Mmmm, I am a bit confused as what to write about this book.

Mallory is 17, home schooled and very protected after a kidnap scare when she was a young child. She has a major crush on the boy-next-door (for FIVE years), Troy, but he won't even acknowledge she exists. When Mallory gets the chance to go to school for her senior year, she sees it as a chance to meet up with Troy and try to get to know him.

It seems like a cutesy YA story and in a way it was. Mallory discovers new things (like parties, alcohol and real friends - not virtual ones) and bumps into Troy several times. He is an underground boxer and after one night he brings her home when she is drunk and somehow that turns into him climbing into her window and them becoming some sort-of-friends.

The thing is: they never really communicate and suddenly there is 'something'? The story was a bit strange that way. Near the end there is a sudden twist, but somehow it is not executed very well and the story turns into something completely different and too OTT.

It did keep me reading (and rolling my eyes). Maybe if the author invested a bit more in communication between the MC's and kept the drama on the low down it would have turned out fine. Still 3 stars as the idea was good.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. The premise of the story was something different. The suspense and the "what is going on" factor was good. Throughout the book, I kept wondering how certain characters were connected. The author did a good job of keeping me guessing until about 80% of the book. For the most part the characters were well developed. I did think that for a YA book, the characters were a bit romance novel cliche- ish. Troy was a tatted up, brooding bad boy who ran hot and cold throughout the majority of the book and Mallory always mentioned Troy's smile or muscles in her inner dialogue. I think for first love-- teenage love there could have been other ways to describe and build their growing affection and love for each other. And while not a prude or wise to teenagers and their raging hormones I think the physical aspect could have been tackled in a much more authentic way. That part was a let down with only one scene and never addressed again considering it's a pretty significant moment.
The ending was rushed but had some great twists.
Overall a decent read.
D 3/5

It felt same like many books but it was different in the end. It was light hearted but soon things changed. I never expected the twist in the end. The characters are charming and I loved reading this book.

For the most part, I liked this book. It was an easy read. I saw the twist coming. I just thought that Troy was the target, not Mallory. But not all my questions were answered. There are still some ujnresolved threads. And it was unnecessarily melodramatic. Not everything needed to be tied to Mallory's backstory and I really wish it hadn't been.

Received ARC from NetGalley for Honest Review

I Give This Book A 2 Star Rating.

I am Reviewing While Reading, so please don’t mind the ‘break down’ and arrangements of some areas.

Not a Mega Grammar Nazi, but there quite a few run on sentences.
It made a little harder for me to read, cause I had to reread a bit.

No ratings here: just comments..
Romance: Stamped HEA for sure, but they just seemed thrown together to make a book.
Smexiness: Minuscule Smexy Scenes and Fans of ‘Next Day’, sure will sure be happy with this book. I on the other hand was just bored.
Drama: Honestly? It was so WAY WAY over the top, that I think Holly Wood Filmmakers would say this isn’t even possible.


I’ve read reviews that said she was a stalker and it was based around a high school setting, that’s what got me into trying out this book, I Love Young Adult Stalker Books.

But I personally don’t see any sign of legit Stalking here.

It’s just a girl infatuated with a boy, and she watches him From Her Own Window at a specific time each day.
She literally doesn’t go anywhere till she enters high school which is 5 years later when she’s almost 18. Then she goes to a fight to see him in action, and a party. big whoop.

But would I call it stalking here? No.

I’ve read enough Dark Stalker books, to know this Girl’s supposed ‘Stalking’ abilities isn’t even good enough to be a blip on the ‘Amateur Stalker’ radar. Heck she can’t even represent the Definition of ‘Stalker’!LOL

Stalking takes dedication, for example: she would follow him wherever he goes, enter his house when he’s there or not and not get caught, hack his equipment maybe, know his people but they don’t know you, maybe copy his habits and time them perfectly with his, take pics or video him.
She literally has done NONE OF THESE!
So a ‘Stalker’ she is not.

I believe some readers might have DNF’d this and twisted what happened in this book, You kind of understand what Troy was doing in the aspect of socializing with Mallory, but to see some classify him as a Stalker too? You are SADLY mistaken peeps, his reasoning though odd helps you understand.

Dislikes: The weird coincidences and timings, stuff always seems to happen with Mallory especially ever since she started school, what a constant convenient stream of bad luck: Almost smashes her face on the floor, Blacks Out at a Party, Gets Severely Hungover and misses school, gets sick and misses school, and then injures her ankle...and that’s just a few.
You’d think she was cursed or something.
There is No Depth in any of the characters, even the main ones, nor is there a real sense of a time flow in this book either.

