What a cute book! I will admit that the whole time travel thing threw me off but once I got bast the initial shock, I loved it. I found the characters to be likable and relaeable, the plot to be well thought out and also relatable - I'm sure we all found ourselves wishing we could redo a moment in our lives - and the plot twists to be entertaining and surprising. The writing style was super light and fun and easy to read and follow. Overall, I was really impressed with this book and loved it way more than I thought I would. I'll definitely be buying a hard copy to share!

Again, But Better is Christine Riccio's debut novel and unfortunately it wasn't for me.

What I liked:
-Shane's voice was distinctly different in the two respective timelines throughout the story.

-I always like a "second chance love story" trope.

What didn't work for me:
-The dialogue was unnatural and hard to read. Honestly, a lot of the writing was pretty hard to read because it read more like YA fanfic than a novel.

-I had a hard time with all of the pop culture references. I realize that the author wanted me to know that it was 2011, but referencing things like T-Swift, Harry Potter, Spotify, and Angry Birds, endlessly just took things overboard.

-Lastly, the romance was not my cup of tea and the cheating that was present throughout the story was unnecessary and uncomfortable. That's one "forbidden love" trope that just doesn't work for me.

Thank you so much for the free copy Netgalley #partner

At first I did not know what to think about this book. But starting reading, I just couldn't stop. This is an amazing Young Adult book that I would recommend everyone!

Well, I'm officially impressed. not gonna lie, this was pretty good. I read it in two sittings and was unapologetically grinning like an idiot the entire time.

Something about this book was too childish for me. Maybe it was because the other books I read recently were of a different age group, or maybe the main character was too naive and girlish for me. I wanted to like this, I wanted to so badly, but it just seemed to fall flat. I was so excited and quite disappointed. I ended up not finishing this one and moving on to something more thrilling.

Christine is one of my favorite booktubers. I love her personality, her obvious passion for books. So I was super excited when I found out that she is publishing a book.
I started this book with skyhigh expectations. Unfortunately it failed very early on to grab my attention. I don't think that I am the target audience for it. I ended up dnfing it after a few chapters so I can't give it a comprehensive review.
Thank you for the opportunity to get a copy of this book from Netgalley.

One of those books that will probably sell well due to the huge popularity of the author, i think a lot of people would be left feeling slightly deflated after this read.
A little too predictable, i struggled to even get to the end

I think this will be an enjoyable read for a younger YA audience. At 26, I do not feel I am the target audience and the protagonist read quite young for me.

The premise was interesting, but it was not for me over all and I did not enjoy the cheating themes.

However, I will say there is a difference in the protagonists voice in the two timelines and I found the writing style easy to read.

Thank you Netgalley and Wednesday Books for the advanced copy of Again, But Better.

Again, But Better is a story about second chances and self discovery. It's the type of book that I think will resonate with some, and for others simply be just alright. I had high expectations and really wanted to like this book, but in the end it just wasn't for me.

I'm not sure if this boils down to my expectations of the book? I was fully expecting a cute contemporary novel about a girl who wanted to do things differently in a new country during college. While the writing is fine, the overall tone of the novel is youthful - to the point where I had trouble envisioning the characters as actual college students. Their actions, dialogue and friendships felt more akin to a high school setting than a college one. Much of it felt repetitive and boring, with little development plot-wise or with the characters. Most of the time I find myself flying through YA Contemporary novels, but this one just lagged for me and I had a hard time caring about any of it.

That said, I am NOT the intended audience for this book - so I believe that there will be a lot of people in the target demographic who will enjoy it - it just didn't work for me.

I have to give Again, but Better credit for not being as terrible as some made it out to be. Because of the novel's mixed reviews, I had low expectations - but I didn't think it was that bad, actually!

My main problem with reading Again, but Better was that I had trouble getting through the beginning of the second half where the "again" part happens. The first half was okay, but it wasn't something I wanted to read again. The second part is different enough that it's somewhat interesting... but not until about eighty percent through the novel. The fact that Again, but Better is almost the same thing twice is the main reason why I gave it three stars.

