Can't go wrong with banter in any book, but when it's in something this cute and sweet? Perfection. I will always stand by any form of banter. In love with the friend group in this.

I loved the Layover, so I was excited about this book and it did not disappoint. I loved Liv’s and Diess’s banter/chemistry. It felt very natural and I liked seeing how the groups friendship came to be.

Review posted to: https://books-are-a-girls-best-friend.com/

Light & Sweet!

Besties since college, five friends are basically inseparable and even vacation together. Truth be told, these guys consider their friendship to be wholly sacred!

Liv is the only one who has lived her entire life on the straight and narrow….never taking a chance, until now. Joining all of her friends on a trip to South Africa everything changes and by everything I mean her relationship with the one and only Lucas Deiss… and that spells trouble for “the friendship.” Upon her return to Los Angeles, Liv needs a place to crash after disaster strikes. Of course, it’s Lucas to the rescue in more ways than one, and try as hard as they might, these two can’t fight those loving feelings.

For Liv and Lucas, these two have to figure out what’s more important, love or friendship, unless of course, they can figure out how to have both.

A light, sweet, cute, and wholly predictable rom-com that kept me entertained throughout.
3.65 stars

A buddy read with Kaceey.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnum/G.P. Putnam’s Sons for the arc.

Published on Goodreads and Twitter.

I was super drawn to this book by the beautiful cover!! I enjoyed reading this book and found it to be an easy, quick read. I think it would make for the perfect poolside/vacation read. I subtracted a star because I would love to have felt more chemistry and steam from Liv and Diess. I really was left wanting more from them and their relationship. I did not like Simone’s character at all, her telling Diess’ secret was very low and unforgivable plus all the nasty things she said. I don’t like how she was so easily forgiven from the rest of the group after that. Overall, a very fun read! I have Lacies first novel, The Layover, in my TBR pile and I’m looking forward to reading that one!

Thank you Net Galley and Putnam books for an ARC in return for my honest review.

This novel was super cute and a perfect escapist concept. Friends to lovers is one of my all time favorite tropes, and if you enjoy mutual pining over multiple years this is the book for you! I also really liked learning about the protagonists' job responsibilities as a graphic designer as well as the pressure that has on her at times. The novel felt very real and well-rounded.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC for an exchange for an honest review.

Such a great book, very much recommend it.

This is a classic romance in that you know early on exactly how the story is going to play out... and it was excellent. The characters were wonderful. I loved their friend group and dynamic.
There are two things I would have liked changed...
1.) I wanted more conversations between Deiss and Liv.
2.) Simone was left off the hook way, way too easily. I mean, come on.

Otherwise, a fun read overall! This is another winner from Lacie Waldon.
Thank you to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the ARC. I voluntarily read and reviewed this title.

This book was stupid cute, I wish it would have lasted longer! I felt like I really related to the MC Olivia - her need to follow the rules she set out for her life and her inability to stray from them, until one day. I was rooting for her happiness the entire day. Featuring a cute best friend-romance plot, we soon learn more about her and Deiss, who both ultimately decide to confide in each other about their pasts after being in a college best friend group for 11ish years. I kept wishing I could get a Deiss chapter!!! And more of them in general!

My favorite adorable quote: “He tastes like safaris and concerts and all the things I’m only just discovering are right for me.”

From the Jump is a contemporary romance novel that at its core, is about 5 tight-knit college friends but mostly about one of the friends, Liv. Liv is a rule follower bent on doing everything “right” to succeed in life rather than able to just enjoy it. This works until she says “no” during a work meeting which leads to her finally going on an international vacation with her college friends.

While on vacation, amidst the South African backdrop, Liv realizes how much she’s missed with her college friends and specifically, with her emotionally unavailable friend, Deiss. Upon returning, Liv’s world gets turned upside down and Deiss helps her and she starts to make some changes to her life.

I loved the found family and friends-to-lovers tropes. But I wanted more Liv and Deiss. There were 2 semi-steamy romance scenes and that was it. The book was leading up to it for so long, I wanted fire.

