"Love Song should be dedicated to all those who've idolized their first crush, taken a drunken leap of faith, and admitted their feelings only to have them brutally shred your imaginary love story because they've known about your feelings all along and do not reciprocate"

Ever feel like a book should come with a warning label because it hits right in the feels? Love Song touches such an intimate part of life, that awkward phase where you're stuck in a rut with no clear direction and you begin to question your life decisions while fighting the overwhelming feeling of being lost and empty.

"What are you supposed to do when it turns out nothing is what you thought it was and everything you'd been planning is totally for nothing."

Andie was such a hot relateable mess as she self sabotages all her potential relationships. It was equal parts painful and insightful watching her try to move on but being unable to because of her unrequited love for Ivy.

Ivy was such an interesting character to me because I feel like everyone has someone like her in their life. They are too cool almost to the point of untouchable, incredibly selfish, and self-centered but you love them anyway and couldn't picture your life without them.

Love Song features:
Behind the scenes of a strip club
Lesbian/ polyamory relationships
An emotionally bereft main character
Dynamic and comedic girl squad

Love Song at its core is about powering through rejection, despite how hurtful it may be and not being afraid to take chances. It forces readers to digest an uncomfortable truth- as much as you may have your heart set on someone, love is a two-way street.

Another powerful takeaway from Love Song is the reality that not everyone finds a grand love story like the ones written in books, sometimes life deals you some pretty shitty cards and you realize, maybe it’s ok not to fall in love?

Thank you to the author, Entangled Publishing, and NetGalley for providing me with an arc.

Trigger Warning: There are scenes depicting alcohol consumption, drug use, and overdose.

I’ll start with the fact that I did enjoyed this book. I really connected with the main character being in love with someone we all know won’t love her or see her the way she sees them. I also loved that Andie and Ivy had strong loving female friends like Melody, Alyssa, and Diana to count on. That being said I did have a few problems with this book. A lot of this book felt disjointed, especially when Andie was interacting or conversing with other characters. More than once I had to go back and re-read a section because conversations or descriptions changed abruptly. I also found it hard to be invested in the relationships. Most of the characters felt like they never really belong together, like they were almost toxic to each other. I didn’t get truly invested in the book until something unrelated to the love stories happened which was not really the main theme of the book. That being said this was a great book about young people finding themselves and growing into themselves.
Overall I enjoyed this book but I won’t count as one of my favorites.

I don't know how to feel about this story. I didn't hate it, I didn't love it. It was a bit confusing and disjointed for me until I realized that this wasn't necessarily Andie's story but Ivy's. Once I recognized that, I was able to delve more into the story. But it was hard for me to do so. I didn't really like any of the characters. There were all a little messed up, which made them seem real to me. The author did a great job in presenting a raw and edgy picture of what a lot of 19 yr are faced with--unrequited love, drugs, alcohol, sex, broken dreams, uncertainty--all while trying to get a grasp on who they are and who they want to be.

Andie's obsession with Ivy was a little disconcerting. Her pining for her best friend's love and refusing to accept that Ivy might have found something real with Dot when she has never let her feelings known and had just started exploring a new relationship herself was a little messed up, IMHO. And hello, they're 19, this is their time to hook-up, mess up and be a little wild before real life and the 20's come along.

Maybe I'm too old to be reading about 19 yr olds. Maybe being a mother of three daughters makes this story a little scary. Or maybe the story is just not for me. IDK.

a bingeable new adult book, with queer women trying to find themselves and their place, and navigating life and new adulthood
i thought it was going to be a low rating for the first half. however, i enjoyed the directions it took and the conversations it has at the end deeply resonated with me.
I really enjoyed the cast of only queer women (with the exception of parents). The characters are not loveable and their relationships are unhealthy at first, but their arcs do get them there (at least for the main characters).
The representation of disability and the discussions of monogamy/non-monogamy was well-done and felt refreshing to read a different type of love story.
The story slowly delves into conversations on finding your path, both in life and love, and how that is different for different people or happens at different times, which i think will resonate with many people!

trigger warnings: implied emotional abuse, parental abandonment, fire, alcohol, heavy drug use, panic attacks, hospitals

thank you to netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book!

