e-Audio, 09:06:45
Narrated by: Christine Lakin and Zachary Webber
Release Date: April 6, 2021
Published by: Hachette Book Group
Read from:
The Friend Zone, #3
Source: Library (Overdrive)
TW:
For Readers Interested In: Contemporary Romance, Realistic Fiction, Tear Jerkers, Companion Novel, Series, Series Ender, AdultA brilliant and touching romantic comedy from the USA Today bestselling author of The Friend Zone and The Happy Ever After Playlist.
Vanessa lives life on her own terms — one day at a time, every day to its fullest. She isn’t willing to waste a moment or miss out on an experience when she has no idea whether she shares the same fatal genetic condition as her mother. Besides, she has way too much to do, traveling the globe and showing her millions of YouTube followers the joy in seizing every moment.
But after her half-sister suddenly leaves Vanessa in custody of her infant daughter, she is housebound, on mommy duty for the foreseeable future, and feeling totally out of her element.
The last person she expects to show up offering help is the unbelievably hot lawyer who lives next door, Adrian Copeland. After all, she barely knows him. But as they get closer, Vanessa realizes that her carefree ways and his need for a structured plan could never be compatible for the long term. Then again, she should know better than anyone that life’s too short to fear taking the biggest risk of all. . .
*MY THOUGHTS*
This book was a little hard for me to get through. I don’t like books about addiction, so I’m giving that as a disclaimer now that my rating might not be as high as the others in this series. But because the others in this series are amazing, I knew I still needed to give it a shot.
Vanessa lives her life to the fullest and takes nothing for granted. She’s a YouTuber who is travelling around the world with her millions of followers. Then suddenly she Vanessa’s sister leaves her niece with her and disappears. Vanessa takes her in even though she has no idea how to be anyone’s mommy. Let alone someone’s single mommy. Fortunately, she doesn’t have to be by herself too long. Her very cute, lawyer neighbor comes to the rescue. He’s the complete opposite of her and likes a well thought out plan, but as they get closer and closer to each other, they realize that life’s too short to miss out on one of the biggest blessings of all.
Starting with what I didn’t like about this book. Some of my long term followers may know that I am not a fan of YA books that depict characters with an addiction. I’m ok if the author just MENTIONS the addiction, but I am not ok with the author showing what they actually go through and what the family goes through. I have family members that are currently battling addiction, and as a firm believer of someone that likes to read to escape her real life problems, that’s something I don’t wish to read about. When I read the synopsis for this one, I was a bit concerned, because this kind of hit close to home. My family’s is a bit different, but I could still relate. It made me a bit anxious. But as I opened the book, I knew I didn’t have much to worry about. Jimenez does go indepth about the character’s addiction, and I found myself skipping over those parts. I feel like I missed quite a bit of the things that were going on because I was skipping some things, but it still made me feel better to read it that way.
However, even with what I didn’t like, it was still a sweet, sweet story. I LOVED the scenes with the baby and how she brought them closer together. I always say that kids don’t make relationships better, but in this case, it made the relationship AND made it better. As for the main characters, I liked them, but I have to say I liked them more together than apart. Which isn’t normal for me and Jimenez books. But I’m not sure what it was about this one, but I just couldn’t connect with them individually.
Of course I liked the writing style. Jimenez still has a way to make me sit and be hooked unto her words from the very beginning. I literally spent the whole day listening and playing a computer game. I was hooked. There were points where I got emotional, I laughed and so much more. I hate that it was the last in the series. I’m actually hoping there will be more. Sometime. (I don’t think so because she didn’t really introduce anymore potential characters. And if she did then I missed them)
However, as much as I liked the writing style of this, I did get emotional and cry like I did with the others. It was so different because with the others, I had real tears falling. With this one I didn’t. I guess it was because I was not as connected to the characters, but I don’t know. Normally that has nothing to do with my reactions to books. Normally I get sad from looking at sad commercials lol Don’t get me wrong, I thought it was emotional and I thought it was hella cute and about a serious topic, but it just didn’t MOVE me in the way the others did.
This book wasn’t my favorite for numerous reasons, but I still did love it. I can’t wait to see more of this author. I wish we had more coming from this series already. Here’s to hoping the success of this series calls for many more books by Abby Jimenez!
Overall, I give this