I loved the 5 college friends and really felt their chemistry, even with Simone. I didn’t like that when Simone revealed a secret from one of their pasts, that it was just kind of forgiven.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and author and almost read it one sitting. Thank you to NetGalley and Putnam Books for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

eARC
From the Jump
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Author: Lacie Waldon
Genre: RomCom
Clean Read: PG-13

The cast of characters pulled me right in! The writing is wonderfully engaging and the characters are honest, funny, and flawed. I loved the group dynamic and the attention to the group’s collective relationship.

It is a VERRRRY slow burn and not as much romance and one might expect, but I think it worked for the purpose of highlighting the importance of the group’s connection. One small note, and this is for my own personal taste, is that I always want the dual POV’s! Liv is the singular narrative and POV for the entire story and I really wanted to know what delicious things Deiss may have been thinking!

I really enjoyed the book overall and read it in one sitting. I think readers will connect to the characters and enjoy reflecting on their own friendships and connections.

Thank you to Lacie Waldon, Penguin Group, and NetGalley for this ARC!

I'm such a sucker for a long-time friends to lovers trope, and this did not disappoint. The romance was addicting, but this book was surprisingly so much more than just a summery romance novel. I really related (painfully, at times) to Liv, the main character, and her struggle to let go of a comfortable routine and embrace risks. As someone who can also be a rule-follower to a fault, her character development felt realistic and empowering. I loved the dynamic between the entire friend group, and I thought the side characters all had great individual storylines. I was rooting just as much for the friendships in this book as I was for the main love story. I also loved how we saw Liv's original friend group eventually interact with Elena, her friend from work, and saw how these initially separate storylines intertwine.

Although incredibly fun to read, this book falls a bit short from perfect for me because it does require to really buy into the story and go along with some of the assumptions. Through flashback chapters, we get very small samples of how this friend group interacted over the course of the past decade (especially the two main characters), so we do have to go along with the "I've always loved you" declaration and the foundations of some of the friendships. I thought the flashback passages in general could have provided a bit more backstory. The big conflict was also resolved a little too easily to be entirely realistic, but I forgave it because it left more room to highlight growing relationships.

I 'jumped" on the opportunity to read and review this book because the cover is beautiful! But I was pleasantly surprised to REALLY enjoy it! I had read mixed reviews about the romantic dynamics in Lacie Waldon's debut novel but brushed them off and approached this with an open mind. I'm so glad I did - I really, really loved From the Jump!

The characters were well thought-out and I appreciated physical descriptions throughout the story to pull me into the scenes as much as possible. The steamy scenes were definitely steamy and the emotional scenes pulled me in just as much. I was quite annoyed with Simone and honestly hoped she would disappear by the end but the moral of "friendship through thick and thin" really supported the ending.

Overall, I really really liked this book!

I enjoyed The Layover but this one missed the mark. I didn't feel a connection between Liv and Deiss at all and the friendships were hard to buy. Liv was extremely shallow and vain and I found myself not really caring about any of the characters. The so-called best friends group didn't really work for me and I didn't care for their behavior, especially while working at the record store. The friendships were just not believable. I also wanted more of a sense of the travel aspect of this book. I wanted South Africa to come alive and the way it was glossed over in this book with just a few mentions of monkeys and elephants this could have taken place at the San Diego Zoo for all I knew. The exotic locale in the first book was very well done and I was expecting more from this.

I really enjoyed this book even though I spent a huge chunk of it mad at Liv for trying so hard to fit into the life she thought she should be making to make sure everything would go according to plan. Deiss was by far my favorite character and I loved his character development. I saw the ending coming but not quite in the way it happened and absolutely loved it!

This book confirmed my love of Lacie Waldon, she will be an auto-buy for me! I think that I have so often been disappointed by an author's second book and was so glad this one lived up to The Layover. I loved Liv and don't even get me started on Deiss. I loved the friend group. I loved the vacation. I cannot wait for more from Lacie Waldon.

Review will be posted on www.instagram.com/bookendgetaway closer to the release date!

This book was just ok for me. I enjoyed this authors first book, the layover, and this one really reminded me of that book. I liked the group of friends and all their relationships and while I understood Liv’s reasons for acting the way she did, I still found her very frustrating at times. Overall it was a fun book but I would have liked more time spent on vacation since that was such a big step for Liv, and I also think Simone was forgiven way to quickly.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group for the advance copy!