Before I begin this review, I want to clarify for anyone who was interested in this book, that it is NOT a lighthearted rom-com, instead, it's an angsty YA-contemporary.
This isn't the first Hannah Moskowitz book that I read and I believe that this is relevant information. If you don't like the kind of unlikeable, messy characters that Moskowitz likes to write or their more crass and edgy style, or their very sex-positive themes, or their more dramatic plots, then this book probably isn't for you. If you, however, like me, enjoy a lot of what they have to offer, The Love Song of Ivy K. Harlowe will not disappoint you.
Moskowitz is an absolute master when it comes to character voice and character development, not only with the protagonists but with the side characters as well and it is, I believe, the point where their craft shines the brightest. They're not afraid to show people as they truly are, a little messy, a little lost, a little broken, but still good. It's also where their penchant for edginess actually also does them a service - it gives them a blunt edge to discuss them honestly without pulling any punches.
Andie, the main character, will frustrate a lot of readers. For most of the book she's nursing a very hopeless crush on her completely unavailable best friend, Ivy. She angsts about that a lot, is completely obsessed with Ivy, and gets jealous even as she herself is in a relationship with another girl (which is a whole other mess).
I loved Andie. She was written in a way where even in places where I couldn't relate to her (and don'T get me wrong, I did relate to her a lot of the time!), I could still understand her. Also, she's a lesbian who identifies as such explicitly in the text - and so does Ivy.
Speaking of which - Ivy is the person who the book almost focuses on more than Andie which I thought was really interesting. We see her develop and grow and have a really cute and believable romance - not through her own perspective but filtered through the eyes of her best friend, which added a whole other thematic dimension to this book and made it even better.
I also really liked Ivys love interest, Dot, who was absolutely adorable. In the first half, I thought she seemed a bit of a manic pixie dream girl character, but slowly, throughout the book, she very much comes into her own and gets developed as her own person, gaining a lot of depth and dimension.
My only complaint about the book comes in relatively late. There's an event in the third act that I won't spoil here, and it's followed by a timeskip, where I could've actually liked to see the immediate repercussions of it, especially from an emotional perspective.
On the whole, I wholeheartedly recommend this book.

I don’t know what to think of this book. It’s well-written. There are feelings. Teenage angst. So much teenage angst.

Andie has been in love with Ivy since forever. Ivy doesn’t do relationships and goes from girl to girl, which isn’t that surprising at nineteen. Andie is okay with it because she’s convinced that, someday, Ivy will settle down with her. Then Dot comes into the picture. Andie doesn’t take her seriously, in part because she’s only seventeen, but when Ivy keeps taking her home and Dot suddenly seems always there, Andie begins to worry.

This story made me feel very uneasy at times, which is actually a good thing. It rang true and makes me wonder whether this book wasn’t for me because I’m too old or because I really don’t want to relive these years.

I didn’t like any of the characters, which, for the character-driven reader I am, is a problem. I might have liked Elizabeth at first but she turned out to be way too closed-minded. I grew to respect Dot after a while and almost wish the story had been told from her point of view instead of Andie’s.

Telling the story from the point of view of a character who isn’t one of the mains involved in the romance is an interesting and bold choice. I can see how it might unsettle some readers but I rather liked it. At some point in the book, Andie, who is the least driven character in the whole story, wonders if she’s a secondary character in her own story, and is there anything more teenager-y than that? Some people, like Ivy or Dot, are lucky enough to know who they are and what they want from a pretty young age, but many others, especially queer kids, spend years finding themselves.

When I say I didn’t like any character, it’s not entirely true, I rather liked Andie’s parents, their strip club and the way they deal with the dad’s mental health issues. And I did like the three main characters a little more by the end.

That said, in all this rather depressing story (it’s not just the characters, there are pretty terrible things happening to them), there are some really good scenes, including a couple of epic ones. And it’s all very sex-positive, which is always a huge bonus. Except from Elizabeth, there is no judgement, no shame.

I was very tempted to give this book 3 stars because of how uncomfortable it made me feel but it wouldn’t be fair. It’s too well-written for that, and I’m also sure it will stay in my mind for a while.

I received a copy from the publisher and I am voluntarily leaving a review.

I received an advanced copy of The Love Song of Ivy K Harlow through NetGalley so I could share my review with you!

Content Warning: The Love Song of Ivy K Harlow contains scenes of drug use, alcohol consumption, overdose, and hospitalization.

