Cover Image: My Life Next Door

My Life Next Door

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A good summer romance aimed at young adults. I’m probably too old and not the target audience for this now but overall it was a nice easy read with a few enjoyable twists.

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This was a good read but the ending felt a little unfinished, I couldn’t identify a clear conclusion and felt too many loose ends had been left. Having said that the book does give you a warm feeling with many many surprises along the way.

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Samantha Reed has spent almost her entire life watching the family next door and can’t help but want to know what they’re like despite her mother’s snobbish objections. When Sam finally meets Jase, her next door neighbour it’s not long before love blossoms.

UGH THIS WAS SO CUTE AND JUST EVERYTHING I DIDN’T KNOW I NEEDED!

This is a wonderful summer contemporary that you can curl up with anywhere (the couch, bed, sun lounger, the pool) and get sucked into. I loved this little world of the Garrett household and easily it was for Sam to be accepted and made one of the family - I feel like everyone knows a family like that, and I definitely saw the one I know in the Garretts. They were almost Weasley-like in nature and what’s not to like about that.

The romance in this is just so organic, it was refreshing. The chemistry between the characters was so naturally done, it was sweet as hell, and their dialogue and dating scenes were written perfectly. Nothing seemed rushed or written for the sake of it and there were times they really felt like real people to me.

One of the things that made me happiest in this book was the approach to safe sex and consensual sex. It was fantastic. Sam and Jade have a conversation about their first time together a while before it happens, and they even go to a pharmacy together to pick out condoms. Something so normal and not stigmatised is great to see in a book that could be read by teenagers in the same way - and a healthy, happy approach to safe sex is a must and I really commend Huntley Fitzpatrick for this. Thank you!

There is the YA trope of neglectful parent in this one as Sam’s mom is really something. Very much the invisible parent until Sam does one thing wrong and she’s grounded for life. Her mom was not really a nice person and, for me, didn’t really get a redeeming arc either. The storyline with Sam’s friend Nan also felt a bit unresolved and we didn’t get closure there but I appreciated the storyline with Nan’s brother Tim who had addiction issues.

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I did not finish this book unfortunately I didn’t like the writing style or characters

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I loved this, and I can't wait to read about Tim and Alice

Happy reading :)

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So I have been meaning to read this book for a while, It’s contemporary, one of my top genres to read. I had heard good things about this book and seeing as it was on my #beatthebacklist TBR for 2018 I thought it was high time to read it. This is Huntley Fitzpatrick’s debut novel, whilst I enjoyed and thought it was a great debut, there were things that I didn’t like quite so much.

My Life Next Door follows Samantha, she lives with her mum and sister and goes to a private school so she doesn’t really know that many people in her neighbourhood not that her mother would let her mingle with them. Samantha appears to have everything, she is beautiful and her family is wealthy, topped off with the perfect house. However Samantha is unhappy, her mother is super controlling and cares more about work and politics than her. Most nights Samantha sits on roof star-gazing and looking upon her neighbours the Garrett’s. They are a large family and everything her mother despises but for Samantha is fascinated by them, when she finally meets Jase a friendship ensues and gradually becomes more only for a crisis to occur that tests their relationship.

This would have been a great story if there wasn’t so many unlikable characters..OHMYGOSH her mother was strict, snooty and really didn’t care about Samantha’s happiness. Then there is ‘Nan’ her supposed best friend but when Samantha finds out a secret of hers she totally ditches her even though Sam still wants to be friends and help.

I felt this book gave across the wrong message that if you have money you can buy your way out of situations and that there really isn’t any consequences for breaking the law and being a douche. Because of this the person that committed the crime(trying not give spoilers) didn’t really learn anything from their actions and went on and continued with their life as normal.

Jase forgave Samantha way to quickly, she had been keeping this secret from him for ages that was pretty major and concerned his whole family and just in a page all was forgiven. The romance aspect in this book was ok, I just didn’t feel the giddiness of first time love. I didn’t seem like there was a lot of character development from Samantha. It frustrated me that she was still this timid girl that we saw at the start of the book.

Despite the above negativity, I loved the Garrett’s, the whole family were so cute. I loved the little boy (I can’t remember his name) he would get really scared over huge world problems even though he was only 4/5 years old and the questions that he came out with were hilarious. I loved seeing how the family pulled together in a time in need and remained strong when things got tough.

Whilst this was a solid debut and a cute contemporary read I feel like the author tried to do much.

I rated this 3.5/5 stars

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My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick sounds like such a great book, but unfortunately, I finished it feeling pretty disappointed.

Samantha has been intrigued by the Garretts ever since they moved next door when she was younger. Loud and boisterous and obviously loving, their family is everything her family is not. Her mum is a clean freak, likes things to be perfect and just so, and has too many rules. She's also rude and judgemental, and doesn't like the Garretts simply because their yard isn't as immaculate as hers, because their children are loud, because Mrs. Garrett breastfeeds in public, and because they keep on having babies. Samantha's mum is also a Senator, and she's currently campaigning to be re-elected, with new guy Clay on the scene to help with her campaign, who she ends up dating. Her mum is so busy with the campaign, she pretty much neglects Samantha, and with Samantha's sister's Tracy away on holiday, things are pretty lonely at home. Until one day, when watching the Garretts from her little perch just outside her bedroom window, Jase Garrett climbs up the trellis and is soon a major part of her life.

So, positives first. The romance between Samantha and Jase was intriguing and sweet before they got together - the whole "will they, won't they?" moments were cute. I loved Jase's family, how big and loud and full of life they are - especially George, a precocious three-year-old who is scared of everything. I loved Tim, Samantha's best friend Nan's twin brother, and his development from a loser junkie to someone who's trying to sort his life out. I loved how Samantha and Nan's relationship ends up kind of rocky after Samantha discovers something. I loved how Samantha's mum obsession with politics and Clay was creating such major distance between her and Samantha. There were so many elements of this book that were so awesome, or had great potential.

