Loved this book. Emma Mills is a go to author and makes me feel nostalgic for my inner teen as well happy to done with high school. Can't wait to get my hands on her next book.

Another great Mills contemporary YA: full of humor, heart, strong character cast, and a shippable romance.

I'm a bit too old to appreciate the girl drama in this book, so I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have hoped. Girl drama is obviously a huge part of high school life, but I wasn't ever really involved. I rolled my eyes even then at stuff like this, so I don't think teen me would have identified with the characters either. This is clearly not a book for me, but I won't shy away from recommending it to readers who I think would enjoy it.

Emma Mills is quickly becoming one of my top ten favorite authors. Foolish Hearts really just cements her spot in my favorites. I actually described her writing over the weekend to my sister as being in the same vein as Morgan Matson, Emery Lord, Jenny Han and Sarah Dessen. So, my contemporary YA must read authors. I just get this wonderful feeling as I read her books and recognize her hallmarks.

Foolish Hearts follows Claudia who attends a prestigious private girl’s school at hefty discount because her father works there. The book opens with Claudia attending the “pink” luncheon hosted by one of her classmates just before school starts. While in the bathroom, she unwittingly overhears the school’s it couple – Paige and Iris breaking up. Through a series of unfortunate events, Claudia ends up drafted into working on the school’s play in conjunction with the neighboring boy’s school – A Midsummer Night’s Dream along with Iris. Claudia also finds herself in this sort of flirtation with Gideon who plays Oberon but also actually making new friends.

This book is absolutely characteristic Emma Mills. There’s a very slow burn romance that starts out as friendship. The main character is an average, normal, every day girl. The friendships in this book – both long term and new – are solidly written. There are SIBLINGS. Claudia has a family that plays a role and comes across as three dimensional. There are funny moments and serious moments and a whole lot of feelings going on.

I think that people who enjoy contemporary YA need to just get their hands on all the books by Emma Mills. Like, it’s wild to me that she’s not blown up as big as Morgan Matson, Sarah Dessen, Emery Lord and Jenny Han. Her books really are THAT good. They’re the types of books that I just fly through because I am so invested and so thrilled with what I am reading. Completely, completely recommend with all my heart and soul.

Is full of great characters (even if they seem a little more deep and considerate than the way I personally remember high school kids.) Honestly it's hard to even describe what this book was about, it was part romance, part friendship, part coming of age, dealing with siblings, leaving your comfort zone and throughout all of this there's some hardcore fandom for what is basically a fictionalized version of One Direction and Warcraft and High School rendition of A Midsummer Night's Dream. Which, yeah, is about a crazy as it sounds but genuinely enjoyable too. It was funny and touching without being super intense or blatantly unbelievable the way contemporary YA often can be. Plus, it really didn't hurt that A Midsummer Night's Dream is literally the only Shakespeare that I've read and enjoyed, so I was able to get in on that. Overall this novel get a solid thumbs up from me and I would recommend it to others.

Claudia, a high school senior on the fringes of the in-crowd, finds herself the unwilling witness to the break-up of Iris and Paige, the cutest couple at Prospect Landower School for Girls. When discovered to be eavesdropping, Claudia becomes a target of mean girl Iris’ wrath. But as the school year begins, Claudia and Iris are unwillingly paired to work on a class project and after they nearly fail this first assignment their teacher forces them to participate in the school play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a co-production with their brother school. The two girls form a tentative pact, which grows into an unlikely friendship that grows stronger as the year goes on. Meanwhile, the play introduces Claudia to Gideon, the male lead in the play, and a romance begins though Claudia, stung from her first boyfriend’s indifference, doesn’t feel she is worthy of his attention. Another curve comes when Claudia discovers that her best friend, Zoe and her brother are dating. I was slightly disappointed with the all too common cliche of the popular and gorgeous boy falling for the unpopular and nerdy girl. But overall, Foolish Hearts is a positive tale which focuses more on the power of friendships between the girls and their growing realization of the need to accept the people they love as they are, not as they wish they were. A good selection for reluctant readers, and fans of Sarah Dessen and Jenny Han will certainly appreciate this light-hearted and heart-warming story.

