Blogtober Book Review: A Million Junes by Emily Henry

GoodReads Summary:
For as long as Jack “June” O’Donnell has been alive, her parents have had only one rule: stay away from the Angert family. But when June collides—quite literally—with Saul Angert, sparks fly, and everything June has known is thrown into chaos.
Who exactly is this gruff, sarcastic, but seemingly harmless boy who has returned to their hometown of Five Fingers, Michigan, after three mysterious years away? And why has June—an O’Donnell to her core—never questioned her late father’s deep hatred of the Angert family? After all, the O’Donnells and the Angerts may have mythic legacies, but for all the tall tales they weave, both founding families are tight-lipped about what caused the century-old rift between them.
As Saul and June’s connection grows deeper, they find that the magic, ghosts, and coywolves of Five Fingers seem to be conspiring to reveal the truth about the harrowing curse that has plagued their bloodlines for generations. Now June must question everything she knows about her family and the father she adored, and she must decide whether it’s finally time for her—and all the O’Donnells before her—to let go.
Review:
This book really surprised me. I actually almost unhauled it two different times. But I’ve since read Emily Henry’s adult romance novel and the novel she co-wrote with Brittany Cavallaro. So, I wasn’t quite ready to give up on A Million Junes. I am so glad I held myself back from unhauling because I gave this book five stars on GoodReads.
We follow June. She goes to the local carnival with her best friend, Hannah. This is when June see’s Saul Angert for the first time in three years. He left town with little explanation and now he’s back. June’s family has one rule, and it’s to stay away from the Angert family. No surprise here that she doesn’t. June finds that she’s sort of attracted to Saul. But Hannah has had a crush on him forever and June wants to respect Hannah’s feelings. I really appreciated this aspect of the story. The fact that June was so thoughtful of her best friend’s feelings really made me love their friendship. I also loved that even when she got Hannah’s okay to act on her feelings for Saul, June didn’t just blow Hannah off. I don’t love girls that blow of their friends once they get interested in a guy.
Now, for the romance. I really liked Saul and June together. I loved the forbidden aspect of their friendship. It definitely led to some funny parts of the story where the pair were trying to keep Saul’s identity a secret. I thought the things that they experienced, the losses that they had in common, were a beautiful part of this story. I also really enjoyed the two sharing their family stories and trying to get to the truth of the two versions.
Overall, this story was beautiful and heartbreaking. It’s a story of grief and love and figuring out how to continue living after losing those close to you. I loved the magical aspects of the story. They were beautifully written and the magic was beyond fascinating. I am now a huge fan of Emily Henry and I’ve bought her other backlist titles. If you like magical realism and stories filled with emotion, this is the book for you.

Quotes:

“Letting go is not forgetting. It’s opening your eyes to the good that grew from the bad, the life that blooms from decay.”

“Grief is an unfillable hole in your body. It should be weightless, but it’s heavy. Should be cold, but it burns. Should, over time, close up, but instead it deepens.”

“When people pity you, it’s like they don’t realize that the exact same thing is coming for them. And then I feel embarrassed and uncomfortable and have to pity them, because, like, do you not realize that it’s always someone’s turn? You haven’t noticed everyone gets a few blows that seem so big you can’t survive them?”

“Maybe for some people, falling in love is an explosion, fireworks against a black sky and tremors rumbling through the earth. One blazing moment. For me, it’s been happening for months, as quietly as a seed sprouting. Love sneaked through me, spreading roots around my heart, until, in the blink of an eye, the green of it broke the dirt: hidden one moment, there the next.”

Keep on reading lovelies, Amanda.

