Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.43 AVERAGE
3.43 AVERAGE
emotional
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
funny
lighthearted
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
As soon as I heard about this book i wanted to read it! It didn't disappoint. Honest, funny and full of character!
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Hold the phone, I actually — surprisingly! — loved this book!!??! It's SO British, and so fun. Of course I would have loved a certain pairing to end up together, but this is definitely realistic. I can live with this ending.
Ahh, freshers. As I'm now getting into my last year of university, I can't help but reminisce those times. We call it "frosh week" in Canada, but the essence is the same. The FEELING is the same. You're nervous and scared, and what if you don't get on with your floor? What if you don't make any friends in your classes? Or any friends at all?! And you can't find people to live with, and the things you're good at don't cut it....... honestly, this book captures the zeitgeist P E R F E C T L Y. Straight up. I wish maybe things were a little more difficult for Phoebe (am I terrible?), because things were ROUGH for Luke. And in comparison, Phoebe was going around finding her people, and you can just tell that Frankie/Josh/Negin are the kind of friends that are going to be around for life. I felt a lot more like Luke in first year. Perhaps Phoebe could've struggled with academics or something? I know that's a Big Deal to a lot of people when they start university, but then again, it also doesn't matter at all to a bunch of others.
Luke Taylor, you dreamboat and charmer. I am SO GLAD we got to read from your perspective. It really put things in perspective, har har. There are multiple ways to remember an event, or even a period in life altogether.
And can we talk about Josh and Will? I guess we got closure on the second one there, but I have trouble reconciling that with the sweet guy from the beginning of the book. I really wanted him to be a good guy. And what's up with Josh? I mean, I THINK it's obvious what could happen there, but everything was left far too open ended.
I don't know how this book managed to be so gossipy, serious, emotional, and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time. Initiation (preach bud). The haze and ridiculousness of week one. The random hookups. The cookie cutters (awww). The mattresses. THE CHEESE! THE NIGHT WITH FRANKIE'S CALL TO MUMMY!! Oh my goodness, the moments are absurd and I love every second. It almost makes me wish I had a Conor at my residence in first year, although I can also imagine that being super awful. Maybe I would've loved Frankie's floor. REGARDLESS: I congratulate these two authors for seamlessly putting together realistic, heartwarming (and heartbreaking) protagonists and making me want to live in their world. Great story.
Ahh, freshers. As I'm now getting into my last year of university, I can't help but reminisce those times. We call it "frosh week" in Canada, but the essence is the same. The FEELING is the same. You're nervous and scared, and what if you don't get on with your floor? What if you don't make any friends in your classes? Or any friends at all?! And you can't find people to live with, and the things you're good at don't cut it....... honestly, this book captures the zeitgeist P E R F E C T L Y. Straight up. I wish maybe things were a little more difficult for Phoebe (am I terrible?), because things were ROUGH for Luke. And in comparison, Phoebe was going around finding her people, and you can just tell that Frankie/Josh/Negin are the kind of friends that are going to be around for life. I felt a lot more like Luke in first year. Perhaps Phoebe could've struggled with academics or something? I know that's a Big Deal to a lot of people when they start university, but then again, it also doesn't matter at all to a bunch of others.
Luke Taylor, you dreamboat and charmer. I am SO GLAD we got to read from your perspective. It really put things in perspective, har har. There are multiple ways to remember an event, or even a period in life altogether.
And can we talk about Josh and Will? I guess we got closure on the second one there, but I have trouble reconciling that with the sweet guy from the beginning of the book. I really wanted him to be a good guy. And what's up with Josh? I mean, I THINK it's obvious what could happen there, but everything was left far too open ended.
I don't know how this book managed to be so gossipy, serious, emotional, and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time. Initiation (preach bud). The haze and ridiculousness of week one. The random hookups. The cookie cutters (awww). The mattresses. THE CHEESE! THE NIGHT WITH FRANKIE'S CALL TO MUMMY!! Oh my goodness, the moments are absurd and I love every second. It almost makes me wish I had a Conor at my residence in first year, although I can also imagine that being super awful. Maybe I would've loved Frankie's floor. REGARDLESS: I congratulate these two authors for seamlessly putting together realistic, heartwarming (and heartbreaking) protagonists and making me want to live in their world. Great story.
I found this to be a rather accurate description of how Freshmen year goes for many undergrads. I enjoyed following Phoebe and Luke as they navigated such a life change. Re-orienting yourself on your own in college is not easy, and is usually filled with mistakes. Freshmen shows that to us in ways that leaves the reader feeling awkward, frustrated, but still entertained. My only qualm was with the ending. It felt a bit rushed to me. Overall, a good, quick read.
✨3.5 stars✨
I haven’t posted a proper review in months and this is the first book I’ve finished so far this year so I feel like a bit of a fake, but I do have a good, genuine reason: university. So it feels quite fitting that this book is my return to goodreads. This book wasn’t necessarily anything special, but it was real. It was realistic and I felt like at any point all of the events of the book could be happening to the people around me at uni and it wouldn’t be at all out of place. It definitely captured the essence of the first term of uni, and having just finished my own first term of uni, it was really comforting.
Phoebe, Negin and Frankie are adorable. I love love love their friendship and the comfortableness of them all draped in their duvets half the time just living their lives together. Their dynamic definitely helps to emphasise Luke’s more isolated experience, especially in the face of his expectations of making friends in the same way. The accuracy of the uni experience that this book conveys really made it hard for me at times to decide who was in the right and who was in the wrong. I adore moral ambiguity, and I felt sorry for both Luke and Phoebe at times when I knew that technically I should probably be judging them a little bit.
