A review by lindsey_kerrigan
First & Then by Emma Mills

3.0

3.5 stars. Although I did enjoy it I had some trouble getting into the story because it took a while to get started. Also, there just wasn't a lot to the book, I loved all the parts with Foster and all the parts with Ezra but I feel like the book could have been expanded and could have made a much larger impact. I wasn't a huge fan of the generic small town football story, I haven't read many in the past but it just isn't my favorite narrative and this book didn't change that opinion. Many of the characters also seemed kind of one sided. Cas and Lindsay were great but I didn't really understand their significance to the story cause the argument with Cas was barely even resolved in the end, it was basically brushed over; and Lindsay was a great character but there wasn't any conflict there at all, it was just a misinterpretation. Like I said before, I feel like there were just two many sides to the story between the football guys, Foster, gym class, Jane Austen, the freshman English class, college club, and the school newspaper I feel like nothing clicked because all these sides were crammed into such a small book. And I'm not saying everything needs to be fixed but I had trouble figuring out what the main storyline was. I understand that Foster was basically the center of the story and I did enjoy that but if Ezra was the side storyline why didn't we get more screen time with him, we really only had like 3 or 4 meaningful scenes with him before the climax and they were short interactions. Also, just to add on, I don't understand how characters like Emir or the English teacher that brought her to Reeding added to the story. I guess it's trying to show that she's finally understanding that people often have more distress in their lives than what you see on the surface, but I've seen that done much better in other books before. I really wanted to enjoy this book, and I really liked Devon as a main character and the few times we saw Ezra, but I had a hard time being sold on this book. The only part that I felt really made an impact were the parts with Foster, watching their relationship as siblings grow and seeing how he changed her as a person.