Reviews

It Goes Without Saying by Taylor Danae Colbert

asteroula_t's review against another edition

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5.0

There was a bit of a heartbreak in this story but man this author is making me so emotional, I can't handle it. I'm hiding under my blanket, crying and sipping wine. Yeap this is how you are supposed to read this book. The characters were annoyingly awesome... and I say annoyingly because "they freaking belong together and they don't aknowledge it". (I'm not yelling) But still awesome.
Taylor is the author that made me realised that I don't have just one favorite trope, enemies to lovers, I love also the childhood friends to lovers trope.
She opened my eyes!!

hannahmaybookreviews's review against another edition

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5.0

It Goes Without Saying
Author: Taylor Danae Colbert

Synopsis:

After Bria is hit by a ball thanks to school's heart throb Knox, they soon become best friends and inseparable throughout their teenage years. They are each others' rock and support when times get rough. Bria tells herself that this is all she wants with Knox but despite fighting with her feelings, Knox becomes the 'one who got away.'
Bria grows up, moves away, starts a new life for herself and meets the perfect man who is eager to make her his wife. However a family crisis sends Bria back home and back to Knox. Bria is determined to keep her feelings towards Knox in the past despite him looking as dreamy as ever, after all she is soon to be married.
However Bria discovers that Knox has made some huge sacrifices for her and her loved ones in the past which changes everything and turns what she thought to be the perfect life upside down.

Review:

Firstly I'd like to thank Taylor Danae Colbert for allowing me to get my hands on 'It Goes Without Saying' before its release to the general public.
It Goes Without Saying was such a lovely read and it was difficult not to get drawn in to the story line. I generally felt that I was riding an emotional rollercoaster throughout. This tugged on my heart strings so much that I generally felt the characters' emotions. The tone of the book was perfect and I loved how light hearted I felt when reading certain chapters. I genuinely caught myself smiling in places and it was such a good feeling!

I generally liked and connected with all the characters and Taylor did a fantastic job at character building. Bria the main female lead was genuine and I found I could really connect and like her because she was real. I could relate to her, especially during her school years. We are also similar in a way that we both put our families first and would do anything it takes to make sure our loved ones are ok, which makes her very believable in my eyes.

As for the main lead, Knox, he was just your typical cheeky chappy. He was the popular, good looking boy that everyone wanted but what I loved about him is that he wasn't your typical bad boy and he was in fact quite a vulnerable soul. He was the type of guy I would fall for and I am still praying that I find my own Knox one day!

I found Bria's partner Drew to be quite smothering when reading. He was the guy that could give you the life everyone wanted but his character was proof that you shouldn't settle and that when it comes to love, when you know, you know.

When I began to read It Goes Without Saying I found it extremely difficult to put the book back down again. I found the flash backs from the present to Bria and Knox's teenage years easy and straight forward. I found that the flash backs did a fantastic job at showing the difficulties of relationships and break up when you are young and again I could generally relate to this. I particularly loved the repeated phrases throughout also- they had such a huge impact and really toyed with my emotions.

I found that I often had those 'scream and the TV' moments when reading It Goes Without Saying. I have never wanted to bang to characters heads together as much in my life! The ending especially left me on the edge of the seat and got me into a bit of a tizzy. I had my fingers tightly crossed that things would work out in the end from start to finish.

Taylor Danae Colbert not only did a brilliant job at writing such a fantastic book but she also did a brilliant job at raising awareness for both Lyme's Disease and Depression. I never knew what Lyme's was until reading this book- which means Taylor Danae Colbert will be educating other readers out there too which is amazing. Taylor touched on the subject of depression brilliantly and sent a strong message to her readers also that depression can affect anyone of any gender and again this will educate other readers and give them a better understanding of how depression can affect a person. Lots of praise to Taylor for this, thank you for a wonderful little book!

yeriwithaj_'s review against another edition

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3.0

A slow, slow, very slow burn

This book is a good friends to lovers slow burn that was endearing and frustrating all at the same time. A good read with so much emotional turmoil.

The ending... I'm not sure how I feel about it. The book is well done. The author fleshed her characters and their story out well.

chaos_carrie's review against another edition

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3.0

Let me preface this by saying, this would have been a 4 Star read, but the digital copy I purchased through amazon had a fair amount of editing and formatting errors that are normal in arcs, not paid copies.

I’m not usually much for romance novels so this was a great read me as the romance bloomed over years and years. Characters definitely fit the story and were well developed. The relationship was relatable and I personally loved the twist at the end!

If you like some cheese, but typically romance is too much for you, this is your book!

dany_cp03's review

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1.0

When I first read the blurb it sounded like something I might have liked. It looked really promising. The whole thing between best friends-turn-to-lovers is a topic that I always find cute and entertaining, but in this case, it turned way too frustrating. This kind of storyline is so easy that ends up being hard, if that makes any sense, because the line between frustratingly good and just frustrating is too thin.

In this case, I think the storyline has all the potential to grow into something interesting, but right now I feel there were some things that just were unnecessary or could’ve been done differently. For example, the book is narrated in third person, which distracted me a lot and even got me confused at times, especially when there were several people involved (I lost track of who was who). I think the readers could relate more to the main character and her story if it was written in first person. It might sound like something way too simple, but I think it would’ve given it a new perspective. The writing style felt a bit basic at points: the conversations were too short and the descriptions way too long, or even sometimes, we were left to imagine what would happen next.

Now, about the story itself. We have Bria, who to me has the perfect life. Her childhood was somewhat normal but she always got whatever she wanted, which tended to feel way too unreal, and this goes on throughout the entire book, which made it impossible for me to feel bad for her or even relate to her. Then we have Knox. The ultimate player. Bria’s best friend and the hero of all things. He’s definitely not my kind of guy, not even for a fictional one. He felt unrealistic with his perfect timing for everything and his perfect way to solve anything that was going on in Bria’s life. It’s obvious both have feelings for each other and it was too frustrating for them to realize it so late and that it took them so long to actually do something about it. These two characters have a lot of work to do about themselves.

Like I said before, there’s something about best friends that have feelings for each other that always catches my eye. It’s the kind of story we’re always expecting it to have the happiest of endings, but this one had so many opportunities to make it happen, and it kept dragging it for way too long.
There’s a lot of space for improvement, I truly believe that. But right now, there were a lot of things that put me off from enjoying the story.
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