And let’s add bullying that had absolutely no reason to be here, two pieces of crappy written papers and let’s label that as excessive bullying.
Wow just wow.
I’ve experienced bullying and it’s scaring, but what Mal ‘experiences’ it’s the Cake Walk of supposed ‘bullying’.

And This girl literally starts school near the end of the year and this chick misses a boat load of days! Wouldn’t the school..oh I don’t know...make a freaking big deal about this?!

I didn’t actually feel an actual honest to goodness connection between Troy & Molly, it just seemed like the Author said “I need to make a new book so...well let’s see here...we have a stereotypical boxer bad boy, let’s make this pair neighbors, his love interest is a stereotypical homeschooled homebody. Yes...lets sprinkle some ridiculous drama and dump eye rolling ‘shocking’ B.S. surprise dramas all the way to the end that didn’t need to be in here, and stamp it with an HEA to seal the deal”.

Mallory is Homeschooled, I’ll say again HOMEschooled.
True she’s Not ‘imprisoned’, but her mother is somewhat described as what you call a ‘helicopter parent’.
So I’ll let her Years of Obsessing her Mysterious Neighbor slide, ya gotta fixate on something to keep you occupied.
But I gotta say when things don’t go her way immediately, suddenly she throws a hissy and wants to gives up when he doesn’t outright talk to her in full convo?
Good lord *eyes rolls* true stalkers don’t give up that easily Lol

She does have her Pen-Pal friend Nicole, who she does socialize with via messaging on computer frequently.

Some people I saw didn’t understand her mindset and I wondered why....well while reading, I too was kinda thrown as well at how as soon as she enters her high school, she’s freaking brainless in very important situations.
I mean Some things should’ve been common sense: Mallory at her age nearly 18, she should’ve been given a phone, didn’t need to be fancy but with her going to public school and her mother being hovering and afraid of being kidnapped, would’ve you want to communicate with your kid? Well at least she gets one way later in the book at least...
Don’t be reckless or try to Preen with the first person or people your trying to friend, you literally don’t know them yet.
And when at a Party Don’t give your cup to someone and on top of that don’t drink alcohol when you’ve never had it, and especially not when your friends are Not nearby.
I mean she says she’s read a lot of romances, but if you look at the stuff I listed that she has done above, clearly from the books she has read she has absolutely learned nothing from them.

I’m not used to a main character becoming so naive and pitiful so quickly.


Troy climbing into her room:
It was cute the first 3 times, but he does it several times...and i was just bored.

And I don’t know how I feel when an author plugs in another authors book via use of a characters name, and ironically even though Christian Grey was mentioned first (it’s so famous it doesn’t count).
I’m actually centering on Travis Maddox, I know quite a few people might not know who he ‘is’, he is a character in another series but it is not written by this author.
I’m just not a fan of him being thrown in here, cause the author might unintentionally end up leading readers to immediately start comparing the books.
Because MMA is used in that book, then in here also.
Plus why do both Travis & Troy share the same first two letters, supposedly look alike, and the here and there similarities in their books?
Color me Skeptical, is all I’m sayin.

Would I read this author again, I’ll pass.

A bit cliche with bad boy and virgin but hey sometimes it is nice to read something easy. This one had some mystery thrown in too.

This story was truly hard for me to finish reading. It was over all just bland and predictable. Good girl meets bad boy with tattoos falls in love throw some drama in there and that about sums up the story. The ending felt rushed and threw together. Overall I think the plot had a lot of potential but few short.

I fantastic mature YA romance (yes there is some sex). Mallory is a sheltered, home schooled girl with overprotective parents and she spy’s on her hot neighbor Troy for 5 years. Troy does his best to hate and ignore her, but it turns out he can’t stay away from her now that she’s actually going to his school, parties, and boxing matches. The chemistry between the two is apparent from the first meeting, I loved how they grew closer and fell in love. The story had a ton of interesting twists that made the book hard to put down. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it to romance readers of all ages.

PS I think they should bring this one to Netflix, it’d be an instant hit with teens and their mothers (like me).

I made it 25% before deciding to set this aside. Mallory had one interaction with Troy and suddenly was in love and spied on him for years. She only goes to school to stalk him and fawn over his beautiful existence. Troy is hot, broody, and protective yet spiteful towards Mallory and I honestly don't care to find out why at this point. It's easy to predict that these characters are secretly in love with each other, furthering the cliche and overused trope of hot bad boy next door falling in love with average innocent girl. This reminded me of Twilight with the interactions paralleling Edward and Bella. Lots of people enjoyed this one according to Goodreads but it wasn't for me.

Thank you for giving me the chance to read this one, NetGalley.

