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A review by zeirazeira
The Best Thing I Never Had by Erin Lawless
3.0
I received this a the result of a FirstReads giveaway.
For the record, I'm not usually a romance reader. I find them repetitive and to be honest, a bit boring. The description of the book was the main reason I opted to read this one when I entered the giveaway. I opened the book and have to admit, the going was a bit slow. It does pick up around the end of the first half so it is worth it to continue reading.
It begins with events happening in the present, which will undoubtedly lead to the end, but then you are pulled back into the past so that you can understand the start and end. To be honest, it had a movie feel to it just reading it. Not many books make me feel that way but this one feels like it was written more for moving pictures. (That could just be me.)
I like to comment on the characters and know that doing so here may open up a can of worms, as there are so many and as usual, I will try hard not to ruin the whole book. Our heroine is easily relatable. I attest that she would have been more relatable had I been 20 years younger, but I digress. She did have her weaker moments and I truly felt that by the end she had not only matured but had become a stronger person. The other characters, including our hero were very well done. I think we all know a medley of people like this and may even have (or have had) friends like them. I really did dislike our villainess and villain. If I could have reached through the book to slap them, I would have. Supporting characters really spanned the spectrum of personalities. Loyal, rude and strong to more passive and torn. Lawless does a fantastic job building them up and describing them to you without feeling like it is all you are reading, something that I find some romances do.
The plot was simple and uncomplicated. I found I could predict what was going to happen along the way and at the end. As for the climax, I think I may have expected just a touch more. I still do not understand why Harriet's flatmates reacted the way they did. Were we that petty when we were young? Why were there so many triangles throughout the book? Were they all so stuck in a past that they couldn't have?
A bit hard to read sometimes as your heart would break for our main character one moment and then will her to fight back the next.
As for editing, I did run across a few mistakes that made me stop and reread the whole sentence. Usually it was just a he instead of a she or vice versa. At one point, I had to reread the whole exchange to make sure who I thought had said something, was in fact the person who had said it.
The chapters are short and make it nice for those moments where you only have a few minutes to spare. Lawless, as I mentioned earlier, has a fantastic writing style that truly brings you into the moment. With the slower beginning, this was critical in having me continue to push through. I am glad I did because it could have been just another romance for me had I not.
A pleasant read with me admitting that this romance wasn't all bad. Stick it out, it is a pretty good book in the end.
For the record, I'm not usually a romance reader. I find them repetitive and to be honest, a bit boring. The description of the book was the main reason I opted to read this one when I entered the giveaway. I opened the book and have to admit, the going was a bit slow. It does pick up around the end of the first half so it is worth it to continue reading.
It begins with events happening in the present, which will undoubtedly lead to the end, but then you are pulled back into the past so that you can understand the start and end. To be honest, it had a movie feel to it just reading it. Not many books make me feel that way but this one feels like it was written more for moving pictures. (That could just be me.)
I like to comment on the characters and know that doing so here may open up a can of worms, as there are so many and as usual, I will try hard not to ruin the whole book. Our heroine is easily relatable. I attest that she would have been more relatable had I been 20 years younger, but I digress. She did have her weaker moments and I truly felt that by the end she had not only matured but had become a stronger person. The other characters, including our hero were very well done. I think we all know a medley of people like this and may even have (or have had) friends like them. I really did dislike our villainess and villain. If I could have reached through the book to slap them, I would have. Supporting characters really spanned the spectrum of personalities. Loyal, rude and strong to more passive and torn. Lawless does a fantastic job building them up and describing them to you without feeling like it is all you are reading, something that I find some romances do.
The plot was simple and uncomplicated. I found I could predict what was going to happen along the way and at the end. As for the climax, I think I may have expected just a touch more. I still do not understand why Harriet's flatmates reacted the way they did. Were we that petty when we were young? Why were there so many triangles throughout the book? Were they all so stuck in a past that they couldn't have?
A bit hard to read sometimes as your heart would break for our main character one moment and then will her to fight back the next.
As for editing, I did run across a few mistakes that made me stop and reread the whole sentence. Usually it was just a he instead of a she or vice versa. At one point, I had to reread the whole exchange to make sure who I thought had said something, was in fact the person who had said it.
The chapters are short and make it nice for those moments where you only have a few minutes to spare. Lawless, as I mentioned earlier, has a fantastic writing style that truly brings you into the moment. With the slower beginning, this was critical in having me continue to push through. I am glad I did because it could have been just another romance for me had I not.
A pleasant read with me admitting that this romance wasn't all bad. Stick it out, it is a pretty good book in the end.