But the main plot of the story, of her and Jase' romance? Once they got together, I lost all interest. I didn't feel any chemistry. And he was just so perfect and she was always swooning, and I was constantly rolling my eyes. It just didn't work for me once they got it together. Things started to get interesting once things go horribly wrong, but then I spent the rest of book constantly angry at Samantha for the choices she makes. It was so ridiculous. I would hope no-one would actually act the way she did, no matter what the consequences of the right choices would be. It was just so wrong, and I was so angry!

And then there's the relationship with her mum and how that's disintegrating, as her mum no longer seems to care about anything other than politics and Clay, following everything he says like a puppy. Of course, the reader wants things resolved for Samantha, because the relationship they have now is just terrible. But things would have continued going the way they were if it wasn't for the terrible thing that happened. If that hadn't happened, I don't think anything would have changed. Samantha certainly didn't seem to have the backbone to say anything, to really fight. So that was a let down.

And things with Nan? I was expecting for things to be resolved in some way, but nope. Again with Samantha not having a backbone and not having it out with her best friend when she's being a complete and utter cow. I can, in some ways, see where Nan was coming from, but Nan doesn't really know anything, and the way she treated Samantha was just appalling. And, I think, not entirely realistic. I could believe that she had started to resent Samantha, but they had been friends since they were five, that's a lot of years and a lot of memories. I don't think things would have gone the way they did in real life.

Over all, a pretty disappointing book. I do have the second book in this series, which follows Tim, and considering I loved Tim, I think I'll give it a go. But I'm really worried it's going to be another disappointment. Fingers crossed it won't be.

Thank you to Electric Monkey via NetGalley for the eProof.

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2.5 Stars.

I found this book to be quite lacklustre and underwhelming to be honest. I just wanted more from the story, the characters and the writing. I don't really have much to say about it so I'll make a list of what I liked, disliked and found to be just alright:

Liked:
~Some of the writing was relatable and good. The quotes I liked are at the bottom of the review.

Disliked:
~ The story. It just needed more. I felt like Fitzpatrick just scraped the surface on where this story could have gone. There was a lot of potential but it didn't measure up.
~ The dialogue. A lot of it was weird and unnatural sounding; I found the bulk of it to be poorly executed.
~ Sam's inner monologue. It was painfully obvious to me that this book wasn't written by a teenager. Some of her language and her thoughts just made her sound like a middle aged woman.
~ The clichés. I get that it's a YA and a lot of authors follow a particular structure but I'm just bored of books that don't think outside of the box.

Meh/Alright:
~The romance. It was fine but if your book is so heavily focused on the romance in the story, it needs to be better than fine. It was insta-love and they got together and they got very intense too quickly for my liking.
~ The characters. They were also just fine. There wasn't much angsty drama but they were sort of flat and boring.
~ The bulk of the writing was just alright.

I would not recommend this book to anyone but I might read something else by Fitzpatrick in the future.

*Thanks to NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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“When people talk about sex, it sounds so technical…or scarily out of control. Nothing like this sense of rightness, of being made to fit together.”

“Then he pulls me closer and we plunge into a kiss that is like deep, deep water.”

“I’ve armed myself for days to talk to my mother, going over things in my head, the clearest arguments I could make. Now I’ve made them all, but it’s like the entire conversation didn’t even exist, like it just got swept up and put away.”

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I feel the need to start with a disclaimer. I’ve read a lot of YA contemporary romances and so I am more critical than I would be of say, historical fiction, of which I’ve read very little. This book is cute, quirky and a perfect summer read, but save it for the time you’re on holiday and want a very cutesy book.

I say this, but I did genuinely enjoy it. It was so cute, there were just a few aspects that I didn’t enjoy. It really was a perfect holiday read (I read it in Barcelona) and for that I appreciate it. However, there were a couple of characters that I truly hated and felt needed hitting around the face with the book - though characters can make or break a book for me. Samantha’s mother and her partner were the most irritating and awful characters I’ve read for a long time, and it did definitely put a downer on the book for me. I couldn’t believe someone could be so terrible. However, I do recognise that the horrible character of her mother is essential for the plot and so I had to accept it.

The romance, however insta-lovey, was absolutely adorable. They were the cutest fictional couple I’ve read about in a long time and I fell in love with them myself. The insta-love did detract from it a bit, though because I read it on holiday I kind of was able to ignore this and just enjoy what I call a ‘fluffy’ story. It did have a bit of depth later on after the ‘accident’ (I’m saying no more because of spoilers), and this turn I appreciated otherwise it would have been constant arguments and not much else.

Leading from this, I found the characters a bit flat, though again, because I knew it would be a cutesy romance I could overlook this. I will admit I found it a bit dull at times but at other points I did feel dragged into the story, especially from about halfway through.

One thing that I did really like about this book was that it contrasted the difference in families by putting two completely different families as neighbours. I really enjoyed this feature as it looks at how those who should be ‘happiest’ aren’t necessarily and vice versa and it made the characters a bit more interesting with their differing family lives.

Overall, I did enjoy this book and it was a fun, adorable, quick read. I’d keep it for summer and holidays, because that’s when I feel this book can truly be enjoyed and its faults overlooked. In all honesty, would I pick up another book by this author? I don’t know, I doubt it. But I won’t say no, because if I want a fluffy contemporary next summer, I know exactly which author I’ll be heading for.

Rating: 3.5 / 5 stars.

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