happened, she stopped speaking and hasn’t spoken since. Even the move to Lawton, Alabama, couldn’t draw Maggie back out. So she stayed quiet, keeping her sorrow and her fractured heart hidden away.

As West’s pain becomes too much to handle, he knows he needs to talk to someone about his father—so in the dark shadows of a post-game party, he opens up to the one girl who he knows won’t tell anyone else.

West expected that talking about his dad would bring some relief, or at least a flood of emotions he couldn’t control. But he never expected the quiet new girl to reply, to reveal a pain even deeper than his own—or for them to form a connection so strong that he couldn’t ever let her go…

Abbi Glines writes the kinds of books that drive me crazy. Her love interests start off as complete pricks but if you can get past their punk ass attitudes and shitty behavior in the beginning, they really turn their shit around. That was the case with West Ashby.

Maggie Carleton doesn’t talk. She hasn’t said a word in years, communicating through pen and paper. She hasn’t talked since her father was put away for killing her mother. A murder she witnessed. As you can guess, that whole situation has traumatized her and she survives by not speaking. She doesn’t want to talk about that night, she just wants to move on and she doesn’t want to become a burden to anyone so she keeps to herself. When she moves in with her Uncle and his family, she knows that her cousin (who is the same age as her) isn’t going to like having her tag along everywhere he goes. He’s a total dickhead to her when she first comes around and Brady (that’s his name) really got on my nerves throughout a whole lot of this book. He warns his friends off of his cousin but mostly because she’s “not right in the head” as he tells them. There were so many freaking times when I wanted to punch Brady’s lights out.

West wasn’t safe from my rage too. When we first meet him, he’s a complete asshole and his father having cancer and him being scared about all of that didn’t excuse his behavior for me. Oh hell no. I’m not even sure why I continued reading this book but more than anything, I was curious. I was curious to see when and how and why Maggie would start talking again and I wanted to see how far Logan would grow on me.

Abbi Glines did a great job of turning things around because I was invested from beginning to end…even when I was pissed to high heaven at West for being such a complete jerk. Brady too.

I liked that despite not talking, Maggie is portrayed as strong. She’s a survivor and her story was one that pulled at my heart strings. I loved the connection she formed with West and I loved seeing her stand up for herself when things between her and West weren’t to her liking. I loved seeing West grow from the asshole jerk in the beginning to the guy he was in the end because he ended up being a real one.

There’s a lot of growing in this book and I’m glad that I finished it because this book made me mad, it made me sad and it made me laugh. All things that I love while reading a book. This is a book that stayed with me after I finished the book and I’m crossing my fingers that we’ll get more from this group of characters. I’m looking forward to seeing the other boys stories, especially Brady.

Grade: 4 out of 5

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

four-stars


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Review: Twisted Perfection by Abbi Glines

Posted June 11, 2014 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Review: Twisted Perfection by Abbi GlinesReviewer: Rowena
Twisted Perfection by Abbi Glines
Series: Rosemary Beach #3, Perfection #1

Publication Date: April 24th 2013
Genres: New Adult
Pages: 290
Add It: Goodreads
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three-half-stars

Life outside of her house was a new experience for Della Sloane. The dark secrets of her past weren’t something she ever intended to share with anyone. They would never understand. No one would ever get close enough to find out. There was always a chance she’d go crazy sooner than they expected…

Woods Kerrington had never been one to be attracted to fragile females. They seemed like too much work. He wasn’t in it for the work just the pleasure. A night full of naughty fun had been exactly what was on his mind when he’d laid eyes on the hot little number that didn’t know how to pump gas and needed some help.

What he didn’t know was she was as fragile as they came.The carefree girl who spoke her mind and didn’t care what the world thought of her was more breakable than he could ever imagine…

This is the second book by Abbi Glines that I’ve read. I’ve heard about her books long before I finally opened one up and I was not expecting to hate the first book that I read. But I did. There are so many books by Glines that I was itching to read (still am too) so when my first go round with one of her books turned out so poorly, I was scared to start another one.

But then I picked this book up, seeing that the hero was actually a guy that I thought was okay in that one book that I liked and thought…I’m going to give her books another go.

And I’m glad I did.

This book is far from perfect but man was it compelling. We’ve got two characters that are from two completely different worlds and one of those characters is broken from past experiences and you’ve got one helluva story.

Della Sloane has lived with only her mother for company for as long as she can remember. Aside from her friendship from the nosy neighbor that turned out to be the best friend she’ll ever have, Della has been alone. She’s never been to school. She’s never gone to the movies. She’s never had friends so when she’s finally free from the constricting life that she led with her mother, she’s free to do whatever she wants to do.

So with her best friend’s (the nosy neighbor) car, she goes off in search of some adventures. Things are going swimmingly as she drives around, with no clear direction in mind, just driving until she needs to stop for gas and realizes that she has no clue how to pump gas into a car.

With the help of a sexy guy in an expensive car, Della wasn’t expecting to spend an explosive night with him…but she does. It was supposed to be a one night stand but when she finds herself back in his presence months later, things get really interesting.

Woods is almost engaged. He lives under his father’s thumb because he wants to be a part of the family business. Running the country club is something that he’s wanted for as long as he can remember and his dick of a father is dangling it in front of him but won’t let him take the reins without jumping through hurdle after hurdle after hurdle. Woods hates his life but has accepted that he’ll have to live without being happy in order to get what he really wants. The country club. But when Della storms back into his life and throwing it up in the air, he finds out that there are more important things that trying to earn the approval from the person that is never going to give it to him. There are things far more important that a country club.

And for him, it’s Della Sloane.

But Della’s got issues of her own. She’s got secrets that she doesn’t want to tell and memories that won’t leave her alone. And it’s a struggle for her to deal with them each and every single day but she does. Because it’s all she knows.

And the closer she gets with Woods, the more she realizes that true love really does exist.

These two characters are young and they make a lot of stupid mistakes that made me want to punch a wall but I kept reading because I couldn’t stop. It didn’t take me very long to finish this book but after I was done with it, I wanted more. I couldn’t wait for Simple Perfection to come out because I had to get my hands on it. Woods was a far better hero than Rush was and Della wasn’t the doormat that Blaire was so I enjoyed getting to know them.

I’m glad that I gave Abbi Glines another chance because I enjoyed this one and look forward to reading more books from her.

Grade: 3.75 out of 5

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

three-half-stars


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