The things I enjoyed the most were actually the little details: the constant cups of tea; the weird ways in which drinks are mixed at pre’s (bathtubs, buckets and spades, washing up bowls- you name it, someone’s mixing vodka in it); Luke walking into the wrong lecture and just rolling with it. Silly things that made me giggle and say ‘yep, that sounds about right’. Luke and Phoebe study English, and so do I, so I must admit there were mentions of things that made me think ‘nooo I’m reading this for fun, please don’t remind me of the work I need to do !!!!!’ (*cough* Sir Gawain and the Green Knight *cough*), but for the most part I really enjoyed the similarities and things I could relate to regarding their course.
What I liked the most about this book is the emphasis on the fact that people are more than they appear. No matter what you think a person is like, they are still a person and have so much more under the surface than you can see from afar. I loved the fact that Phoebe realises this with Mary- whilst she is amazing once she gets to know her, it’s different than the character of her that the girls had previously created just from seeing her around. I wasn’t really a fan of the writing style I have to admit, sometimes things felt under-explained or unfinished and it meant I had to reread things at times in order for them to make sense. Despite this though I did really enjoy this book, and I want to try and read more YA books set at university because it’s not something I’ve come across that frequently. It was fun and easy to read, and it’s been on my shelf for bloody ages so I’m really happy I finally got round to reading it!!
I haven’t posted a proper review in months and this is the first book I’ve finished so far this year so I feel like a bit of a fake, but I do have a good, genuine reason: university. So it feels quite fitting that this book is my return to goodreads. This book wasn’t necessarily anything special, but it was real. It was realistic and I felt like at any point all of the events of the book could be happening to the people around me at uni and it wouldn’t be at all out of place. It definitely captured the essence of the first term of uni, and having just finished my own first term of uni, it was really comforting.
Phoebe, Negin and Frankie are adorable. I love love love their friendship and the comfortableness of them all draped in their duvets half the time just living their lives together. Their dynamic definitely helps to emphasise Luke’s more isolated experience, especially in the face of his expectations of making friends in the same way. The accuracy of the uni experience that this book conveys really made it hard for me at times to decide who was in the right and who was in the wrong. I adore moral ambiguity, and I felt sorry for both Luke and Phoebe at times when I knew that technically I should probably be judging them a little bit.
The things I enjoyed the most were actually the little details: the constant cups of tea; the weird ways in which drinks are mixed at pre’s (bathtubs, buckets and spades, washing up bowls- you name it, someone’s mixing vodka in it); Luke walking into the wrong lecture and just rolling with it. Silly things that made me giggle and say ‘yep, that sounds about right’. Luke and Phoebe study English, and so do I, so I must admit there were mentions of things that made me think ‘nooo I’m reading this for fun, please don’t remind me of the work I need to do !!!!!’ (*cough* Sir Gawain and the Green Knight *cough*), but for the most part I really enjoyed the similarities and things I could relate to regarding their course.
What I liked the most about this book is the emphasis on the fact that people are more than they appear. No matter what you think a person is like, they are still a person and have so much more under the surface than you can see from afar. I loved the fact that Phoebe realises this with Mary- whilst she is amazing once she gets to know her, it’s different than the character of her that the girls had previously created just from seeing her around. I wasn’t really a fan of the writing style I have to admit, sometimes things felt under-explained or unfinished and it meant I had to reread things at times in order for them to make sense. Despite this though I did really enjoy this book, and I want to try and read more YA books set at university because it’s not something I’ve come across that frequently. It was fun and easy to read, and it’s been on my shelf for bloody ages so I’m really happy I finally got round to reading it!!
Very entertaining & highly nostalgic, even though I did not go to college in York, England.
If there’s one thing I don’t like about the current state of publishing, it would be the almost complete lack of books focused on the experience of anyone aged 18 to 25. There are plenty of angsty sixteen-years-olds in YA (why are so many of them sixteen? I was sixteen once and it wasn’t as life-changing as I was led to expect), but after that we’re left with full-on adult fiction. You’re either reading about schoolkids saving the day or adults balancing work and home (yes, I know that is a very brief generalisation). The crazy gap between these two age groups is largely missed even though there’s all kinds of exciting stuff going on.
This would be where Freshers comes in. It’s co-written by Lucy Ivison and Tom Ellen and it’s all about Luke and Phoebe’s first term at university. It’s a split perspective book about a guy and a girl. But the whole book is NOT just about the building of their romantic relationship. Sure, there’s some fancying involved but there’s a lot of fancying everywhere and it’s the friendships in the book that are the most important.
I also read Freshers at the end of the summer between my own first and second years so I can tell you from experience that the book pretty much gets everything right. And forget the student cookbook, the Ikea trip and the shiny new stationery, this is what to get to prepare a fresher-to-be about their new experience. This book covers all the most-known cliches but also the parts that people inconceivably forget to tell you about.
I'd definitely recommend this to any student-to-be, current students or anyone who fancies a quick, fun read!
Full review and more at https://musingmimiblog.wordpress.com
This would be where Freshers comes in. It’s co-written by Lucy Ivison and Tom Ellen and it’s all about Luke and Phoebe’s first term at university. It’s a split perspective book about a guy and a girl. But the whole book is NOT just about the building of their romantic relationship. Sure, there’s some fancying involved but there’s a lot of fancying everywhere and it’s the friendships in the book that are the most important.
I also read Freshers at the end of the summer between my own first and second years so I can tell you from experience that the book pretty much gets everything right. And forget the student cookbook, the Ikea trip and the shiny new stationery, this is what to get to prepare a fresher-to-be about their new experience. This book covers all the most-known cliches but also the parts that people inconceivably forget to tell you about.
I'd definitely recommend this to any student-to-be, current students or anyone who fancies a quick, fun read!
Full review and more at https://musingmimiblog.wordpress.com