Title: Been Here All Along
Author: Sandy Hall
Published: July, 2017 by Pan Macmillan
Pages: 224
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

Gideon always has a plan. His plans include running for class president, becoming head of the yearbook committee and having his choice of colleges. They do not include falling head over heels for his best friend and next-door neighbour, Kyle. It’s a distraction. It’s pointless, as Kyle is already dating the gorgeous and popular head cheerleader, Ruby. And Gideon doesn’t know what to do . . .

Kyle finally feels like he has a handle on life. He has a wonderful girlfriend, a best friend willing to debate the finer points of Lord of the Rings, and social acceptance as captain of the basketball team. Then, both Ruby and Gideon start acting really weird, just as his spot on the team is threatened, and Kyle can’t quite figure out what he did wrong . . .

Final Thoughts:
With characters so vanilla, I kept wondering why I was reading this. It wasn’t inherently bad, I mean, I got through it in a few lunch breaks, but there was just no meat to it. Occasionally, some issue would arise and get my hopes up that there’d be some drama, something to invest in, but every time an easy out would appear to solve the problem. It seemed like all of the characters were made simply to be likeable, rather than to be real. Sure, it was sort of romantic, watching best friends realise they like each other, but it was just fluff.

Title: Girl In Between
Author: Anna Daniels
Published: May, 2017 by Allen & Unwin
Pages: 320
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

Lucy Crighton has just moved in with some gregarious housemates called Brian and Denise …who are her parents. She’s also the proud mother of Glenda, her beloved 10-year-old …kelpie. And she has absolutely no interest in the dashing son of her parents’ new next-door neighbour …well, maybe just a little …

As the girl in between relationships, careers and cities, Lucy is facing some awkward truths – like her mum’s obsession with Cher, her father’s unsolicited advice, and the probability there’s more cash on the floor of her parents’ car than in her own bank account.

Thank goodness for Lucy’s crazy-but-wonderful best friend, Rosie, who’s around to cushion reality with wild nights at the local Whipcrack Hotel, escapades in Japanese mud baths, and double dating under the Christmas lights in London. But will Lucy work out what she really wants to do in life – and who she wants to share it with?

Girl in Between is a warm, funny, charmingly Australian story about life at the crossroads. Featuring an endearing and irrepressible cast of characters, it will have you chuckling from start to finish.

Final Thoughts:
Lucy is a flake. I get that she’s at a crossroads, but she has absolutely no direction in life. She would pick random career ideas out of nowhere and drop them barely a page later. About the only thing she seemed to want for in life was to have a baby, but even that wasn’t really a goal of hers. She wasn’t out looking for a husband, she wasn’t doing much of anything—it didn’t feel like she had any kind of mission, she just let things happen around her. Plus, the overdose of Aussie culture littering the pages of this book…I could probably write an entire review just about that.

Title: History Is All You Left Me
Author: Adam Silvera
Published: February, 2017 by Simon & Schuster
Pages: 294
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

When Griffin’s first love and ex-boyfriend, Theo, dies in a drowning accident, his universe implodes. Even though Theo had moved to California for college and started seeing Jackson, Griffin never doubted Theo would come back to him when the time was right. But now, the future he’s been imagining for himself has gone far off course.

To make things worse, the only person who truly understands his heartache is Jackson. But no matter how much they open up to each other, Griffin’s downward spiral continues. He’s losing himself in his obsessive compulsions and destructive choices, and the secrets he’s been keeping are tearing him apart.

If Griffin is ever to rebuild his future, he must first confront his history, every last heartbreaking piece in the puzzle of his life.

Final Thoughts:
I don’t know why I did this to myself again. That’s not to say that this isn’t a good book—I felt immersed in Griffin’s grief, and loved all of the character building, both in the present and the flashback chapters—but there is a definite depressing undertone. I had to pick up another feel good book mid-way through this to give myself a break.

With chapters alternating back and forth between the past and the present, I struggled initially trying to find a balance. Having something interesting begin to happen in one time period, then being sent back to the other became frustrating. I would have preferred if the ‘history’ chapters were spaced randomly so you didn’t know when to expect one.

Title: How To Not Fall In Love, Actually
Author: Catherine Bennetto
Published: January, 2017 by Simon & Schuster
Pages: 512
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

Emma has a job in television which is distinctly less glamourous and exciting than it sounds. She’s managed to claw her way up the ranks from Tea-Maker and Rubbish-Collector to 2nd Assistant Director (heavy on the ‘assistant’. Even heavier on the ‘2nd’).