I was worried in the beginning of the second part that the book would only focus on Shane and Pilot's relationship and would barely include interactions between Shane and her study abroad friends like Babe and Atticus... which is kind of what happened. I was annoyed with the fact that Again, but Better turned into a romance and almost completely ignored the main character's friendships. In this way, I liked the first half better, which is a shame because it ends poorly for Shane. On the other hand, the end of the book was satisfying since it ends well for everyone.

I enjoyed Again, but Better, but it wasn't great. It was a chore to get through in some parts, and though the conclusion was worthwhile, it's not a book I would choose first to recommend to others.

I tried this one out but the story just wasn't for me. I admit that I picked this up because of the author alone, being a fan of her youtube career and all. The cheesy romance genre is just not for me and I should've seen that coming.

I gave this book 3.5 out of 5 stars. Being a fan of Christine’s, and watching her writing videos, I had a high expectation for this book. My expectations were met. I liked Shane’s character and related about wanting to do something in a field that’s so hard to follow up with after college. Her relationship with Pilot after the middle of the book was amazing and I’m so happy I got to read this book, as I am entering college.

While the book was fun and reminded me somewhat of myself when I was in college, I had a hard time connecting with Shane. Maybe it's because I was beyond-my-years mature even in my first year of college, I don't know, but I felt that she was very immature, almost childish. However, I would have loved the opportunity to travel to another country to try and figure myself out while getting to explore a beautiful place.

Shane Primaveri has done college all wrong. So, she decides to study abroad in London, make friends, and enjoy her life more. Then there's some magic time traveling and a love interest named Pilot.. blah, blah, blah.

I'm not trying to be mean here, but this book is pretty poorly written, and the main character is actually pretty annoying. I thought about giving it 2 stars because sometimes I do that if the story is decent or different (and just the writing bad), but I don't think the plot was even that interesting. Overall, I do not recommend this one!

I really enjoyed this book more than I expected to. I had never heard of Christine Riccio prior to receiving this ARC so my opinion is based solely on the book. I had no preconceived notions or expectations based on Christine’s Booktube because I didn’t even know it existed. I thought the story was cute and fun and had a bit of an unexpected twist that made it even more interesting. I enjoyed the characters and their growth from college kids to adults and it made me wonder whether there are any things I would do differently if I had the same opportunity Shane and Pilot did.

DNF @ 19%

Maybe this was just not my time to read this book or it's another case of right book, wrong reader--either way, this book didn't sit well with me, and because of that I had to DNF. I loved the premise of the book, and having watched the process from the beginning of this book being created, I was intrigued. However, I could not for the life of me enjoy the writing style of our main characters POV. It wasn't bad or anything, and was decent for a debut novel--I just couldn't connect to it is all. Excessive use of references that I was like "I get it, you are cultured Shane" and our MC, Shane, is almost the fictional version of Christine, which is awkward for me for reasons I don't know how to describe. Like I said, this could just be me not being in the mood/mindset for this type of contemporary, which is totally fine, or it could be just a serious occurence of right book, wrong reader...who knows? Since I'm not sure, I think I will keep this on my physical shelf a little while longer, and maybe have a go at it again in the future...

Christine is the person who got me into booktube and I have a lot of respect for her. That being said though, I really didn't like this book. I'm not a fan of this trend in YA/NA to shove pop culture references in books as a form of relatability, and this book turned that trend to the max. Most of the references were to things only people who follow booktube would really understand, and that cringe factor added to the already bad writing was enough to turn me away.

I had a really hard time getting into this book. I didn't like Shane as a character. I felt that the dialogue was clunky and the plot didn't hold my attention.

I have to admit that I had no idea what I was getting myself into, of course I read the synopsis but truly I just went with the fact that Christine had wrote it and that was enough for me to want to read it.

As I began reading I found that it was kind of impossible to stop, right away the characters grabbed my attention and refused to let it go until I was at the very end, and let me tell you this book will surprise you, a lot. There were several plot twists that I definitely did not see coming and they made the book sooooo completely different and richer.

I received this arc from Netgalley for an honest review, I could not connect with this book from the beginning. I was so frustrated by her list and the fact that someone read it over her shoulder to start just turned me off and I was done.