Howwwwww are Emma Mills’ books so good? Like, her contemporary romances and Becky Albertalli’s are the absolute pinnacle of fluffy books imo. Foolish Hearts has just become my new favorite, which has happened with each book so far, because they’re all just so damn good. Mills hits basically every possible emotion, and they feel so real and so beautiful and relatable. With Foolish Hearts, Emma Mills gets even better, which, like, honestly, I’m back to HOW?


From the very beginning, I fell in love with Claudia. She’s charmingly socially awkward, by which I don’t mean that she trips sometimes or whatever, but that she’s kind of terrible at social interaction and it’s massively relatable. She has a tendency to be very direct or very sarcastic, and, whenever she tries any other social tactic, she’s just so incredibly bad at it. For example, in the first scene, at a boring party, someone asks for her affirmation on a stupid thing she doesn’t care about, so she goes “Abso-tootin’-lutely!” like that’s a thing that people do.



The catalyst of the novel is a rather strange event but one that really does kick off the action: at said party, Claudia accidentally overhears the cutest couple in her all girls’ school break up. Of course, being Claudia, she gets caught listening and her incredibly terribly attempts at lying don’t really pan out. This means that Iris, who is super duper mean, now has it out for her. Which makes things awkward when they’re assigned to be partners in English.

Iris and Claudia have one of the best relationships in the whole book, and I relate to them both so incredibly hard. (Also, in some alternate universe, they are the ship and I also love that version btws.) Iris also doesn’t know how to people but where Claudia comes off weird and kooky, Iris comes off mean. They become friends slowly and sort of by accident, and I have so many feelings about their friendship. I also super love that scary, forbidding Iris is a massive fangirl.



Getting assigned to be partners in English while they still hate each other earns them a bad grade, which means that, for extra credit, they have to audition for the school play. The whole novel is basically Claudia and Iris being forced out of their comfort zones and made to interact with other humans. Claudia makes all of her friends basically accidentally, and every time she is really fucking surprised that anyone could possibly like her. I RELATE TO THIS GIRL SO HARD.

Obviously there is this boy, Gideon Prewitt. He’s charming and adorable and at first he seems like he’s Mr. Popular Smexy Dude, but actually he’s a complete goofball and the most cinnamony of cinnamon rolls. Gideon is absolutely precious and adorable and weird and lovable. Like, the amount of time he spends trying to ask Claudia out while she has actually no idea because she doesn’t think anyone could ever like her is the cutest damn thing I’ve ever seen. And I just love how they are such perfect weirdos together. It’s absolutely ideal.



At times, Foolish Hearts had me literally laughing out loud. There was this one scene where Gideon joins the MMORPG that Claudia loves because she loves it, and he can’t figure out how the controls work, and I had to put the book down and laugh for an actual minute it was so funny. Mills’ banter is so incredibly on point throughout the whole cast, and there are so many different varieties of perfect banter.

As well as she hits the highs, Mills also excels at the lows. She really delves into Claudia’s insecurities and you feel every moment. I almost cried through, like, the last hundred pages. I’ve been unaffected through books much sadder than this one, but I care so freaking much about these precious children that any time their feelings are hurt, I’m a goddamn mess. The whole cast shines; Mills does such an incredibly job developing her secondary cast as well as the leads. There are THREE ships to enjoy, and they’re all totally delightful.

Part of me really wants to sit down and reread this book immediately that’s how good it is. Not kidding. I really actually want to, but I won’t because my tbr is a million books long. This book, you guys.

Foolish Hearts is a really sweet book. It has a lot of good meaty ideas swirling around in it, but overall it's just a story of a girl figuring herself out and learning how to relate to the world around her. It's not overly dramatic, but it still manages to feel real. It's the best kind of YA, to me.

