Why I picked itLast year I started to get into watching BookTube videos, and Christine Riccio was one BookTuber that I started to watch once in a while. When I heard that she fulfilled the dream of writing a book, I thought, "That's really cool! Maybe I'll check it out." Then the hype started, and her book was EVERYWHERE. I kept seeing great reviews and mentions of Again, but Better, so I ended up buying it. Brand new, hardcover…for me that's a splurge, since I typically buy used books from Goodwill or borrow them from the library. It may have taken me about six months, but I finally got around to reading it! I also am counting this book toward my World Tour stamp on my #2020ReadingPassport challenge. This book occurs in many places, mostly London, but also some in the US, as well as France, Italy, and a couple other European settings. SummaryShane is a shy college student who feels like she's so behind in life. She doesn't feel like she has many friends, she thinks that almost everyone her age has already had their first kiss (or even gone further), and she's following a career field that her parents dream for her instead of the one she dreams of. So she decides to give herself a bit of a new beginning and picks a study abroad program she is interested in and heads overseas to London. While there, she focuses on making friends, getting out of her comfort zone, writing, traveling, and living the life she's always wanted. Along the way, she makes mistakes and realizes that she maybe still isn't going about things in the right way. Eventually she finally realizes that with courage (and maybe a bit of magic), she can make a life she's only dreamt of. What I likedI definitely related to Shane a bit throughout the book. I was a shy introvert with few super close friends. I remember being told by a couple upperclassmen friends that I needed to go party instead of sit in my room and read or watch TV, but that just wasn't my scene. I had a boyfriend throughout college (who is now my husband), but we were working through a long-distance relationship and had our fair share of struggles. I even tried to reinvent myself a little bit later on in my college career when I was at conferences or new experiences with few people who knew me, and let me tell you, that truly does take courage, especially for an introvert like me. So all the way through, I was finding it SO EASY to relate to Shane and her awkward young adult struggles with money, relationships, and finding your path. I liked the supporting characters. Meeting Pilot and Babe, Atticus and Sahra was wonderful. I liked the friendships that they built with one another and with Shane. It was a semi-diverse group, though it was interesting that all of them in the flat were from the same country. I've never been in a study abroad program, but I always thought that there were students from all over the world in these programs and that there would be a little more diversity, I guess. But that wasn't a turnoff for me. The characters each had unique personalities and interests, helping each other find new TV shows, movies, etc. that they liked. It was kind of nice to have some throwback in there of 2011 references to T-Swizzle, Lost, etc. Made me think of high school and reminisce a little bit. And I just thought that it gave more personality to each of the characters, especially Shane. What I didn't likeThe magical element was my least favorite part. I'm going to be honest, I missed the part in the description that said there was a magical element (and by that I mean I didn't take it seriously and just thought it was a figure of speech when it said "a touch of magic"). But I thought it was disjointed and didn't make a lot of sense. I get that the story was about starting over and reinventing your path, but I wasn't sure the magical element used was the right way to support that. I would have preferred a normal contemporary book to be quite honest. I just think it could have been done differently, or the magical piece could have been nonexistent. Either one. Something NeutralSo, I don't normally look at a lot of reviews on books until after I've done my own so that it doesn't sway my opinions, but I did read a few for this one because I saw a few really low ratings on Goodreads that I was curious about since I rated it mid-high on my own scale. But when I read this review, it ranted about how Shane is too similar to Christine. Shane is just the character version of Christine. Christine was inserting herself into this book. My response to that is, "Okay, why does it matter?" I understand trying to push out of your comfort zone a little bit with your characters and creating something new, but how can you write something you don't know? I try not to insert myself as the main character of my writing, but I definitely take a few of my own personality traits and experiences and insert them into various characters as I write, because if I haven't experienced something, it's SO HARD to write about! As a debut novel, I'm not upset that Shane had MANY similarities to Christine Riccio (blog name, likes/dislikes, personality, etc.) because it's her first book, I'm sure her writing is improving, and sometimes you just need to get your own story out there. I didn't love the fact that she essentially used herself as the main character, but I also don't blame her for doing so. I'm just right in between. It was actually kind of cool because it felt like I got a little more of a glimpse into some of the struggles that maybe Christine also went through in college, and once again, I related to some of those things. Overall Impression 🌟🌟🌟🌟I noticed as I was writing this review that I actually originally rated this book five stars on Goodreads, but since I've had a bit more time to digest what I read, I'd say this is a four-star book. There is definitely room for Christine to grow as an author, but I think she did wonderfully with her debut novel. I enjoyed it, I related to it, and I couldn't put it down! I was intrigued and just wanted to keep reading (I may have stayed up WAY too late to read it one night). It was a great start to my reads of the new year.
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AuthorJust sharing my passion of reading through my passion of writing. Archives
May 2020
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