Ivy K Harlow doesn’t fall in love. She never sleeps with the same girl more than once, and she has never been in a committed relationship, much to the relief of Andie, her best friend. Andie has pined over Ivy endlessly but hasn’t been able to let Ivy know. It would ruin everything if Andie told her one-in-a-million best friend how she really feels. But, when Ivy begins seeing the same girl on more than one occasion, Andie’s world begins to crumble. Ivy K Harlow was never supposed to fall in love unless it was with Andie.

You can get your copy of The Love Song of Ivy K Harlow on June 1st from Entangled: Teen!

The Love Song of Ivy K Harlow had a wonderfully queer cast of characters, which was one of my favorite elements of this story! Andie is trapped in an endless state of pining over her best friend, Ivy, which made for a very compelling narrative. Though over-dramatic at times, Andie's was an interesting perspective to read from, given that the story seemed to primarily focus around Ivy. I think this speaks to the ways that Andie’s life revolves around Ivy, in that Ivy is the main focus of Andie’s energy. Hannah Moskowitz absolutely nailed the extroverted-friend/introverted-friend dynamic, making this book an enjoyable read for me!

My Recommendation-
If you love high-school stories with plenty of queer representation, you need to pick up a copy of The Love Song of Ivy K Harlow! This book would be a great pick for fans of Kelly Quindlen or Becky Albertalli!

Thank you to netgalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review!

The love song of Ivy K. Harlowe was entertaining to say the least. This story is told through the lens of Andie who has a crush/obsession with her best friend Ivy. Ivy is a complicated character who many have troubles connecting with and I think thats what I loved about her. Complex and hard to understand are always a favorite. I do wish I could have gotten to know Andie’s character a bit more since she mostly only talked about Ivy and her girlfriend Dot!!

The storytelling of this book is super unique. This story is told from the perspective of Ivy K. Harlowe's best friend, but the story is more about Ivy than our narrator. The narrator is basically Ivy's stalker; she's obsessed with her best friend because she's in love with her, but Ivy is in love with somebody else.

I think this unique storytelling really raised my interest in the book at first, but as I kept reading it got really tired. The pacing was a bit weird, some parts moved a lot quicker while other stretches would be SUPER boring. Overall I really like this experimental fiction in theory, but in execution I think it could've went. a lot better. This was interesting to read in places, but dreadfully dull in others. However, this story will definitely stay with me for a long time, which is why I'm rating this book 3 stars.

CW: alcohol consumption, drunkenness, drug use, drug overdose, serious illness/hospitalization

Thank you to NetGalley and Entangled Publishing LLC for an advanced electronic copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Ivy Harlowe does not date. She takes girls home and moves on, living her best sexual non-manogamous life. Until, of course, that seems to start changing. Ivy is in denial, but not nearly as much as Andie, her best friend who has been pining over her for as long as she can remember. Andie is convinced that this isn't how it's meant to go - if Ivy is going to choose someone, shouldn't it be her?

This book is pure hormones and chaos and I love it. There is some darkness to it, so take note of the content warnings, but if those are things you can read about, this book is worth picking up. All of the characters are working to figure themselves out, and it's a journey you want to be there for.

'The Love Song of Ivy K. Harlowe' features an all-queer cast and incredibly tasteful disability and mental illness rep, and is the perfect New Adult read for every introvert (or somewhat quiet extrovert) with a loud and flashy extrovert best friend. This story is all about Ivy, beautiful and desirable Ivy, with her one-night stands and her new maybe-relationship with Dot, and the family issues she hides from almost everyone - narrated by Andie. Best friends since childhood, Andie loves that she is the only person allowed to see the real Ivy, to know the family drama and all the complicated things that make up Ivy, rather than the fake show Ivy puts on for everyone else. She's even in love with Ivy and firmly believes that once Ivy gets certain things out of her system and is ready to settle down, it'll be Ivy + Andie forever. Reader, if you've had a loud and flashy extrovert best friend, you may see where this is headed. You may very well know how Andie feels at certain parts throughout this book. This is well-written, relatable content (even if you did not have a crush on that extravert bestie.)

This was interesting and different, but not always in a good way. I had read some of the mixed early reviews so I went into this with my expectations lowered but still very open. It’s my own fault, but I requested this because I believed it was YA, but in fact it’s very much New Adult. I love YA, but I just don’t click with NA all that often. In some ways I actually liked this more than expected, but there were too many issues I could not get passed. In the end this is strictly in the just okay/average territory.

