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A review by blkgrl_bibliophile
You Belong With Me by Mhairi McFarlane
lighthearted
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced eARC and an honest review.
I wanted to like this book. I really did. It was just very hard to get into from the very beginning. I will say, I have not read the previous book and did not realize this was a follow-up, but I don’t think that factor led to how this read for me overall.
In general, the story was just flat. I understood the complexities of both Elliot and Edie trying to navigate their on-again relationship given his celebrity status and the distance, but I just don’t know how much he needed to convince her he was all in after EVERYTHING he was already doing. Throwing Declan’s character into the mix felt unnecessary, but I do think it made the last 20% of the book more interesting and engaging as it forced Edie and Elliott to finally talk to each other about their relationship and future.
Finally, my biggest complaint about the book is the heavy use of colloquialisms that I’m assuming makes sense for someone with connections to Nottingham or the region in which they live, but I would imagine that the audience for this book would be a bit more widespread than that and even as an American having lived in London, I had a hard time understanding what they were talking about at times and just had to either rely on context or completely skip over it.
I wanted to like this book. I really did. It was just very hard to get into from the very beginning. I will say, I have not read the previous book and did not realize this was a follow-up, but I don’t think that factor led to how this read for me overall.
In general, the story was just flat. I understood the complexities of both Elliot and Edie trying to navigate their on-again relationship given his celebrity status and the distance, but I just don’t know how much he needed to convince her he was all in after EVERYTHING he was already doing. Throwing Declan’s character into the mix felt unnecessary, but I do think it made the last 20% of the book more interesting and engaging as it forced Edie and Elliott to finally talk to each other about their relationship and future.
Finally, my biggest complaint about the book is the heavy use of colloquialisms that I’m assuming makes sense for someone with connections to Nottingham or the region in which they live, but I would imagine that the audience for this book would be a bit more widespread than that and even as an American having lived in London, I had a hard time understanding what they were talking about at times and just had to either rely on context or completely skip over it.