This book was such a great relationship story! It had a good bit of everything...family drama, friendship, lesbian and heterosexual romance, along with some good doses of light humor. The characters rang true and the dialogue (peppered with f-bombs) sounded like teens. I appreciated the varying social angst felt by many of the characters and thought the author Did a great job with all the different situations.

Emma Mills always has a way with storytelling, and this book is no exception. Her characters are dynamic, her writing is fluid, and everything about this book is wonderful. Claudia's journey in the novel feels realistic, and over and over again, I'm reminded of why I love Emma Mills's writing.

Foolish Hearts is a light read that's sure to make anyone feel warm and tingly for a little bit.

In my quest to finish as many 2017 releases as I could before the year was over, I picked up Foolish Hearts by Emma Mills during a day of travel and was easily and immediately charmed. Foolish Hearts is the story of Claudia, who overhears a breakup conversation she shouldn’t have and becomes enemies with the most ruthless girl in school, only to have them both participate in the same production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

I really loved all the characters in Foolish Hearts as well as their relationships with each other–including friends, siblings, and love interests–which just felt authentic. I especially loved the amazing friendships, both for Claudia as well as her love interest and his best friend. There are also some great funny moments. I didn’t the inciting incident for the book–the conversation that Claudia hears–was nearly as big a deal or as secretive as the story makes it out to be, but once I got over that, I absolutely loved reading the rest of the book. If you are looking for a light, romantic, contemporary young adult novel I definitely recommend checking out Foolish Hearts.

Originally posted on Forever Young Adult on 2017 December 5.

BOOK REPORT for Foolish Hearts by Emma Mills

Cover Story: Love Looks Not With The Eyes, But The Mind
BFF Charm: Yay x 2
Swoonworthy Scale: 7
Talky Talk: The Course of True Love Never Did Run Smooth
Bonus Factors: Shakespeare, K-Pop
Relationship Status: What Fools These Mortals Be

Cover Story: Love Looks Not With The Eyes, But The Mind

I can’t decide if I love or hate this cover. It’s pretty, sure! I like the funky tapestry/embroidery, and I like that it’s not dumbed down. On the other hand, I genuinely have no idea what it has to do with the story.

The Deal:

Claudia has accidentally overheard her classmates Iris and Paige’s breakup, which is not just sad for them, but for her—mean girl Iris, who has a set of genuine brass balls (figuratively), threatens to ruin her if she ever blabs a word of it.

As the school gods would have it, Iris and Claudia are both working on their school’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, where popular guy Gideon takes a liking to Claudia, and Iris gradually lets Claudia in as a trusted friend.

This book, which reads like every classic teen rom-com in existence, brings all the classic delight, too: new friends, new loves, and the healing of old wounds.

BFF Charm: Yay x 2

I love Claudia, who, like all of Mills’ protagonists, is a sweet and fully-formed human—but I really, really love Iris. Iris is a prickly, loyal girl who has an all-consuming love of K-Pop and a heart-on for her ex-girlfriend. Iris (who has the best name, and I’m not just saying that because it’s my middle name) gets all the best lines, and her friendship with Claudia blossoms in a delightful, sincere way. It’s a nice contrast to the “prickly girl blooms with love from the right man” trope, and one of Mills’ signatures is sweet friendships between girls. You can tell that she really gets how nice it is to have besties.

Swoonworthy Scale: 7

Oh, Gideon. If you like sweet, joyful, jovial boys, come for the adorable boy and stay for the female friendship.

Talky Talk: The Course of True Love Never Did Run Smooth

There are few contemporary YA authors that I really love, but Emma Mills is one of them. Her books are like sweet, sweet candy to me; her characters are always fleshed out, with surprising depth. When studious, angry Iris seriously referred to a K-Pop hero as her “smol son” I chortled. It’s that unexpected cuteness and cultural relevancy that makes Mills’ books so fun to read.

I also have to reiterate how this book reads like all of my favorite John Hughes movies—you know exactly what’s going to happen, but that’s totally okay. The enjoyment is in the journey.