This book follows Liv, a straight-laced graphic designer who seems to be following the “that girl” lifestyle. She has everything planned out and knows exactly what she’s doing. That all changes when she learns the power of the word “no.” Forced to give up her ambitions and carefully-laid plans, Liv embarks on a journey to figure out who she really is and what she deserves, starting with a trip to South Africa with her longtime friends Phoebe, Mac, Simone, and Deiss.

I absolutely adored this book. I read it in less than 24 hours and almost entirely in one sitting. After reading the Layover, I just fell in love with Lacie Waldon’s way of crafting stories, so I was really excited to see that she had another book coming out! The relationships she’s able to weave in this story seemed so realistic to me - especially as Liv finds out that all of her ambition has been keeping her away from time with her friends. Some of the other reviewers seemed bothered by that, but I personally think that’s a very realistic picture of friendship, especially in groups.

I love a friends to lovers story, and I was literally rooting for these characters from the very beginning. Lacie Waldon did a great job building up the tension and their relationship. I really wish we had gotten multiple POVs since we only got Liv’s thoughts and feelings throughout. I also wish that there had been a little more time spent in South Africa, but I don’t think it necessarily detracted from the story since it revolved around the relationships and South Africa was just a jumping point for Liv.

Rounding up because I would give this a 4,5/5 stars!

I didn’t intend for my first read of the year to be a July release yet here we are.

I couldn’t resist diving into a light read and since I really enjoyed last year’s The Layover, I was excited to pick this one up. Thank you to @netgalley for the advanced review copy.

This is a lighthearted read focusing on a group of very close friends and their relationships - romantic and otherwise. You find yourself invested in each friend but this is Deiss and Liv’s story. Liv is a yes girl with a plan and she has crafted an entire persona around it. When she decides to make a change, thing definitely don’t go as planned but maybe ended up being just what she needed. Deiss is the swoon worthy book Boyfriend of my dreams. This is a great read and if you are a fan of any I’d the following - mark this on your TBR for a perfect beach read!

-Vacation setting
-Found Family
-Friends to Lovers
-Forced Proximity
-Slow burn romance

🏖️From the Jump🏖️
Author: Lacie Waldon
Publishing: 7/18/2022
Publisher: Penguin Group Putnam
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

Special thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to review this book. All opinions are my own.

➡️From Amazon: "Liv Bakersfield is used to living her life in “shoulds.” Be fit. Be financially responsible. Be your best self. An overworked graphic designer, she’s stretched so thin that she’s about to miss yet another vacation with her beloved group of college friends. But when Liv finally decides to start saying no, it feels good…good enough to leap straight into quitting her job and hopping on a plane to join them in South Africa.
Amid the exotic landscape and unforgettable sights, Liv expects sun and safari animals and an easy time with her best friends. But such close proximity makes everything more complicated, especially with the emotionally unavailable Lucas Deiss. Their friendship is the only thing in her life that's still solid, and she vows to do anything she can to keep the group together. But once they get back to L.A., Liv discovers that her leap of faith has become a freefall, sending her crashing into Deiss's arms. With the trust of the people she loves most on the line, Liv must decide between doing what she should … and risking everything for what she shouldn’t want."
➡️Review: If you are looking for a cute story about a straight laced girl who wants to change and hits a lot of kind-of obstacles, this book is for you.
It was just an OK read for me personally. The book was a bit long, with what felt like a lot of unlikely things that just happened. It was almost too easy. I don't want to give away any spoilers, but it just didn't have the grit I was hoping for. It seemed to just jump from one incident to the next with little flow. There wasn't enough resistance and the ending was relatively predictable.
I did, however, like that Liv had the courage to step outside of her comfortable bubble and change. That is something I hope to accomish myself in the coming year.

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From the Jump has a lot of my favorite elements. Friends becoming family, friends to lovers, a fun vacation and more.

Liv is used to saying yes to everything and trying to curate the perfect life. She finally hits a breaking point and starts saying no. She learns a lot and grows closer with her friends and a true love in the process. Lucas Diess has his own issues and is usually a mystery. Liv grows close with him and realizes there is more than meets the eye.

I enjoyed this one but wanted more of the travel. That was only a piece of the story and I definitely thought it was going to be more. I also wanted more closure or growth with Liv and her moms relationship as there were some issues brought up that then never got resolved. Overall a fun, quick read where you were rooting for the characters to find their happily ever after.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.