Meant to be Broken by Brandy Woods Snow

GoodReads Summary:
Rayne Davidson is perfectly happy fading into the background. Her mama’s antics garner enough attention in their small Southern town for the both of them, but when Rayne catches the eye of all-star QB, Preston Howard, she’s enamored with the possibilities. Too bad Preston doesn’t make her heart thump—but his brother does.
Gage Howard doesn’t mind the town’s stares, probably because he doesn’t get them. Growing up in his older brother’s shadow, Gage shrugs off the endless parade of girls Preston brings home—until Rayne.
But there are unwritten rules that shouldn’t be broken, like cheating on your boyfriend or betraying your brother. Rayne and Gage deny their growing attraction, neither willing to hurt Preston—until the town finds out.
They think overcoming the gossip will be the hardest obstacle.
They’re wrong.
Rayne’s mama has a secret, and its revelation could divide the town, the families, and the new couple.
Can love really exist if it’s all built on a lie?

Review:
I received this book through an awesome opportunity offered to me through Filles Vertes Publishing in exchange for an honest review. I love opportunities like these because I get made aware of books that I would necessarily choose for myself or hear about through the normal channels.
Meant to be Broken was a book I was excited to get once I read the synopsis. It definitely caught my interest and was the perfect change of pace that I needed. I’ve been on a fantasy kick for what feels like forever. I flew through this story. I started it last night because I couldn’t sleep and I can read my Kindle without the light bothering my husband trying to sleep.
I got so much more from this story than I expected. I expected a high school drama about a girl falling in love with her boyfriend’s brother. I got so much more. I got a bit of one of my favorite bookish tropes, forbidden love. It sort of alternates between forbidden love and a really dysfunctional love triangle, but I forgive the triangle because the forbidden love part is done so well. I was way more invested in these characters than I thought I would be. I may or may not have cried more than once (but it’s possible that’s just the pregnancy hormones).
I loved the setting that Meant to be Broken takes place in. A small town in the south while it doesn’t have a lot of physical descriptions, most of the things that take place just make it so realistic and believable, one example is the gossip that spreads like wildfire. There are little touches throughout the story, such as certain activities the kids do for fun, that make the setting authentic.
I loved the characters. Rayne was funny and mostly down to earth for a high school girl. She was the nice girl in the group of snotty cheerleaders. So when she hears that the popular boy in school, Preston, is interested in her, her first question is why? I liked that Rayne wasn’t a typical girl who had wicked self-esteem issues. She wondered why Preston liked her because she didn’t look like most of the girls he usually chose to date, not because she thought there was something wrong with her.
As for Preston, I almost felt bad for him. Everyone puts him up on a pedestal. He’s the golden boy, the good boy. But they all make him sounds so shallow and like his whole life is based on pleasing others, specifically his mother. I have many more thoughts on Preston but I’m not going to go into them so I avoid giving any spoilers.
This story is told from two points of view. We alternate chapters between Rayne and Gage. I really liked Gage. He’s definitely swoon-worthy. The boy in school that is indifferent to everything except football and his car. He becomes best friends with Rayne and acts as her number one defender. He sticks up for her when he feels that she’s being treated or talked about in a way that she doesn’t deserve. But he also knows when not to get involved, when to let Rayne learn for herself that she’s trusting the wrong people or making a mistake.
The relationship between Preston and Gage is one that I liked. It was a heartwarming relationship between two brothers that do their best to look out for one another, but not without making sure to poke fun back and forth when the opportunity arose.
So like I said, there was way more drama than I originally expected, way more, and I loved every page of it. I was given characters that I easily fell in love with and became way too invested in and plot twists that completely took me by surprise. This is something I love in a book. I really like being surprised. There’s nothing better than when I’m completely blindsided by the events in a book.
As a whole, I really don’t have anything bad to say about Meant to be Broken. I thought the characters were fabulous. They were likable and realistic and reacted to the situations in the story in ways that made sense. I loved the little town that this book took place. The story was more than I was expecting in every way. I would for sure recommend it to anyone looking for their next contemporary read.

Keep on reading lovelies, Amanda.