Bonus Factor: Shakespeare

One of the nice things about this book is that Claudia crosses social divides to help others understand Shakespeare. I remember reading Shakespeare as a teen and not necessarily getting it all the time, but if I had books like these that put it in perspective, or a friend like her, I might have understood better. Plus, what is better teen drama than a high school theatre production?

Bonus Factor: K-Pop

I’m not a K-Pop fan, but so many of my friends are. What I loved about this was how it bridged the gap between Claudia and Iris—prickly, untouchable Iris has an interest that allowed her to let Claudia in. Claudia’s open-mindedness, in turn, allows her to get close to Iris, who seems desperately in need of a good female friend. It’s adorable…and Mills handles fandom in her usual sensitive, funny way. So yeah—it’s not about K-Pop at all, but it totally is.

Relationship Status: What Fools These Mortals Be

Book, I picked you up because of your author, but I would have read you just for the Midsummer production. You were exactly what I wanted: a sweet, funny love story with a lot of friendship and depth. The other mortals will be fools if they don’t see in you what I do.

I have such a hard time reviewing anything Emma Mills writes because I just want to put a ton of heart-eyed and sobbing emojis together and leave it at that. Seriously, how does she manage to write such perfect contemporary every single time? It's like, I think that her latest book can't possibly compare to her previous novels, and then it does and I'm just dying over here because of all the fangirling. I would read terms and conditions of various boring websites if she wrote them.

Foolish Hearts is the perfect whimsical romantic friendship novel. I just loved everything about it. Claudia is an interesting protagonist - she doesn't have many close friends at school because she likes to stick to the background, but she has a killer best friend at home and her and her siblings all like to get together online to play an awesome RPG game together, which I think is just about the cutest thing ever. Then, one day she overhears a dramatic breakup and ends up being targeted by one of the fiercest girls at her school.

Thankfully a boy band brings her unlikely friends, and she gets to be a part of a school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream with the dreamest boy of them all, Gideon, who is my new book boyfriend. No, you can't have him. He's mine. I'm claiming him for my collection. Seriously, back off.

Claudia has this awkward way about her that felt so wonderfully refreshing to me! I just adored her. She's just playing Battle Mage with her siblings, secretly listening to cheesy boy bands, and crushing on Gideon without meaning to. It's a very fun relationship to watch unfold; one of my favorites in all of contemporary YA. Yeah, I said it.

Emma Mills is always on point when it comes to relationships, and Foolish Hearts is certainly no exception. She'll tug all your heartstrings and it will be glorious.

I usually enjoy Emma Mills's books greatly, but this one seemed underdeveloped. I couldn't get into this story as I wished I had, partly because I couldn't really believe the source of the issues that Iris had with Claudia and partly because I'm not a huge fan of theatre books. Hopefully Mills's next book resonates more with me.

Light-hearted teenage romance. Somewhat predictable. Felt more of a connection between Claudia and Iris than with Claudia and Gideon but was happy with how the book ended. One thing this author can do is write with a lot of humor. Some of the dialogue had me laughing out loud a few times.

The plot of Foolish Hearts is loosely based on A Midsummer Night’s Dream. When you take Shakespeare as your inspiration, you need to deliver, and I think the author really does that with her take on the play.

Claudia is the kind of girl who has always flown under the radar at her all-girls high school. That changes when she accidentally overhears the messy breakup of her school’s most popular couple, Iris and Paige. When Claudia and Iris are then forced to partner on a class assignment, it doesn’t go well, and their teacher assigns them both to work on the school’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream for extra credit. Their work on the play brings Iris and Claudia closer together, and the two become friends. Claudia also starts to connect with other students working on the play, including the very popular Gideon, who attends the nearby boy’s school. All of these new relationships are difficult enough for Claudia to navigate when she’s always kept herself in the background, but the relationships she’s always relied on—with her best friend, Zoe, and with her family—are changing, too. Claudia has to learn how to open herself up to change and to trust that the people around her really do care for her.

