Kissing in America by Margo Rabb

e-ARC, 400 pages

Release Date:May 26, 2015
Published by: Harper
Stand-alone
Source: Edelweiss (A copy of this book was sent to me from the publisher via Edelweiss. This in no way changed my opinion of the book. Thank you to Harper and Edelweiss for the review copy.) 
For fans of: Romance, Contemporary, Stand-alones, YA, Road Trip

     In the two years since her father died, sixteen-year-old Eva has found comfort in reading romance novels—118 of them, to be exact—to dull the pain of her loss that’s still so present. Her romantic fantasies become a reality when she meets Will, who seems to truly understand Eva’s grief. Unfortunately, after Eva falls head-over-heels for him, he picks up and moves to California without any warning. Not wanting to lose the only person who has been able to pull her out of sadness—and, perhaps, her shot at real love—Eva and her best friend, Annie, concoct a plan to travel to the west coast to see Will again. As they road trip across America, Eva and Annie confront the complex truth about love.
     In this honest and emotional journey that National Book Award finalist Sara Zarr calls “gorgeous, funny, and joyous,” readers will experience the highs of infatuation and the lows of heartache as Eva contends with love in all of its forms.

*MY THOUGHTS*

     I have to be completely honest… The reason I decided to grab this one from Edelweiss was the cover. It was bright and had and all these super crazy colors that looked like neon signs. And it just drew me in. But unfortunately I didn’t feel the same about the inside of this book.
     Eva draws comfort in many of the ways me and most of my friends do… From reading books. Romance novels actually. But finally meeting the boy of her dreams makes her able to finally live out her own romance story. Ironically what ties them together is grief. And then he up and moves to California. Of course she couldn’t just let him get away that easily. 
     I’ve been seeing so many people disagree on this book. Either you really liked it or you really didn’t like it. I guess I was in the percentage that didn’t really like it. The grief in it didn’t really feel… Sad. It felt like she was depressed and going through some things, but she seemed more worried about the boy than what she was going through. I’m not sure that makes sense, but in my head it did lol 
     And then there was the fact that there was the “l-word” within the the first 25% of the book. I just wasn’t impressed. I can deal with you saying you like him and that you’ve liked him for so long and you finally get to express those feelings, but actually saying the “l-word?” I just didn’t understand. Other than that, he had way too much going on his self to be worried about so many girls anyways. I just wasn’t sure why he was even thinking about a relationship when he could barely keep his life together. I just wasn’t a fan of him.
     Overall I just wasn’t a fan of this one. The writing style was good enough for me to want to continue reading it, but the romance and the way the emotions are missing made me not want to continue it. I ended up having to DNF. As I always say though, just because this book wasn’t for me, doesn’t mean someone else won’t like it. Try it out and give your own opinion. As stated, a lot of people either liked or loved this one! You may be one who loved it! 
Overall, I give this

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