364 reviews for:

Le Pacte

Karina Halle

3.58 AVERAGE


Okay, I like this book too much.

excellent

Karina has done it again! Great friendship to lovers story. I caught myself laughing at the funny parts and cringing at the not so funny parts.

Did Karina Halle have a pact with someone to get as many lines from 80s songs into a book as possible? I'm intrigued. May be it's just me, but I found loads.

I love the kind of story when best friends realise they love each other, thinking My Skylar, The Remembrance Trilogy, Just Human.....

Linden McGregor, helicopter pilot - hello! I'd do him.

Stephanie Robson, happy go lucky kind of girl who just wants to have fun (jeez the 80's lyrics have rubbed off on me).

I was screaming at my kindle - just tell each other NOW.

Then the moment of oooooooooo I made the strangest noise. Not quite growl, not quite whimper. Luckily all the testosterone in the house was focused on football/play station. I think I got away with it.

Then that feeling oh holy hell something has to go wrong, there's too long left in the book for it to get to the end without a crisis. The wings of love are strong (tick) and just may be, against all odds (tick) it would work out.

My fave bits (sans 80's quotes).

"It's the most gorgeous penis I've ever seen and it makes me wish I could paint because I could have a whole gallery devoted to the beauty of his dick and I would consistently sell out of all my paintings."

"She's mad but she's magic."

"The free soul is rare but you know it when you see it."

"In the end you might have all my pieces...Please be gentle with them."

"Life leaves scars. Sometimes you don't see them until later. Sometimes you don't know where they've come from. Sometimes they fade before your eyes. But the world leaves its mark on us."

Fab read and one of the most perfect declarations of love I have ever read.

In ‘The Pact’ we meet Stephanie and Linden. Stephanie and Linden have been best friends for years, but there’s always been a certain attraction between the two. An attraction they never acted on, because of their friendship with each other, and with their other best friend James. One drunken night when Stephanie and Linden are both twenty five years old, they make a pact. If their single and there are both thirty years old, they will marry each other. The pact first sounded like a joke. But how closer Stephanie and Linden come to their thirty’s, the pact is always on their mind and changes everything.

From the beginning ‘The Pact’ is a book you can easily get lost in. The writing is easy to follow, funny and there is immediately this palpable attraction between the two main characters, which makes you want to keep reading. This book is written from both Stephanie and Linden’s point of view. This makes this book even more fun if you ask me. I love reading both their thoughts throughout this book.

This book was definitely a very fun read. I loved both main characters and I loved how their friendship developed. Their friendship was very pure and I was rooting for them from the first page on.
This book is definitely a romantic one. But it also includes sex and there is some serious dirty talk. It didn’t bother me, and I felt like this fitted the story and the characters perfectly, but if you’re not into reading dirty talk, this book is not one for you.

What I loved most about this book was that the characters where in their thirties. It was definitely fun to read about characters in their thirties and not in their mid-twenties like most books. I really enjoyed this book and I’m so glad I bought it all those weeks ago.

I liked it well enough until the inevitable break up after our characters get together. That Linden would make that choice, for that reason, at that point in their relationship was just STUPID and unbelievable.
I could see his reasoning if he and Steph were in the talking about getting together stage or had only had one night together, or if James had a terminal illness but Steph & Linden had been together for a couple of months, declared their love for one another, Steph & James had not been and item for NINE years and Steph obviously had no interest in him. To break up with her and hurt her like that - to me that says he didn't really love her at all. Then instead of coming to his senses and chasing after her because he was wrong he moves away and only goes after her after she visits him when he is injured. If I was Steph I would not have been so quick accept his proposal because how could you trust he really loved you and would stick by you after that.
Spoiler

It got so ridiculous halfway through it, it’s a no for me!
emotional tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: N/A
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

I felt like this book could've been shorten and it would've been better. It was very wordy and felt like it went on and on. The characters were awesome, loved that it took place in the Bay Area where I'm from. Go sharks! But after 50% I had to skim some just to get to the dialogue. This was the third book from the author I've tried to read and the only one I finished.
emotional funny tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Mir fällt es echt schwer dieses Buch zu bewerten, da es mich auf der einen Seite sehr gut unterhalten hat und ein echter Pageturner war, mich aber trotzdem mit einem mittelmäßigen Gefühl auf die Geschichte von Stephanie & Linden zurückblicken lässt.

Ich bin ein sehr großer Fan von "Friends to Lovers" Geschichten und wenn sie richtig umgesetzt werden, kann ich sie praktisch nur lieben. Und bis zu einem gewissen Punkt ging es mir auch mit "The Part: Versprich mir nichts" von Karina Halle so. Die Prämisse des Romans empfand ich als sehr erfrischend: Die beiden Freunde Stephanie & Linden schließen wie der Titel es ja schon vermuten lässt einen Pakt ab, dass sie heiraten werden sobald sie mit 30 immer noch Single sind. Am Anfang der Geschichte bekommen wir aus beiden Sichten eine Zusammenfassung der einzelnen Lebensjahre ihrer Zwanziger; an welchem Punkt im Leben sie gerade stehen in Bezug auf Karriere, Liebe etc. bis zu dem Punkt an dem sie 30 sind. Und ab da an geht die Geschichte auch erst so richtig los.

Ich habe zwar darauf hingefiebert, dass die beiden endlich zu einander finden, allerdings muss ich ehrlich gesagt zugeben, dass ich trotzalledem keine wirkliche Chemie zwischen Stephanie & Linden gespürt habe. Mir kam es eher wie bloße körperliche Anziehung vor, weswegen manche Textpassagen in denen die zwei über ihre Gefühle gesprochen haben sehr konstruiert und unecht gewirkt haben. Und wie das leider in vielen New-Adult Büchern der Fall ist nahm die Geschichte irgendwann die Wendung in Richtung Erotik und dies hat leider dann 80% der Handlung eingenommen, anstatt eine vernünftige Connection zwischen Stephanie & Linden zu bilden. Man weiß sie sind beste Freunde, nur leider habe ich das nicht sehr oft gemerkt.

Zudem konnte mich der Schreibstil von Karina Halle leider überhaupt nicht von sich überzeugen. An manchen Stellen war er zwar ganz angenehm, aber im Großen und Ganzen hatte ich das Gefühl die Autorin wusste selbst nicht in welche Richtung das Buch gehen soll. Manche Sätze klangen einfach überhaupt nicht passend und ich kann es selbst nicht wirklich beschreiben, aber diese Einfachheit der Wortwahl hat mich einfach etwas gestört. Das Drama am Ende des Romans kam für mich alles ein bisschen plötzlich und ich hätte mir gewünscht noch weitere 50 Seiten zu haben, damit Stephanie's & Linden's Beziehung nachvollziehbar geworden wäre, aber die Autorin wird schon ihre Gründe gehabt haben, die Geschichte genauso zu schreiben.

 
Fazit: "The Pact: Versprich mir nichts" von Karina Halle ist meiner Meinung nach kein Buch was man gelesen haben muss. Die Geschichte ist zwar ganz nett, aber trotzdem besonders für das Genre nichts neues. Es war eine gute Abwechslung für Zwischendurch und das Lesen hat auch Spaß gemacht, also kann ich es schon weiterempfehlen, aber ich denke es gibt da draußen durchaus Liebesromane, die ihre Zeit mehr Wert sind.