The main connection between this novel and Shakespeare’s play are the four deluded lovers at the heart of his plot and the four characters that make up the central relationships in this book—Paige, Iris, Claudia, and Gideon. The author wisely doesn’t try to line her novel up with Shakespeare’s play exactly, but elements of the play are here: Paige and Iris are a couple who are truly meant for each other, although they are separated by the plot; Gideon’s single-minded pursuit of Claudia reads a bit like Helena’s pursuit of Demetrius; Claudia has to be encouraged to open herself up to the one who loves her, just as Demetrius does with Helena in the play, etc. Part of the fun of the book for me was trying to trace the connection between the play being performed and the main story.

I think a lot of an individual reader’s enjoyment of this book is going to come down to how much they like Claudia as a character, since she is the narrator of the story. One plus is her quirky sense of humor, which I really appreciated. She also cares about the people around her, not just her friends and family, but other people, too. (For example, Claudia reaches out to Iris when most people would have been put off by Iris’s prickly exterior.) It’s easy to root for someone like that. However, Claudia is presented as being extremely insecure about her own charms, to the point that it takes her forever to believe that Gideon actually likes her. While I understand that it’s hard to believe that people are interested in you when you don’t think you are particularly interesting, after a while, I found myself frustrated with her inability to see the obvious. That part of the story dragged on a little too long for me.

One other strength of this novel was how well all the relationships between the characters are written. That includes those between Claudia and her friends and family, of course, but also between the other characters, like Paige and Iris or Gideon and his best friend, Noah. All of the secondary characters felt more real because of how well the connections between them were drawn.

Overall, this was a very good read. I’d recommend this novel for any reader who enjoys YA contemporaries.

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley for review; all opinions expressed are my own.

Can Emma Mills write a bad book? I think not! Having absolutely loved both First & Then and This Adventure Ends, I was keenly looking forward to reading Foolish Hearts. Yet again, Mills has written a heartwarming story about friendship, family and love. She does a brilliant job with the combination and I hope she never stops writing these stories for teens. 

I think it says a lot about an author when you wind up caring for every single character introduced in her book. Foolish Hearts may be told in Claudia's POV, but every character introduced is important to the story, and I could not get enough of them. Claudia, herself, is a fabulous protagonist, who I think a lot of readers will themselves in. She's a total sweetheart, and it's hard not to like her! She's a little quiet at first, but once we get to know her, we see the witty, snarky girl underneath all the awkwardness. She's such a normal girl, and I absolutely loved that about her. While Claudia is the main character, it's Iris who stole the show for me. From the first scene we meet her, I thought I knew the sort of character she was going to be, the stereotypical mean girl, but there is so much more to her and you really get to see a lot of growth to her character as the story moves along. 

The unexpected friendship between Claudia and Iris was the star of Foolish Hearts. The two don't exactly start off on the right foot - Claudia accidentally overhears Iris' girlfriend breaking up with her after a heated argument at a party, and Iris decides that she hates Claudia. They are pushed to work together on an assignment, and then eventually for the school play, and they develop a shaky but very sweet friendship. I loved every moment of their relationship, because it's depicted with a lot of realness. Claudia also finds love in Foolish Heart was an adorable doofus of a boy, Gideon, who I also adored with every fiber of my being. If you've read Mills' romances, you know that she makes the couple really get to know each other before they even begin to think about a relationship, and she does the same here. I loved watching the two of the interact, and be all cute together. Claudia's relationship with her siblings was also brilliantly portrayed here, showing both the ups and downs of having a sister and a brother.

Foolish Hearts is honestly a story about the relationships a person can have, and as you can probably tell, the relationships are built really well. I couldn't get enough of this book! Be sure to pick this one up on your next book shopping adventure. You won't regret it.

