As a fan of Christine Riccio's youtube channel I was so, so excited to receive and ARC of Again, but Better from NetGalley, but that excitement died out once I finally picked up the book. I believed that I would love this book no matter what because I truly enjoyed Christine's content, but alas...I was wrong.

The main character of this book IS Christine. I don't think is is necessarily a bad thing to base your main character on yourself, but some of the similarities between the two were just downright cringe-worthy. For example, the MC, Shane's, online persona is FrenchWatermelon19....does that sound like PolandBananas20 to anyone??? It honestly felt like Christine forgot she wasn't writing about herself during parts of the story and just left those bits in. I think it's perfectly acceptable to use real life experiences to help build up characters for your stories, but there should be a clear line separating real life from fiction--a line that seems to be missing in Again, but Better.

Despite my lack of interest surrounding Shane, I did really enjoy the two timelines and how we as readers got to see her character grow. From 20 to 26 we get to see Shane mature and make smarter decisions which I really liked. I really didn't like how the book tried to constantly remind you of what timeline you were in by shoving unnecessary references in your face. I think references can be fun when used sparingly, but it felt like there was a new one thrown at you every other page. I think the premise of Again, but Better was really interesting, but the execution wasn't there. The writing felt juvenile, the character too similar to the author, and the story lacking overall.

I give Again, but Better by Christine Riccio 3 out of 5 stars for having some major potential, but ultimately falling flat. I think that this book is a good growing opportunity for Christine to see how she can grow as an author and find success in her next novel.

This was okay, but could have been better. I wanted to love it, but nothing about it stood out as exceptional or cravable.

DNF @ 70%.

I tried my hardest, I really did. This book bored me SO much and I really couldn’t get behind any of the characters. That being said, most of my issues were personal taste related so I do recognize checking this book out if it seems interesting or you like Christine!

"I've been dragging myself through the motions of what I thought I needed to do for so long, I forgot how great it feels to do what I want to do."

"Again, but Better" follows a 20 year old girl named Shane Primaveri who signs up for a Study Abroad trip to do her first years of college over again. From all the hype surrounding this book because of Christine's Booktube, I got it right when it came out because I thought it was going to be epic. I mean, her writing Vlogs were great and even got me working on my own discarded novel, so I thought what the hell, might as well see if it is my cup of tea.

Let me get into the parts that I did like and then we'll work our way through the list of problematic things I did not like about this book.

Things I liked:

Shane's character development from Part 1 to Part 2 was great. It almost made me like her as a main character. The humor in this book was okay.
The descriptive writing in which Christine described the settings of every new place the Flat Three crew found themselves in was so good. It transported me through Shane's travels and painted a lovely picture in my head to visualize as I read.
The magical realism element and the subtle hints that got dropped from chapter to chapter until it happened really brought me into the moment to where, when the magic was revealed and the time travel began, I wasn't left scrambling back to past chapters trying to figure out what exactly was going on.

Things I disliked:

Shane's weird chair thing. I get it, Christine wanted her to be accident prone, but there are other ways to do so besides repeating the same thing twice.
Another thing I didn't like was the cheating/flirting with Shane and Pilot when Pilot has a girlfriend. The whole Lamppost thing - When I read reviews here on Goodreads before I started reading the book, it seemed to me that "Lamppost" was going to be significant to the couple in some way. Instead, it turned out to be yet another stupid pop culture reference (Equivalent to TFIOS's "Okay?" and Harry Potter's "Always")

"Must. Not. Lose. Shoulder. Contact."
The complete and utter character of Shane was Christine. This whole damn book was a self-insert, from the FrenchWatermelonNineteen YouTube channel to the study abroad blog.
I get that first time authors write about their experiences and fictionalize it, but Shane was too much Christine for me that she didn't have her own personality traits.

Also, Shane's internal monologue throughout this whole book was nauseating. She's supposed to be 20 and yet, Christine wrote about her like she's stuck in the mindset of a 16 year old. Some examples:

"All the alarms go off in my brain when I realize his shoulder's leaning against mine. We're touching shoulders! Shoulders are touching. This is something! This is romance. Must stay still. Can't. Lose. Shoulder. Contact."

Another example of shitty writing/editors that don't know how to cut out unnecessary word vomit:

"She laughs. "Cool! You ready to try this burger place?" She says excitedly. Ninety percent of what Babe says is said excitedly."

The pop culture references were nauseating. It was like every three pages was "Harry Potter this" or "Cassie Clare's fourth book comes out next month!" There are better ways to show appreciation to authors that you like in your books than having your readers be nauseated and roll their eyes every time a pop culture reference was said because it's exactly what she would fan girl over.

Now don't get me wrong, there are some really good quotes in this book, the descriptive language really drew me into the settings that were explored, but overall, I don't even know how I got through this book. I thought it would pick up and be better when the -thing- happened, but instead, Shane was still the annoying narrator.

