I received an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Kylie Reid is an observational genius. I could not get enough of how she described people in this book, weaving in comments and details that made me laugh out loud. Each one drills to the heart of a person, and they balance an acerbic insight with profound truth.

Come & Get It switches among a few main characters, but centered around Millie, a Black college student who had to leave school temporarily to help her family but is now back to finish her senior year and work again as a resident assistant. She takes her job and responsibilities very seriously, and despite having some misgivings about the year, she makes friends, makes money, and starts to feel positive about her future. Her life intersects with Agatha, a white visiting professor and author who teaches creative writing and interviews some of the students on Millie’s

A well-written but emotionally challenging read about women of all ages making poor life choices. Kennedy is a well-meaning but slightly neurotic first-year student with a dreadful accident in her past. Millie is a dutiful RA who finds herself caught up in a passion beyond her control. Tyler is the popular cute girl with a rebellious streak. And Agatha is a visiting researcher who gets tangled in all of their lives, including one relationship that leaps beyond the bounds of ethics.

Reid is a very readable writer. Her characters are unique and believable, and her dialogue realistic and suited to each character. I may not have been the exact target audience for this book - I gave it three stars just because I found it difficult to put up with all these people just doing the wrong thing. But I recommend it for a light beach read and some lovely realistic description.

I have mixed feelings about this book.

I liked Reid's previous book and was looking forward to reading this despite the mixed reviews. I will say that the first 75% of the book is just character studies. It introduces each character and sort of pulls back to give you a snippet of their life and how they ended up here. It's interesting but it reads a bit like a character study. Nothing major happens until around the end of the book where things crescendo and there's some good food for thought. But it requires that you have a lot of patience with this book that I think is too long for that type of buildup.

I still enjoyed my time with it and i like her writing and will definitely read her next book but this wasn't one of my favorites.

with gratitude to netgalley and PENGUIN GROUP Putnam, G.P. Putnam's Sons for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book mostly held my interest but nothing actually happened. I’m a sucker for books that take place on college campuses but this story centered around an RA names Millie and a visiting professor named Agatha didn’t give me enough action on o feel satisfied at the end.

Both of these main characters were likable, and we also got more insight into less likable characters like Tyler, Peyton, and Robyn, as well as heartbreakingly insecure Kennedy. While I enjoyed reading about the characters the plot just plodded along and then the book ended with nothing major really having happened. I found myself skimming a couple times because I was waiting for a climactic event. When that finally occurred, it wasn’t really all that climactic and it left me with questions to which I never found the answers.

Overall, not a boring read, really, but just one with no major plot twists. Not sure I’d recommend, though it was well written and I empathized with some of the characters. Thanks to Netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I laughed so hard at the dialogue in this novel. Kiley Reid is a genuinely funny person. I found myself relating entirely too well to the southern university students that said such cringeworthy things. If I took myself too seriously I probably would have hated this book, but instead I just laughed at myself for being a white girl from the south with two many friends named Becca. Point taken. I was on the edge of my seat wanting to learn what would happen to these characters, and I loved their arcs. Would highly recommend.

I really liked Such a Fun Age and after this, I’m in the bag for whatever Reid writes next. She is such a careful observer of human experiences and puts them into words in exactly the right way so you feel them too. A lot of reviews complain about lack of plot, which didn’t bother me because I enjoyed the character studies so much, but it is the definition of a slow burn. Things happen, but not until the end. I think there’s something interesting to be said about parking lots as a recurring theme but I’m not sure what. Maybe that college in general and this college during the events of the book in particular exist as kind of an in between space where we go to sit and wait until we decide what to go with the rest of our lives?

This book explores the dynamics of college life among (mostly) women at a southern university – dorm mates, resident hall leaders, visiting professor. There are pressures of time, decision making, finances and moral choices that expose flaws in each of the characters. It’s a fun read, the voices are great and the themes are thought provoking.

I loved Kiley Reid's previous book, but this one didn't do it for me. It had good bones, but it just didn't capture me. I found myself bored and speed-reading. Reid is a wonderful writer, but a more compelling story (even a slow burn like her previous) is better suited for her style.

This is my first book by Reid and I have to say, I was slightly disappointed. I kept thinking that the many backstories from all the various characters in this book would eventually intersect in some shocking or delightful way or interesting way, when in actuality they did not & the result was a very clunky, disjointed story that never came together. I couldn’t get attached to any of the characters when their stories were so isolated. This felt very much like a first graph, it wasn’t awful but it wasn’t great either. This was a middle of the road reading experience at 2.5 stars!

From the author of Such a Fun Age comes a new literary fiction story centered around a cast of unique characters. Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for this ARC in exchange for my thoughts!
I went into this one aware that it was a character driven novel as opposed to plot driven. Overall, it worked for me. The beginning was a little confusing, I wasn’t sure exactly where we were going. After I got to know the characters a bit, I found myself thoroughly entertained. The setting took me right back to dorm life in college.
This might not be a winner for everyone, especially those who seek excitement and thrill. If you are looking for a relaxing read, this might be the one for you. Without giving spoilers, I was expecting more repercussions for the characters after “the incident” at the end of the story. 3.5 stars rounded up.

Kiley Reid’s sophomore novel COME AND GET IT is a rather large departure from her debut SUCH A FUN AGE, and I think patience is required for it. Along those same lines, I’m not sure it’s going to be a hit for every reader. This will resonate more for those readers who like slower, character-driven contemporary novels.