Foolish Hearts is a sweet and beautiful story that reflects real struggles of teens and gives hope that things can work out in the end. I love that this story, while a love story, is much more than that. It is a story of friendship, trust, and betrayal. The best relationships are not the romance stories between Claudia and Gideon or Iris and Page but the friendships that Claudia develops with Iris and the roller coaster ride of her friendship with Zoe. This book is a book of self-discovery and potential. It is a welcome addition to any YA collection.

When was the last time you fell completely head over heels for a book? If it were acceptable for a review to consist of just heart eye emojis and goofy grins, that’s what my Foolish Hearts review would be. I was not expecting to adore this book at the level that I did.

Foolish Hearts focuses a lot on friendships and how they change and grow. Claudia was really easy for me to relate to. She has her best friend, her hobbies, and her family. She doesn’t really need more, but when she’s forced out of her comfort zone she finds new friends and new confidence.

I loved all the characters in this book. Every single one. Claudia was a fabulous main character. She was easy to relate to and fun. Seeing her blossom in the situation she was forced into was wonderful. Iris was another amazing character. She had a strong Paris Geller vibe for me, and that was awesome! She was snarky and sometimes just plain rude, but I loved her fierce loyalty to her friends.

The romance is swoony and warm and fuzzy. I do wish that Claudia would’ve seen what was right in front of her face a bit faster, but just so I could’ve had more Gideon. I adored watching their relationship unfold. Gideon was so sweet. His genuine feelings for Claudia leapt off the page. He even started playing her video game to impress her! Swoon!

Foolish Hearts was also laugh out loud funny on more than one occasion. The snark and banter was wonderfully done! It’s been a long time since I read a book that made me laugh this much. I was worried about waking up the sleeping 4 year old beside me with my giggles.

Foolish Hearts is going on my perfect contemporaries list. I think I could’ve easily read 100 more pages about these lovely characters. I highly highly recommend this one!

Back in September, I shared a list of authors I NEED to read. Emma Mills was on this list, and I cannot believe it took me so long to read one of her books! This book was such a joy to read, and exactly my cup of tea.

I am not quite sure where to start with my outpouring of affection for this book, but I am going to try.
•Claudia was so wonderful! I related to so many of her worries and the baggage she was carrying from a past relationship, but also found her to be such a genuinely kind person. She made mistakes, but she also knew she made mistakes, and worked hard to remedy those transgressions. I just adored her and wanted to be her friend, and part of her guild too.

•Gideon!!! There was a LOT more to this uber-popular boy than we were led to believe. He came off as a little goofy and not very serious, but as the story progressed, we learned about what a beautiful and kind person he really was. I would totally have Gideon as my "majestic space prince" any day.

•In general, this book is packed with superb characters. They were quirky and interesting and felt real to me. I just was ecstatic to spend time in their world, and I couldn't have asked for a better group of characters to do it with.

•I love romance, and my heart just exploded from the the romances in this book. There are three to watch, and all are sweet and adorable and I shipped them all. Claudia's romance was the main focus, and it was so adorably awkward and perfectly "her". I just couldn't get enough of it.

•Claudia's narration was so fabulous! I just loved being in her head, and I found her voice to be perfect.

•Growth, growth, and more growth! I felt like a lot of characters experienced a lot of personal growth in this book, but most notably, Iris and Claudia. Iris learned how to be a better friend and a better person, and Claudia learned to love and appreciate herself more. I am always on board with personal growth, and found Claudia's to be an important journey to share.

•The family ties are tied nice and tight in this one. Claudia' family is total #FamilyGoals. Her parents are very present in this book, but we see more focus on the sibling relationships, which were quite lovely. I love that they maintained contact over the miles by playing an MMORPG together. You know what they say, the family that plays together, stays together. Mills really did a wonderful job with the family dynamic, and I couldn't get enough of this family.

•This is my favorite kind of book, because it is quite fun, packed with great and witty banter, and low drama. It's almost as if Mills wrote this book just for me.

Overall: A wonderful story filled with family and friendship, which warmed my heart and left a smile on my face. I have now found an new author for my go-to list, and am eager to read every book Mills writes.