Great cover!
The premise of this book really grabbed me. ... fight club guy and sweet artist ... Yes please!
I just found Tristan to be a very spoiled twit. He didn't have any depth.
Kaia, on the other hand is naïve and a pushover.
I wanted more from them.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book tells the story of Tristan who tries to manage his anger issues over being adopted by participating in underground fighting. After being badly injured his family move away, back to his childhood home to remove the bad influences. His new friends surprise him by taking him to an underground fight one night and again Tristan gets involved. At the same time he meets his old best friend Kaia and they quickly form a relationship. She doesn’t like him fighting and manages to stop him getting badly hurt when his dad takes ill. Following that point he tries to turn his life around and get on the right track.

For me the story line was good but the plot was lacking in emotional depth and character building. I felt the author skimmed the surface of mental health, addiction, anger and assault and didn’t dive deep enough into these issues and the emotions that can result. I never got a feeling about who Tristan was other than a kid who was angry that he had been adopted and liked to fight. Kaia was another kid whose mother died of an overdose that had no self confidence in herself. Tristans dad is mentioned as saying Walker men are strong and always get back up however, I didn’t get this opinion of him from the actions in the story.
There was no connection for me to either the MCs or the side characters of Alex, Brody and Becca.

The story had a few inconsistencies for me as well such as Kaia asked Tristan about the bear tattoo and this was never answered. Kaia was prepping dinner with her grandma and when Tristan came to the door she just left and went and spent the night with him. It took a long time for Kaia to think about the guy who had offered money for her paintings and get back to him, especially since she was short of cash. There were also quite a number of typos and grammatical errors through the book.

I enjoyed what I read but it could have been better with the presence of the emotional connection with the characters, more detail of who they were as people and a little more depth on the situations.

Fighter is the most recent new adult romance book (with a bit of friends-to-lovers in the mix too) by Anna Ray.

It follows Tristan and Kaia, childhood best friends who haven't seen each other in ten years, until a few poor decisions lead Tristan back to Santa Rosa, and constant encounters with Kaia. But they're both so much different than the people they used to be, and both are in seemingly impossible situations.
Tristan knows he can't do what he wants to do, what he loves to do, because it just might end up killing him and hurting the ones he loves. Kaia's a talented artist, but she knows it's a tricky business, and she can't afford to follow her dreams.

Written in a simple, colloquial and rather beautiful style, this is an exciting and lovely story of two people finding each other, finding love, understanding, and sometimes just some much needed peace and quiet with each other.

I absolutely adored them both, I loved the ending (I cried quite a few times), and I really enjoyed this book! With that being said, I rate this book 4 - 4.5 ☆.

I received a Advanced Reader Copy from NetGalley for my honest opinion. I love a good fighter romance but to be honest this fell a little short. Tristan is a lil immature and troubled through the whole book. There was no depth to Tristan and Kaia just that they were best friends when they were kids. I would have liked it better if they had more depth more response to their feelings.

I got totally roped into this one by the cover! It's quite awesome :-)

Tristan is a moody, sulky, spoilt bad boy who loves to fight. It’s underground fighting, tough, dirty, no holds barred kind of fighting. It’s not honest and it’s not the way he was brought up to be. Tristan was adopted and blames his adoptive parents for pretty much everything.

Kaia is a talented young artist, kind, gentle for the most part, and lives in a trailer out the front of her grandparents. She’s at community college but wants to go to art school but isn’t financially able.

Tristan and Kaia cross paths while Tristan is there for five minutes (failing) - they’re childhood friends but haven’t seen each other for 10 years. The attraction is there, and you can tell the road’s going to be a rocky one.

I struggled with this - Tristan is really a spoiled brat with a poor me attitude that’s incredibly painful. Kaia whilst an attempt is made to have her depicted as stronger, is pretty blind to his failings. I guess reading this it pays to remember they’re supposed to be 18 and 19 and have a whole life in front of them. There were some good bits here but there were lots of conversations where the dialogue felt forced, some typographical and grammatical things that didn’t help, and I kept thinking Kaia should run not walk away from this kid. I felt the relationship whilst it was aiming for deep, was mainly about attraction, Tristan being as moody AF, and not giving a damn about anyone's feelings.

Thanks to netgalley for the opportunity to read a free reading copy.