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One Small Thing by Erin Watt

Summary:
Beth’s life hasn’t been the same since her sister died. Her parents try to lock her down, believing they can keep her safe by monitoring her every move. When Beth sneaks out to a party one night and meets the new guy in town, Chase, she’s thrilled to make a secret friend. It seems a small thing, just for her.
Only Beth doesn’t know how big her secret really is…
Fresh out of juvie and determined to start his life over, Chase has demons to face and much to atone for, including his part in the night Beth’s sister died. Beth, who has more reason than anyone to despise him, is willing to give him a second chance. A forbidden romance is the last thing either of them planned for senior year, but the more time they spend together, the deeper their feelings get.
Now Beth has a choice to make—follow the rules, or risk tearing everything apart…again.
Review:
I received this book from NetGalley as an ARC (though I think the book was released last month). I was super excited to get this book because I read the Royals series also by Erin Watt and I really enjoyed it. The synopsis of this story was really intriguing to me. I really enjoy reading about characters going through some trauma or awful life event and coming out better on the other side. There’s always just really great character development in books like this. One Small Thing was no different.
I knew I was going to like Beth within the first few pages because of one specific line. She’s told by her mother to clean the area for her stuff in their mudroom and while she’s doing so she’s telling us what she has there. One of the things she moves around and cleans is “a stack of Sarah J. Maas books that I’m reading for the eightieth time.” Right there I knew I liked her because I absolutely adore a main character that reads, though this was really the only mention of books, that’s okay. I really enjoyed reading about Beth and her struggle to deal with her feelings of grief and frustration that come with the death of a loved one. It was really interestingly written in a way that she wasn’t really able to properly grieve because she was so upset about so many other things in her life, such as her parents and their suffocating and unbearable rules. Because of her parents’ behavior, she starts to rebel and just finds herself in more and more trouble.
I understand that her parents are grieving the loss of their firstborn daughter and they want to protect the daughter that they do still have left, but I think they went overboard. It was to the point where if I were Beth I would have absolutely run away and stayed somewhere else away from them. I would not have been able to deal with them and just take the crap they were throwing at Beth.
I absolutely adored Chase. I was right alongside Beth falling in love with him even though everyone thought it was wrong. This is a guy that Beth was supposed to hate, but she finds herself attracted to him before she knows who he is. Then after she finds out who she is she deals with the shame and guilt because all of these people are telling her how she should be feeling, but she’s still drawn to him, still attracted to him. Let me just say, I LOVE FORBIDDEN LOVE. In this book, it has more frowned upon love than actually forbidden, but the feels are still the same. I honestly could not get enough of Beth and Chase together. They were just so good for one another even though they both tried to fight it. They were both what the other needed. Chase has no problem telling Beth she was being a spoiled ass brat and she needed to think about her actions and how she was treating people. This really had an effect on Beth. This wasn’t the only thing that Chase set her straight about either. I think that’s why I liked them so much because neither was afraid to tell the other how things really are and they need to get over themselves and do better. They’re just two people that were different parts of a horrible life event that were trying to figure out how to move forward and continue living their best lives. I see no reason why they shouldn’t be allowed to do that together.
There were a few side characters that I just have to mention. Jeff was garbage and I hate him. That’s all I’m going to say about him or else I will rant and I don’t want to do that. Beth’s best friend Scarlett is one that I mostly liked. They fight like typical high school girls and it was sad and horrible and made me really happy that I don’t have to deal with that petty drama anymore. Fighting about boys and not listening to your friends who are almost always right, it was super relatable but also made me mad because I’m out of that phase of life. There were a few members of staff at Beth’s high school that I just really loved. I think the high school did an excellent job of trying to support Beth and checking in with her even though she’s a high schooler that doesn’t want to talk about her feelings with any adults. I think it was a nice touch to the story.
Overall, I was pleased with this book. It was a really interesting read about two characters trying to deal with the same traumatic event where one is the victim and the other caused it. There was such a fascinating dynamic to this story and I loved every second of the forbidden love aspect. I also liked the tie-in with the title of the book. The idea is that you just need ‘one small thing’ to get you through each day. It was a really nice input into the story and it was something that I could really relate to within my own life. The writing wasn’t overly fancy or complicated so it made for an easy read of a story I really enjoyed. I liked most of the characters well enough but adored our two main characters. This was a nice quick read with a great story.
Keep on reading lovelies, Amanda.