Mal and Troy have been neighbours for the last five years but even though Mal has had a serious crush on Troy they met only once because Mal is being homeschooled. No friends, no school, no parties - Mal finally wants to experience real school and she begs her parents' permission to go to school for her final year before college. That's when Troy and Mal start to interact more and more. and it turns out that Troy may know way more about Mal than she knows about herself. With lots of plot twists, suspence and swoon worthy moments this book is one of the best novels ever!

I received this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. I didn’t like this book. I liked the beginning and a few later scenes, but most of the potential vanished.
I’ll begin with the positive.
As someone who was homeschooled until high school, I related to many of Mallory’s initial emotions, from forced friendships with other homeschoolers solely because you’re both homeschoolers to the necessity of online communities and friends. In the beginning, many of the details of her life resembled my childhood or other homeschoolers I knew.
I like how some of the teens experienced and discussed mental health issues. I enjoyed these scenes. As for the online friend mentioned earlier, I like how Nic was portrayed as a good friend and not creepy or dangerous. There’s an unexpected scene between Mallory and her neighbor which was enjoyable. As a protagonist, Mallory makes mistakes and learns from some. Kaitlyn was my favorite character, as her story was interesting.

Negative aspects of this novel outweigh the positive. The writing style is average at best. Filter words are used incessantly. Settings are sparsely described.
As for the characters, many are underdeveloped. Evie is Mallory’s first nonvirtual friend, but little is revealed about her. She serves as a plot device to bring Mallory to Troy. Mallory’s brother George exists to annoy her. Troy and Mallory have character depth, but their relationship is toxic. A significant portion of the novel is dedicated to Mallory’s excitement and anxiety about highschool, but I counted only five students she meets. As a former homeschooler, homeschooling is a small world such that any larger environment feels like a galaxy. Mallory would be fascinated or stressed by all the people she encounters, not disinterested in her surroundings.
For five years, Mallory watches Troy from her window each day. When they finally speak, he wants nothing to do with her. She keeps pursuing him, despite his clear disinterest and rejection. Mallory doesn’t take no for an answer, Finally, for an unknown reason he relents and they date. He also climbs into her room while she’s sleeping without permission or warning. They also spend little time getting to know each other or having conversations. Their relationship lacks depth Unfortunately, most of the novel focuses on this unconvincing and unhealthy relationship.
Many dramatic revelations happen in the last forty pages, leaving no time for Mallory or other characters to respond properly or convincingly. There’s some foreshadowing that leads nowhere.

I wanted to like this book because of my own experiences. However, poor writing and the romantic relationship tarnished the story.

This title was totally not for me. I read about 25% of it and then had to skip through chunks of it to get through. The premise was cute, but the execution missed the mark for me as a reader. A girl has never spoken to her neighbor but is in love because she sees him everyday and he's super hot? And then expects him to be all OMG LET'S BE FRIENDS when he firsts sees her when she starts public school? Weird. Weirder still - apparently he lurves her back! And now they've spoken only a handful of times and he's climbing in through her window? Uh... that's when I started skipping chunks. No. Chemistry. I will say, because of skipping chunks, I know I missed a ton - including a 2nd subplot about who her real dad is and prison and...? I was disappointed because it sounded intriuging, but not enough for me to go back and actually read about it. I'd be willing to read this author again though!
Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. Sorry to the author for it not being for me :/

This was an interesting read. I enjoyed it. The plot was unique. The author is new to me, I can’t wait to read more of her work.

I just finished I Spy the Boy Next Door and I just loved this book. I found a new favorite author in Samantha Armstrong and I can not wait to read her next boo. Mallory was a great adorable character that you'll be rooting for till the end. Mallory and Troy's relationship from start to finish is so great you'll be flipping through so fast to see what happens next. GREAT BOOK

Good storyline. Kinda unique. There were some parts in the book I found hard to believe.. Daisy kind of seems to suffer from social anxiety in the beginning of the book but suddenly she becomes an extrovert as soon as she goes to high school. I think the transition could have been described in a better way. Also the ending seemed kinda rush. Nonetheless, good effort!

A coming-of-age story about a home-schooled teen coping with anxiety attacks and the boy next door she is inexplicably drawn to. The slow burn romance has a definite twist to the ending that I did not see coming until about 60 percent into the book, especially as this started off as a cutesy YA romance!

Mallory and Troy meet first at age 12. She smiles. He scowls. She thinks its because her dog deflated his ball that sailed over the fence between their homes. They never speak again. For the next five years, Mallory watches from her window every day as Troy runs down the street revealing sculpted abs and tattoos when he tears off his shirt. This she reports back to her pen pal Nic through an online chat.

I have to admit, if I lived next door to Troy, I'd probably be spying on him, too! But, his personality would probably kill the attraction. He's so broody. Ugh. And, yet, Mallory's attraction intensifies as she gets to know him and he starts to let down his walls. While things heat up with Troy (code for lots of touchy feely!), Mallory also develops new friendships and self-admittedly becomes less "judgey" of people she didn't really know.