I could easily see why this would be a very polarizing book. There are multiple reasons why –I’ll go into more later- but it took me about half the book to figure out that the main issue –for me at least- came down to a stylistic choice. I want to be clear that Moskowitz can definitely write, her writing is quite smooth and very readable, which kept me reading the whole book, but her choices were what I had issues with. This story is written in first person, which I love, but the character who’s POV we are in the whole time, is not really a main character. Once I realized this, I figured out that is where the disconnect came in for me. I was watching this messy “love” story, but experiencing it from an outsider perspective instead of from the characters themselves. It’s funny but towards the end of the book, the character whose headspace we are in says this:

“It’s not that I’m the secondary character in my own story. It’s just that this one was never my story.”

While she is right that we are not really reading her story, she is wrong because she really did become a secondary character. I don’t know if I have ever read a contemporary “romance” like this before. While I applaud that it is something different, I don’t want to read a romance from the outside. We did see some more intimate moments and some fights and stuff since that character who’s POV we are in eavesdrops and watches a lot –more than made me comfortable- but still I was too much on the outside and could not connect with the main romance because of it.

Besides that large problem, we are dealing with a lot of unlikable characters. I don’t know if I really liked any of them. Ivy who the book is such a big part of especially… well I guess I just didn’t get why? There was just a lot of toxicity, bad choices, and unlikable people. The character who’s POV we are in is pretty bland. She is just sort of there as a vessel to help us experience other people from the book. She did have some growth, but it was pretty tiny and I hated how much of a pushover she was and that never really changed.

I did like that there was a lot of sex positivity in the book for the most part. I liked that one of the characters helps to run her family’s strip club. And I also liked that there was a poly couple, although they are not big characters in the story. I did find it off putting that one of the characters all of a sudden is biphobic. I don’t know if it was done to make us not like her, but it just came out of the blue and was never really addressed so I didn’t like how it was used.

Finally, back on the good side, is the last one third or quarter of the book. Something pretty major happens and the book seems to finally get a bit deeper and has more heart. I wish more of the book was like that and I found I even had to grab a few tissues. I had a lot of ups and downs with this book but that last part made up for some of the downs. If only I could have liked the characters and connected with the romance, things would be different. There was some good stuff here but there was a lot to get over too. I can’t really recommend this one, but I would not say stay away either. If you are a big NA fan and are looking for something different, this could be for you.

The relationship with Andie and Ivy is super superficial and awkward to me. Ivy is a perfect 10 and could get anyone she wants, and uses this to play with people's feelings. Andie, who's POV you are reading, is obsessed with Ivy and her love for her makes her world revolve around Ivy. This is super destructive behaviour and not something that interested me. She also tends to be destructive when intervening within Ivy's own relationships.

The writing itself was good, however the stalker theme was very off putting.

Thanks to Entangled Publishing and Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for a honest review!

I genuinely do not know what to feel about this book.

Andie is definitely an annoying character with an annoying plot and an annoying ending, but I guess she's realistic, even though that doesn't really make it better.

It was an interesting story though, something that I haven't read before but maybe there's a reason to that. Like, why would anyone want to read a story about two people falling in love but from an outsider's perspective?

I would much, MUCH rather to have Ivy or Dot as the narrator in the book. It would've been a better experience.

I did like that it was an all queer cast and that the author didn't treat the word "lesbian" like it was something wrong and dirty, which is new and exciting.

It was an overall good book that could've been better if Andie was a lot less lame.

I got an ARC of this book.

I am a sucker for a blue book if my fiancé is to be believed, but I never listen to them about things when I should so I am going to say it wasn’t the cover that sucked me in and made me want this book.

I at first thought this was going to be some fluffy, mild heartbreak sort of romance novel. It really isn’t. There is no fluff here. It is a lot of heartbreak and a lot of messy people. There are a ton of complex relationships, which I normally love. The issue is I just didn’t like a single character that got a lot of page time. I loved Andie’s mom and that was about it. Everyone else could go and I would be ok with it. Everyone else was so flawed to the point I was having any issues seeing any good in them.

If it was not for someone else’s review that promised that the book picked up in the last third, I would not have kept reading. I almost DNF at around 70% because I was just so bored with the same messiness over and over again. Then the big twist I did not see coming happened. The last 25% or so is what carried this book and made me finish it. I devoured that. I loved that section. It just took so long to get there.