So when she finds she’s accidentally very pregnant and at the same time accidentally very sacked (well, less accidentally: she did tell her boss to stick his job up his bum), she knows things are going to have to change.

Luckily she’s also accidentally the heir to a lovely cottage in Wimbledon, with a crazy Rottweiler-owning octogenarian as a neighbour and a rather sexy boy as an accidental tenant. But this baby is coming whether she likes it or not, and she needs to become the sort of person who can look after herself let alone another human being – and quickly.

Final Thoughts:
Oh, this book cracked me up so much. With such strong personalities, these characters lit up the pages. It was hard not to love even the annoying people as their idiosyncrasies brought Emma’s disastrous world to life. Pregnant, broke and getting nowhere in life, Emma’s up shit creek, but watching her wade her way through it was just so heart-warmingly awkward and fun.

Title: The Upside Of Unrequited
Author: Becky Albertalli
Published: April, 2017 Penguin
Pages: 340
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love-she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful. Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess.

Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness-except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. Will is funny, flirtatious, and just might be perfect crush material. Maybe more than crush material. And if Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back. There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker, Reid. He’s an awkward Tolkien superfan, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him. Right?

Final Thoughts:
Oh my…gah—why does it have to be over? Though honestly, I felt like it ended perfectly. I lived for these characters. Reading well into the early hours of the morning, I forwent sleep in favour of some extra time with Molly and her family and friends. Randomly bursting out laughing, I felt like this was exactly the book for me. Suffering from anxiety, a lot of the struggles were in her head, which I found immensely relatable. I really appreciated finding a book like this. I just clicked with her from the get go and got so absorbed in her world.

Title: Seven Days Of You
Author: Cecilia Vinesse
Published: March, 2017 by Hachette Children’s Group
Pages: 304
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

It’s Sophia’s last week in Tokyo, and she’s going to make it count…Sophia has spent her life ping-ponging between different countries and schools, so, in theory, saying goodbye should be easy. But now she’s leaving Tokyo – the place that finally felt like home. The only way she can get through this is to make her final week perfect. Then Jamie Foster-Collins shows up, just in time to ruin everything. Jamie and Sophia used to be friends …and his return stirs up feelings she thought she’d forgotten. Suddenly, hours and minutes become meaningless. Only time spent together, exploring the hidden streets of the city they love, is real.

Final Thoughts:
Fun at times, and at others, a bit of a snore, this one took me three weeks to finish. I was drawn to the idea of reading about Tokyo, and got a bit of that in the beginning, but eventually it became all about the romantic drama. I’m usually down for that. If the characters strike a chord with me, the book could be about anything and I’d still devour it. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel connected enough to Sophia (Sofa to her friends), Jamie or David to get on board with either of the pairings the book tried throwing at me. Basically, I just wanted to be in Japan and leave these people behind.

Title: How To Repair A Mechanical Heart
Author: J.C. Lillis
Published: September, 2012
Pages: 255
Rating:  
Purchase: The Book Depository

Eighteen-year-old Castaway Planet fans Brandon and Abel hate bad fan fiction—especially when it pairs their number-one TV crushes of all time, dashing space captain Cadmus and dapper android Sim. As co-runners of the Internet’s third most popular Castaway Planet vlog, they love to spar with the “Cadsim” fangirls who think Cadmus will melt Sim’s mechanical heart by the Season 5 finale. This summer, Brandon and Abel have a mission: hit the road in an RV to follow the traveling Castaway Planet convention, interview the actors and showrunner, and uncover proof that a legit Cadsim romance will NEVER, EVER HAPPEN.

A Brandon and Abel romance: also not happening. Brandon’s sick of his struggle to make “gay and Catholic” compute, so it’s safer to love a TV android. Plus Abel’s got a hot new boyfriend with a phoenix tattoo, and how can Brandon compete with that? But when mysterious messages about them start popping up in the fan community, they make a shocking discovery that slowly forces their real feelings to the surface. Before they get to the last Castaway Planet convention, Brandon’s going to find out the truth: can a mechanical heart be reprogrammed, or will his first shot at love be a full system failure?

Final Thoughts:
So, this was fanficcing-tastisc. Aside from, maybe, Fangirl, I’ve never seen so much fanfic love in a book. And here, both the main characters were gay! It had me gripped in the best possible way. I should lament—but I’m won’t—the poor disintegrating Sunday that met its demise when I started and finished this book that day. With so much to love about this book, from the cross-country convention road trip, flirting, internal warring over a religious upbringing, the geeking out and more flirting, I can’t help but want to recommend this book. I don’t want to let go of these characters—Brandon and Abel (and Bec) forever.