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Synopsis:

Losing his dream, his ultimate plan, and his future- Nash Lee never expected to be facing a life without football. One wrong move and it had all changed. Going back to school for his senior year no longer appealed to him. He’d rather not leave his house. Walking back into Lawton High School, seeing pity in everyone’s eyes was just another reality in his nightmare.

Revenge wasn’t a pretty thing. Tallulah Liddell had found it was rather controlling. The way you looked at life changed completely when you clung to the ugly notion. But she’d done it anyway. From the last day of her junior year when Ryker Lee had made a fat joke about her and Nash laughed with him, she’d been driven by pain. It wasn’t like no one had made fun of her weight before. She was used to that. What had hurt so deeply was Nash’s laughter. He’d always been the one person to notice her, include her, not treat her differently. But that one moment had changed it all. From the time she walked out of the school building to the moment she returned for her senior year Tallulah had been determined to lose weight and finally be the size her peers considered acceptable.

What she wasn’t expecting on her return was to find a broken Nash Lee who no longer smiled, rarely spoke, and didn’t care about anything or anyone around him. He was just existing. But the pain in his eyes she understood all too well. He was alone. He no longer fit into the perfect package.

You know those daydreams you have for years . . . the ones you know won’t come true, but they get you through the day?

An epic start to what turned out to be a total letdown of what we began with. This book legit started out with me fangirling and just knowing I had to have it on my shelf. I’m not kidding-within that first 20%, I was texting my friend and praising the glories that be, so excited that a cover so gorgeous would soon grace my shelf because Nash was just…he was just so dang addictive.

That is, until he wasn’t. I’m not sure what Glines was doing here, but she turned what started out as an epic novel into a hot mess that careened out of control. I won’t lie and say I have always loved her writing-because I haven’t. In fact, I found that, years ago, I needed to say bye to this author because her overly-dramatic and cheesy [and, I’m sorry, somewhat trashy] books weren’t to my taste. I didn’t bash. I didn’t continue to try and make it work-I just gave up and moved on. Yeah, her dudes are hot. And, yes, I LOVE some of that hot boy drama…but that’s just what it is: Drama.

And I’ve never gone back. Not once. Though, when I started following Glines on Bookstagram because our blog began to become a big part of Instagram, I fell in love with her. Her precious daughter. I really like this woman-a LOT. Same with CoHo-her posts crack me up daily-but that doesn’t mean I agree with either of their books’ writing styles.

But then Glines posted about her new book coming out, I got curious, I looked it up-and it was INSTA-LOVE, my friends. Well…we all know how we feel about insta-love, amirite? I read about the hate-to-love romance and how the girl wanted revenge on the tortured FOOTBALL player and I just…I caved. Maybe her writing was different. Maybe the guy would be enough. And, in the beginning, it was. I was OBSESSED. This book was a 5, people. And then I started to see why I stopped reading her work in the first place.

Repetitive issues. Words. Statements. Overly used drama. Too many problematic themes that literally had no place in the story. Like……the one dude that showed up at the football game suddenly became a big part of Nash’s story-Why??? It was so irrelevant and dumb and just…stupid, I literally laughed when that arc ended. Come on. Really, Abbi? Really? I’m so sorry, but no. So silly.

And the one dramatic element that didn’t belong that I loved?? That I wanted to be a thing??? It literally went NOWHERE and actually ruined the book. It did. It made Nash into somebody hard to relate to and I just don’t get why this was a path she didn’t jump on. It was so epic!!!!! I LOVE WHEN THESE INTERFERENCES HAPPEN! Bring on the jelly.

And, worst of all, this ruined opportunity also ruined what was blooming in Tallulah and Nash’s relationship. I think we saw so little of them together, in my opinion, after a certain point, that I was disgusted. Isn’t this the point of a smutty YA/NA? To see them get past stuff and recreate issues and get past it again? Why are we getting so little time of them on the page together? This gutted me because, honest to God, even after the trainwreck that was the middle, I rooted for this to shape up and for me to get obsessed again.

But, alas, in the end, I was disappointed and don’t think I could give this author another chance. I mean, maybe when I’m in the right mood? Who doesn’t love the HS football player arc? Many don’t, I suppose, but I adore it…so I might go back and read the others and hope their drama is more central to the actual story. But, for now, I’m so sad and disappointed in what had started out with so much dramatic promise. I’m still pouting about it. Honestly. And, also, come on now-Tallulah? That name?! That’s the name you use when you can’t think of someone’s name or a good make believe name. I kept picturing Phoebe signing for Monica’s bed in Friends-Monicaaaa Tallulaaaaah Gellar. *My apologies to anyone named Tallulah*

So. Yeah. This sucks. But better luck next time, I suppose.

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