When the novel starts out, we are introduced to Agatha, who is a visiting professor to the University of Arkansas, and she’s interviewing college residence hall residents on weddings. This immediately was weird to me because wedding research at a university seems so … odd. It reminded me of my days in college when psychology experiments are stated as being for one purpose to those who volunteer, but actually something else is being studied. So I was immediately suspicious of Agatha’s motive for her “wedding research.”

Then we are introduced to Millie, a Black residence advisor in the Belgrade (least preferential) dorm. She’s hard-working and is of little means, scraping together money from wherever she can. The reader sees how the residents and fellow residence advisors treat her: not well, she tolerates a ton of microaggressions and other insulting behavior.

We learn background on Agatha, including her relationship with her wife Robyn, and Millie, and we are introduced to some of the residents that are being interviewed. There is a lot of detail in the writing; for example, we are told how each of the dorm rooms looks in an exhaustive way. Again, patience is needed.

This novel shows so much in the small moments, and it talks about money with much more specificity than you see in other novels. It doesn’t slap the reader across the face with conclusions and epiphanies. It’s definitely a slow burn. And it’s not a storyline/novel that I’ve ever seen before. I definitely give uniqueness points, and some chide me for doing that, but I think it’s really difficult to achieve uniqueness these days in books. This novel looks at race and economic class in a way that can meet the reader wherever they are in their race and economic justice journey, provided that the reader doesn’t DNF due to the very difficult-to-nab-down plot.

The plot gets going at 75% with the main incident, and it didn’t resolve to my complete satisfaction. But that’s life, right?

Thank you to Putnam Books and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to receive this book for an honest review.

I enjoyed Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid so I had high hopes for this one. But honestly I felt a little disappointed in this book.

I felt like it dragged and I felt like this book was way too long. Alot of it could have been said in about half the pages. I struggled to get through it.

Also, what does the title have anything to do with the book.

Thank you to Netgalley for this e-copy!

Unfortunately, this didn't really work for me. I liked the authors last novel, or I at the very least found it engaging, but I found this book incredibly slow to get through and at times boring. For my personal taste, there was too much characterization and not enough plot. This isn't my normal genre, so I am sure there are people who are more character based readers and would enjoy this, but it just was not for me. I would still be interested in reading whatever Kiley does next!

After all the online hype about this novel I was pretty disappointed. As I didn’t read the author’s last book, I can’t say if this one is better or not but I found the dialogue vacuous and the characters bland. While I can see that the author was trying to include cultural issues the many stereotypes felt offensive. After reading so many backstories of so many characters that didn’t go anywhere or have anything to do with the plot, I wanted to scream. This book was just not it for me. Thank you NetGalley for the digital copy.

Thank you NetGalley and G.P. Putnam's Sons/Penquin Random House for an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I jumped at the chance to read Kiley Reid's sophomore novel after liking Such a Fun Age so much; however, this one fell flat for me.

Reid is a character & relationship heavy author oftentimes at the expense of the plot. As other reviewers have noted, the plot truly didn't kick in in this book until about 300 pages in and even then we were left without resolve. I found myself frustrated with the characters and especially frustrated with the ending.

Ultimately, I feel this book tried to do too much. As many as 8 main characters with overlapping points of connection became increasingly hard to follow. I don't understand much of the point of Agatha's relationship with Robin taking up so much of the beginning or the backstory we received on Kennedy's life before transferring to Arkansas.

However, the reviews of this are pretty split and I'm confident some of my friends will really like this one. I wouldn't tell anyone not to read it, certainly, but it mostly wasn't for me.

Much like its predecessor, Such a Fun Age, Come and Get It is uncomfortable in parts, typically when discussing race relations and microaggressions. But the discomfort is in its accuracy and specificity. In the nuances of human behavior, Reid nails it.

I nearly gasped when a character imitated gossiping with intention for the Lord, in which someone feigns concern for a person while covertly badmouthing them. "God's really putting Hannah on my heart this week[...]And I need to figure out a way to hold her accountable while I do my best to shower her with grace," Reid writes.

TW for suicidal ideation

The author built interesting characters but the book had no plot or good ending. The ending was rushed and made no sense with no way to understand what had happened. All the action in this book happens in the last few chapters after a lot of character building.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5722987024

Kiley Reid is one of my all time favorite new authors. I thoroughly enjoyed Such a Fun Age, and I was super excited to get an advanced copy of "Come and Get it". This second novel did not disappoint! Come and Get It takes place at an Arkansas University and focuses on professor/author Agatha Paul, Resident Assistant, Millie Cousins and numerous residents of Belgrade dormitory. As with Such a Fun Age, this novel is strong in character development. This novel also explores many of the same issues as her first novel (racial and socioeconomic contrasts). Kiley Reid is definitely not a one hit wonder, and I look forward to her future novels! Thanks to #Putnam and #netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this book! I have mixed feelings about "campus novels," partly because I'm so tired of reading about little geniuses and their problems. This is not that campus novel! Perhaps it read differently because it's not about an Ivy or near Ivy League school and the characters were not predictable in their flaws. I wish there had a been a bit more depth to the racial dynamics, but I'd still recommend this book to just about anyone. It's too bad it's not coming out now (in August) because it was great to read alongside the discourse surrounding rush at the University of Alabama (aka #Bamarush). Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

This is a very character driven book about a group of young women living in a dorm and a professor/journalist who get to know them. I enjoyed the various viewpoints and though it’s lighter on plot the book kept me really engaged. I feel llle those that like a lot to happen in books won’t appreciate the nuances of this one but if you’re someone who likes to know every detail of a character down to how they eat their cereal you’ll enjoy this one