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A review by wicked_ginger
The Distance Between Us by Kasie West
2.0
I'm writing this review just to remember my thoughts on The distance between us, but based on other reviews and average rating, this won't be something that majority will agree upon.
I've read some Kasie West books before and I even liked the ones that had lower rating more. The basic premise of the book is interesting and might work for sure. Poor girl/rich guy love story is a timeless classic when it comes to romantic cliché and I believe that you can always write new and original pieces based upon this concept. So what went wrong for me?
I start with the positives. I liked Caymen sarcasm, I've only encountered a few female book protagonists capable of a good one liners, so I instantly connected with her. The story seemed good. Caymen is from a poor family, they struggle financially, the reader is not really sure whether she can afford to go to college, there are other family secrets to unravel so you always thinking about what is actually happening, the 'career days' with the rich guy are great opportunity for them to connect on a deeper level, the second guy is also cute and luckily not an A-hole and best friend is happily in a relationship and always there for the main protagonist, no drama. But the one negative is that, for me, it does not work. There's not enough depth to this story. I could not decided if this is supposed to be light YA romance or more of a contemporary with some romance in it. For romance, it lacked romance. Yes, both of the guys are cute but Mason, the lead singer, smells like cigarettes (bleh) and acts too casual around Caymen to know if this will be right relationship for her, even though she insists that he is right for her, I guess because she's poor or something. Xander is a good looking rich guy with proper manners, pretty eyes and cute smile, but why exactly he wanted to date her was mystery to me the whole book. He keeps repeating that they are similar, because they don't really know what they want to be after high school but I didn't catch that moment when this become obvious to him.
I've read some Kasie West books before and I even liked the ones that had lower rating more. The basic premise of the book is interesting and might work for sure. Poor girl/rich guy love story is a timeless classic when it comes to romantic cliché and I believe that you can always write new and original pieces based upon this concept. So what went wrong for me?
I start with the positives. I liked Caymen sarcasm, I've only encountered a few female book protagonists capable of a good one liners, so I instantly connected with her. The story seemed good. Caymen is from a poor family, they struggle financially, the reader is not really sure whether she can afford to go to college, there are other family secrets to unravel so you always thinking about what is actually happening, the 'career days' with the rich guy are great opportunity for them to connect on a deeper level, the second guy is also cute and luckily not an A-hole and best friend is happily in a relationship and always there for the main protagonist, no drama. But the one negative is that, for me, it does not work. There's not enough depth to this story. I could not decided if this is supposed to be light YA romance or more of a contemporary with some romance in it. For romance, it lacked romance. Yes, both of the guys are cute but Mason, the lead singer, smells like cigarettes (bleh) and acts too casual around Caymen to know if this will be right relationship for her, even though she insists that he is right for her, I guess because she's poor or something. Xander is a good looking rich guy with proper manners, pretty eyes and cute smile, but why exactly he wanted to date her was mystery to me the whole book. He keeps repeating that they are similar, because they don't really know what they want to be after high school but I didn't catch that moment when this become obvious to him.