Would I read it again? No. Absolutely not.

"If something goes wrong, be my constant?"

This book is all over the place and unfortunately not in a good way.
There are so many inconsistencies that I just ended up confused and wondering if I had made some of these things up.
I couldn't connect with any of the characters and didn't care or even like any of them and there were massive holes in sections of plots.

Finally got around to try this book. All I'm going to say is that this book had so many inconsistencies. I was confused by some things and just the overall writing was very meh. Not my favorite storyline and I just didn't care about the characters.

Unfortunately, I did not enjoy this book. I prefered the first half of the book to the second. I was enjoying reading about Shane's adventures as she studied abroad. The 6 year time jump felt very abrupt.

I thought that all the pop culture references that were added were unnecessary as they didn't add anything to the story. I also think that books that use lots of references like this will quickly become outdated. I didn't really connect with any of the characters. The romance in this book was very insta love. Almost as soon as Shane met Pilot she seemed to become obsessed with him. Also in the second half of the book when Shane seeks Pilot out after 6 years of not talking to tell him how she feels. I didn't then like how Pilot dealt with the situation and his breakup with Amy.

I would have liked certain plot points to be developed a bit more. The scene in the restaurant with Shane's parents was shocking. Whilst I get that her parents would be angry that Shane had lied to them her Dad's abusive language was unexpected and never seems to be addressed again. I would have expected there to be more follow up on this though. Shane mentions that she had a strained relationship with her parents after this but they are there at the end at her book signing. I would have liked to have seen more from this.

Overall this book did not work for me. I am not sure whether I would pick up any future books written by Christine or not.

I've been meaning to read this book for a while, I got an ARC of it, and it just had it's 1 year birthday, but the birthday post is why I read it now, because I didn't want to get spoiled. And I needed to read it when I did, because I got bad news that day, and needed a good, light story to read. And this book delivered!

It was kinda funny and weird to read this book, because I turn 26 this month, and I related so hard to 20 year old Shane. I'm a bookworm, I'm super shy, I don't put myself out there. Shane's had these experiences in Europe, and while she doesn't always like the way they turned out, she's done them. You go, girl, for putting yourself out there!

I hadn't read the synopsis again before reading this book, and even if I had, I wouldn't have guessed where this book would go. It was unexpected and so fun and interesting and entertaining to read, watching these characters go through this!

That ending, and the epilogue, were so cute to read! They both experienced some amazing moments, and difficult ones, and found the path that was right for them, which was really great to read. All the little things that built their relationship-and how they worked through their problems, it just made for great reading!

This was a really great read, I really enjoyed it, and I'm glad I read it!

I enjoyed this story very much, but felt like the writing hindered it. There were a lot of references to 2011, which wasn't that long ago to be referencing. There was a lot of secrets on Shane's part, which led to a lot of unnecessary conflict. I also felt the romance to be a bit lacking. But I really loved the magical realism element and I appreciated that we got to meet Shane in her early 20s and then see what happened to her in her mid-20s. However, since she is an older character I don't think I would recommend this to my middle school students. I could see a high school junior or senior reading this book and enjoying it, so I would recommend it to them.

I've been a fan of Christine's youtube channel for awhile, so I was excited for her debut, but I unfortunately thought that it was fairly bland and didn't seem to add much to it's genre.

Shane Primaveri is starting over. She's been doing college all wrong-staying huddled up in her dorm, friendless, and home every weekend but she believes this study abroad program will change everything. Following her dreams, Shane is accepted to a creative writing study abroad program in London. She meets Babe, Sara, Atticus, and crushworthy Pilot. Everything is going stunningly until unexpected visitors show up in London and send Shane's world into a whirlwind. Everything falls apart and six years later, Shane finds herself questioning her path. She seeks out an old friend and with a bit of magic, they are given the opportunity to start over. Can Shane relive her life and go after all of her missed opportunities? What new paths will forge by rewriting history? Will it truly be for the better? They can only hope. Amazing coming of age story that I wish I read when I was 20 years old!

I'm torn on this one. 3.5/5 Stars, rounded to 4 because I always round up on Goodreads.

When I started this book I didn't know much about it or its author. I knew Christine Riccio was a booktuber, but I had not and still haven't watched any of her videos. That's not any statement against her, I just don't really watch videos.

The book begins with a character named Shane (ugh, I do NOT like that name, not at all) going to a study abroad program in the UK. She leaves her New York life behind, which isn't too difficult because she never settled into it. She has no friends (uh, really?) and did not enjoy her pre-med program. This was a chance to make a change by going to London and enrolling in semester long creative writing program. Perhaps it could be the start she needs to change the direction of her life.