I had some issues with the book, but they mostly came down to the slow pacing and just how flawed everyone was. The MC seriously dated a biphobic lesbian, despite being bi. She then claimed it was a preference and she couldn’t blame someone for it. I’m sorry, but no. That was just gross. It really fit her, but I was so grossed out at the same time. That was most of the book. So much of what happened made sense from a toxic place, but the characters really did grow. Some of the growing was all at once and some took the entire book to really become clear. So I have to be impressed that Moskowitz was able to take these characters that really needed to grow up and helped them grow up in a way that made sense and for the most part in a story that was enjoyable to read.

If you are looking for something quick and about people who are more put together than not, this is not for you. If you like disaster lesbians then this just might be for you. I went into it looking for more fluff than there was. I was not ready for something as serious as this turned out to be. A lot of my own red flags in a relationship were thrown constantly so I had issues engaging with the characters.

I hate to say this but the first half of this book wasn't particularly enjoyable. I thought Ivy and Andie's relationship was uncomfortable to read. Andie's obsession with Ivy, and Ivy's complete self-obsession, made it feel really icky to read the interactions between these two. When Dot comes along, she seems so incredibly young and Andie's actions towards her felt quite bully-like. Thankfully, the second part of this novel won me over.

I thought the characterisation in this is very good. Our three main characters, Ivy, Dot and Andie, all developed from their young, self-absorbed stage to a more well-rounded, likeable character. In saying this though, I liked that Ivy remained honest with herself and the way she sees relationships. It was great to see a description of an atypical romance and relationship.

No spoilers here but some big themes were unpacked in this novel, which again gave it a lot more depth to when it started out. An interesting way to relay a story as honestly, the three mains were not likeable initially.

This novel is definitely worth a read if you are looking for a new adult romance that pushes some unconventional boundaries.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Entangled Publishing for a copy of this novel. ARC provided in exchange for an honest review.

This was a quick, engaging read with lush detail but with a lot of unhealthy relationships.

I do appreciate the queer and disability rep, with the latter being done in a respectful manner, and wasn't made the focus on the character. However, I had a lot of trouble with the relationships. Andie is obsessed with her best friend Ivy, and has convinced herself that they will date eventually, to the point that when Ivy starts dating Dot Andie goes a bit crazy.

I've definitely had crushes that seemed to consume me, but Andie's actions towards Dot, and her later time with Elizabeth, felt like a train crash that kept going, and her lack of growth was disappointing.

I really liked this author's style of writing though, and I would try another of her books.

Thanks to NetGalley and Entangled Publishing for an ARC.
This was kinda a slow burn to me. I kept waiting for something to happen. But of course it quickly picked and I found myself scanning through the pages!
This to me felt to be a woman's fiction/romance read!.which I just devoured.
Looking for a quick read with cute, loveable enjoyable characters?
Read this beautiful book!

“There’s always been something so exotic and intriguing about how damaged Ivy is, and I don’t really feel bad about saying that, because I know it’s what she wants people to think. Ivy wears her trauma like it’s a sexy dress. She puts up walls to make you desperate to break them down and turn her into that girl she was on the street around Christmas, and then she makes you feel like you’re special for noticing….”*

Andie is in love with her best friend Ivy. She waits in the wings hoping Ivy will tire of her string of one night stands and start a romantic relationship with her. Then Ivy meets Dot, who manages to keep her attention, and they seem to be in an actual relationship. Andie must decide whether to accept Dot or declare her love for Ivy and let the chips fall where they may.

The most important thing readers should know going into this book is that it’s not a romance novel, rather it’s more a new adult/women’s fiction novel with romantic elements. What I mean is that a romance novel focuses on the people navigating the relationship, typically a couple. In this novel, Andie’s love for Ivy is the focus as Ivy begins a relationship with Dot. While Andie has relationships with other women during the course of the novel, the story is more about her finding herself and growing as a person, both as a person and a partner.

I adore so much about this book, including the way it explores chronic illness, includes a strip club, and looks at various kinds of relationships. The book made me want Andie to win Ivy over, yet Dot grew on me. Each character is a delight.

For me, this was a four and a half star read rounded up to five.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thanks to NetGalley and Entangled Teen, an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC., for providing an Advance Reader Copy.

*Please note that my review is based on uncorrected text.

A story of love and friendship, but also of growing up. This was a good read. I enjoyed the characters and watching their growth and struggles.