With all the blushing encounters between Mallory and Troy, it threw me for a loop when a murder occurs which unleashes an avalanche of memories for Mallory. All the secrets start to unravel at this point, including secrets that Troy himself has kept from Mallory. As the reader, I gotta say it was a lot to take in, but it kept the story from being overly predictable and overall it was a quite satisfying ending!

Thank you to #NetGalley for the advance reader copy of #ISpytheBoyNextDoor!

This book is about a senior in high school—Mallory Taylor—who has been infatuated with her next door neighbor for some time. This story takes off when Mallory is able to enroll in the local public school for her senior year while also realizing there are more secrets to her next-door crush than she thought.

I have very mixed feelings on this book. I don’t think this was the type of book that makes me super crazy and happy like some other ones do. I was interested in the beginning but it fell off pretty quickly for me. It was full of cliches and scenes that I don’t particularly find cute.

I was uncomfortable with the whole “spying” thing and I know, I’ve seen the title but I didn’t think it would be like this. The whole “I’m going to stalk you and until you like me” on BOTH ends didn’t sit well with me especially one scene where it’s supposed to be romantic when he sneaks into her room while she’s sleeping after having talked to each other like....twice?? Don’t romanticize that type of behavior please :,) I admit I used to read books like this when I was 15 and thought it was so cute but now at 19, I know how inappropriate and terrifying that would actually be.
I think that the dark themes in this story could've been handled a lot better than they were and that's the main reason I'm giving this the rating that I did.

Overall, I'm pretty disappointed because I really was curious about this one. Maybe this one just wasn't meant for me.

<i>ARC kindly provided by the publisher via Netgalley <3 Thank you!</i>

You know those books where you think it's one type of book and it turns out a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT WAY THAN YOU ORIGINALLY THOUGHT?? This is that book, but in a truly amazing way! Mallory Taylor is a completely sheltered and naive character (and it's totally fitting). At first I thought, "Ugh, you cannot be THAT naive!" but those thoughts disappeared fast, and soon I was completely behind her 100% of the way as she grows as a person throughout the book. Troy Parker was an awesome character that transforms throughout the book as well. My emotions for him were all over the place, until about halfway through the book when I thought "Oh, THAT'S why he's the way he is!". I finished this book in a day. I could NOT put it down, and I am now going to devour anything else that Samantha Armstrong has written!

Mal and Troy have been neighbours for the last five years but even though Mal has had a serious crush on Troy they met only once because Mal is being homeschooled. No friends, no school, no parties - Mal finally wants to experience real school and she begs her parents' permission to go to school for her final year before college. That's when Troy and Mal start to interact more and more. and it turns out that Troy may know way more about Mal than she knows about herself. With lots of plot twists, suspence and swoon worthy moments this book is one of the best novels ever! I wholeheartedly recommend it especially for all the fans of 'The Kissing Booth' - Troy is very much like Noah from Beth Reekles's book.

This reminds me of Mean Girls meets The Kissing Booth with a twist.

The story follows Mallory, a seventeen-year-old, who's been homeschooled most of her life because she was almost kidnapped as a child, so her mother is slightly overprotective of her. Since Mallory doesn't much to do with her spare time, she's taken up spying on her next door neighbor, Troy, ever since he moved in five years ago. One day, Mallory decides she's had enough of the homeschooled life, and wants to attend the local public school to see what it's all about. She's seen movies and read books, but wants to experience it herself. After much reluctance from her parents, they enroll her in the school. Shortly after attending the school, she starts interacting with Troy.

The story continues like a typical YA Contemporary Romance novel, until the last 85% of the book where it takes this sudden dark, twisted turn where you're like, "wait, what?". It's a little far fetched, and it does give the story an interesting element; however, it was a little sudden in my opinion. There didn't seem to be many clues to hint that something like that would happen, which I can assume is for the shock value, but it also made it seem like the author was trying to spice things up and decided to add the last 15% of the book at the very last minute.

It was enjoyable, just a little jarring with how sudden things seemed to have progressed.

I gave the book 3.5 stars because it does tend to be pretty cliche in the YA Contemporary Romance aspect, and the twist at the end does have some cliche to it too, but it's still a unique twist that's not very popular, in my opinion.

I believe the characters' romance would be classified as hate-to-love, as well as, slowburn.

Some might even go as far as saying they would hate the love interest because he has "abusive" tendencies, or is just an overall asshole, but it wasn't as bad as other "Romance" books that portray toxic relationships (if that makes sense?).

Thank you to Samantha Armstrong for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.