I enjoyed reading about Shane's stay in London and her travels, even if they felt a bit vague for me. I've been to some of the places Shane visits in the book and I didn't feel like I was transported back there with Shane. That was a little disappointing, because I LOVE reading about those places. But, I did enjoy her flatmates and even the drama that ensues.

But then, the author introduces a time skip - a relatively large one - and it threw me for a loop. I felt like the time skip was too sudden, too large, and too unannounced. I did enjoy seeing a peek into this future for Shane and some of the other characters, but whoa- I think that portion of the book was the weakest.

After the time skip episode was pretty great. I read all of that portion in one setting. It got me to thinking about what I would do if I could start over again in my final year of college and I enjoyed that thought exercise.

Overall, for a debut novel, pretty good! I look forward to seeing what Riccio comes up with next.

** Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an e-ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.**

** Teachers and Parents, there are a couple of steamy scenes in this book, but nothing is described in great detail. There is some language in this book,. Since the characters are all in college I would not describe this as a YA (young adult) book, but an NA (new adult) book. I think it is still appropriate for high school students, but the subject matter might be of greater interest to undergraduate students. **

There were some moments that made me genuinely laugh out loud (in a good way) but ultimately I found Shane to be too on-the-nose like Christine and there was a lot of cringe. I understand that the references were to help ground us in the time period but they were too repetitive and distracting to me, personally. I think Riccio's concept was very interesting but that the book suffered from pacing issues and her writing needs time to mature and develop.

This book had a cute concept, but I think it took too long to get to the gist of the story. There was waaay too much set up in the 2011 portion. I also felt like the writing was like that of a teenager (which I guess is expected because the narrator is young). Good book, just not for me.

I thought I would like this book based on the summary, but I just didn't at all. The plot was unbelievable at times, and it was just really boring.

This book was received as a digital ARC through NetGalley in return for an honest review.

The first section of this book was on-point for the angst of figuring out who you are and what you are meant to be, finding that one special person who unfortunately already has a significant other, travel, and parent/child pulling away. In short, the perfect twenty-something set-up.

The remainder of the book was a bit harder for me to grapple. It relied heavily on suspension of disbelief and a completely impossible set of circumstances that made me feel impatient and honestly made it harder to finish with the same enthusiasm I had started. I know that this book will find the right readers, but I'm afraid I am not it.

This premise of this book was good- Shane, in college, trying to succeed, achieve good grades, build a life for herself. The grades are coming long fine, that's the easy part, but the rest isn't following suit. So, she takes the plunge and sets off on adventure to London just for one term where she finds assimilation anywhere needs effort from you too. Her new life isn't as easy as she anticipated which brings many mis-adventures and laughs along the way. It's a fun story more suited to late teens or twenty year olds. I found it so anyway. I give it 3 stars.

I remember I read this right around when it came out and I wanted to love it sooooooo badly. Christine is one of my favorite YouTubers of all time and I adore her videos. I have been watching them for so long and I truly appreciate her insights into literature, movies, and all-around storytelling. When she started making videos about her writing experience, I was so happy for her and I am still so happy for her and that this book has come out and was on the NY Times list. For me though, because I know her through her videos, it was strange to read.

Undeniably, the book was a great, humorous, light-hearted contemporary about Shane awkwardly finding her way out of her shell. It was so nice to read about an introverted character, just like it is every time there's an introverted character. (The really nice thing is that Christine did such a tasteful job portraying that introversion.) The story was also set in London for the most part and I adore that city, so it was fun to be back there.

The big big element that I couldn't ignore however that drew my away from the story was that I could hear Christine talking. Shane was Christine, straight down to the username and study abroad and everything in between. The whole plot was almost autobiographical. The other thing that I was not thrilled with was the constant reference to pop culture. They were everywhere. In general, those are not my favorite things in the world. They need to be so carefully done in my opinion and even then, the timing as to be perfect for the reference to land a punch. There were references out the wazoo in this book and it drove me crazy.

At the end of the day, the big question is, would I recommend it?
Depends.

If I were talking to someone who was deeply entrenched in the book community, either actively or by viewing only, I would probably not recommend this one. Christine is just such a well-known persona that someone in the community would likely also hear her voice the entire time.

If it were someone looking for just a good book. Maybe. Definitely maybe. Clearly I won't recommend a contemporary to someone looking for fantasy or something like that. But even with contemporary recs, I think I would only give the title if someone was looking for a plot line similar to this one.

I received and ARC of Again, but Better from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

I was really hoping to love this book; however, it was a DNF for me. I couldn't get past the first few chapters where all we learn is that Shane is obsessed with everything London and Lost (the tv show). The amount of allusions in the few chapters I read was a complete buzz kill. I really wished I could have connected to this book since I did study abroad in the UK, but it just wasn't there for me.

This is a great YA read that I enjoyed. As a recent graduate, I relate to the character in this story and found her growth to be inspiring. I think this is a fun read for people in their teens-twenties.
Thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.