Tristan, an angsty 19 year old underground fighter, ends up moving back to his hometown with his adoptive parents after a bad fight left him in the hospital for months. He is supposed to be going to community college and straightening his life out, but something about fighting just keeps drawing him in.
Artist, Kaia, loses everyone. Her childhood best friend moved away when she was ten, her mom died of an overdose, and her high school best friend moved to Oregon to go to her dream college. Meanwhile, Kaia is stuck in her hometown, working towards a degree she doesn't want, with no friends or social life.
What happens when her childhood friend comes back into town and challenges everything she thought that she should be doing? He's definitely not the same kid who ghosted her ten years ago.

Overall, I liked this book and would read it again. It is a cute, quick read that took me about 2 hours.

Pros - The characters are likeable, but flawed. They are interesting and have their own lives outside of each other. Both main characters have a solid background story that explains what motivates them. The sex scenes were descriptive without being cringe filled. The ending was satisfying and nothing important was left unanswered.

Cons - They went from long lost friends to head-over-heels in love way too quickly. They went from cold to hot in an instant. There was no real build up, even though they did not get together until about halfway through the story. It is hard to understand how such strong feelings happened in overnight. I wish that there were more scenes establishing a connection and building towards something more before both characters jumped in head first.

This is a case of childhood friends becoming lovers. They are opposites of each other ok story dialogue. The hero I did not like he was very immature but overall a easy read.

Absolutely loved reading this book! It was an easy read which I read in one day! Slightly predictable but still enjoyable all the same.

Thanks to Netgalley for an advanced copy of this book, which I voluntarily read and reviewed. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

So firstly Anna Ray is a new to me author, I enjoyed the book and its pace so I am sure I will be reading more of her work. When I saw the description 'A bad boy college romance' I don't think I was expecting something quite so gritty or adult. Underground fighter Tristan Walker returns to his home town after ending up in hospital after one of this fights. His parents scared, try to keep him out of trouble, but Tristan is angry with the world, and his parents when he finds out he is adopted. Struggling academically he wants to give us his education and find a job or continue fighting which earns him good money.

Our female lead is Kaia Brooks, the pair were best friends when they were children but now as young adults are finding their paths have taken them in very different directions. Kaia is studying hard and working hard to save money for her education. She is a budding artist and hopes to enrol in art college. She has been brought up and lives with her grandparents who raised her when her mother died.

I really liked Kaia characters she has been through a lot of battles but keeps plodding on without complaint, on the other hand Tristans bad attitude stopped me warming to his character, I am not really sure why he was so angry and horrible at times towards the people who chose to adopt, love and raise him as their own.

When they meet up again it is under very different circumstances but their friendship is still strong. The relationship quickly moves into lovers territory, I found the first encounter a little awkward. She having dinner with her grandparents, there is a knock at the door she disappears and doesn't come back until morning as she is shaking up with him, but her grandparents don't check where she had gone?!

All in all I enjoyed the book.

Overall this was an enjoyable read with a decent plot and several steamy scenes. Tristan and Kaia were friends 10 years ago before Tristan moved off. He comes back into Kaia’s life and there’s an instant connection. I liked the characters in the book.

The reason for the 3 star rating is because the plot seemed rushed without more character development. I also felt like the writer was following a formula and just plugging stuff in without fully developing the characters and plot.

DNF'ed at 10%.

This book sounds like it would be right up my alley, but I pretty quickly realized that this was not for me. The main character is just so angsty and it didn't really seem like he had any reason to be. It just came across as teenage immaturity to me and leaned more towards the YA realm than I prefer.

A dual-narrator account of finding yourself and facing your fears with the help of a caring love interest. Kaia and Tristan were once childhood friends who have now rekindled their friendship as college students.

Kaia is an artist who prefers the comforts of her cozy art studio trailer and Tristan hashes out his internal battles in an underground fight club. Can they find a way to work through their own insecurities to become a happy couple?

**I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

I received an arc from NetGalley and this is my honest opinion.
Tristan and Kaia were once childhood friends but Tristan moved away whe he was a teenager. Tristan finds out a devastating lie he feels his parents kept from him and he starts underground fighting to cope.
After some terrible injuries his parents move him back so he can start fresh at a new college.
Tristan however gets wrapped up in fighting again and once he crosses paths with Kaia their friendship turns to more but can Tristan realize he is loved no matter what?
4 stars

Got to love the bad boys! I loved the fighting and the romance in it! I identify a lot to the main character, because she was looking for security and fell in love with someone who lives on the edge, not great, but leads to a very good story.