Any Boy but You

A "Romeo and Juliet" type tale without all of the killing and death. Star crossed lovers and a family feud make for an enjoyable read. Readers will be sucked in from the very first page and will be eagerly turning pages to see what happens next. Definitely recommend!

I want to thank Netgalley, Entangled, and the author for a chance to read this book for an HONEST review.

So this is basically your normal RomCom--Modern day Romeo and Juliet set in North Pole, MN

Like typical Romeo/Juliet style many moons ago there was this feud between the two families for reasons that are unknown at first. (you find out towards the end of the book) You have the Elena Chestnut (Juliet) and Oliver Prince (Romeo) who have grown up taught to hate each other but as fate would have it they end up having feelings for each other. What makes this book different is one 2 sporting goods stores are involved in a town where it is Christmas 365 days a year (yep that's right 365 days) an the Chestnuts have one an the Prince's have the other...during a app game that the Prince's came up with is when Elena an Oliver start talking not knowing who the other is an BOOM! instant chemistry! I'm not saying it wasn't a bad book because it wasn't...it was a really good book just a normal RomCom

One of my favorite YA novels from last year was Julie Hammerle’s The Sound of Us; you can read that review here. What made that novel stand out so much to me, besides its theme, was the characters. They were uniquely drawn and not falling into stereotypes. The same holds true for Any Boy But You.

Oliver is attached, almost literally, to his computer. He can develop a game or play games and not be under pressure to be popular like his sister. If he doesn’t put himself out there, he doesn’t risk getting rejected. Elena, on the other hand, wants to be out with her friends, but she’s stuck minding her parents’ sporting goods store while they’re off doing who knows what (seriously, what are these people doing that their teenage daughter is responsible all the time for the shop? Both sets of parents sound way more immature than their kids, but then I’ve seen that in real life when people get caught up in grudges, etc.).

If you’ve seen You’ve Got Mail with its battle between the super-sized, money-backed bookstore versus the indie children’s bookshop, then you have a taste of the ideology driving the Prince’s and the Chestnutt’s feud, as Elena and her family have remained in North Pole, MN while Oliver and his family have transplanted from Florida in order to run the shop after the passing of Oliver’s grandfather. Add in the anonymous messaging, which allows Elena and Oliver to get to know each other and you have a wonderful homage to the movie.

Taking a cue from this summer’s Pokémon Go phenomenon, Oliver develops an app for a treasure hunt game that involves finding stashes and answering trivia questions regarding one of North Pole’s famous hockey playing citizens.

The ending has a grand gesture and I am always a huge fan of those!

As you can see, there is a lot to enjoy and love about this novel. And, at its heart, is the question of feuds and grudges and knowing when to make amends and letting go of things you can’t control, of deciding what’s important and putting yourself out there and taking risks.

Immediately before I began writing this review I discovered that Any Boy But You is part of a series taking place in North Pole. Yippee! Very excited about future installments!

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

the princes and the chestnuts have two things in common. sporting goods stores and a mutual dislike for one another and their entire families. oliver prince and elena chestnut have both been brought up in the family tradition of mutual dislike and would gladly continue it if it were not for the fact that oliver needs some help bringing up his latin grade and elena is trying to make some extra cash by tutoring since her family's sporting goods store is failing. 

she'll take the princes' cash but she'll still gladly blame them for her family's current misfortunes, even if it's not really fair. the store had ben suffering for a while. both stores had been actually, since they were facing greater competition from larger chain stores. and while north pole, minnesota was sort of a tourist destination given the town's ridiculous name most people didn't think much of the north pole when it wasn't christmastime. 

oliver isn't a sporting goods kind of guy. it's the dead of winter, and growing up in florida didn't give him the chance to beef up his winter sports skills. at his heart oliver is a programmer. and to help his dad out he's created an app that will hopefully help drive up the store's business and will look good on his résumé. of course, when his mom busts him on his antisocial behavior and sets him up with elena chestnut as a latin tutor while banning him from his laptop the day after the app launches, he's more than bummed out. 

and so both elena and oliver are not in the best of moods when they are forced to interact with each other. neither of them has any intention of playing oliver's app game either. oliver because his original intention was to be on the look out for bugs, but since his electronic device ban does not include his phone, playing the app is the only way he can interact with it, he gives it a whirl. it's also his way of checking on his twin sister's managing of the app while he's out of commission. elena gives in when the prize becomes too tempting and she figures there's no reason why she shouldn't throw her hat in the metaphorical ring. 

the app has a chat component, and soon both elena and oliver are chatting with an opponent that neither of them realizes is the other. not knowing their identities they begin to open up to each other. and soon they are telling each other things they've never confessed to anyone else. 

i love this kind of secret identity story because the characters are interacting with each other on two different levels and get to see different sides of each other. when they finally put the whole picture together it's always so satisfying, because they can understand one another more fully. and that's what happens with elena and oliver over the course of the story. it actually takes them a while to figure out that they've been chatting with one another. and they both react pretty strongly to that information and things are complicated by other family drama. 

the best thing about any boy but you is seeing how elena and oliver's relationship develops and deepens. and the novel also has a great cast of characters in this town, some of whom who will be great candidates for sequel stories in the series. i can't wait to spend more time in north pole, minnesota. and i've never said that about somewhere cold ever.

Here is a general overview of the state of my heart after reading this book (or even while reading this book): aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwww! I am a puddle of warm and sweet feelings. 

This was so sweet and heartwarming, I do want a big hug right now. It was not too much sweetness, though, and it tackled quite a lot of nice topics, such as sexual identity, divorce, with on the one hand seriousness and on the other hand a lot of fun and humour, too! These many ingredients made the perfect recipe for a heartwarming novel that made my heart melt, for sure! 

The characters were incredibly realistic and funny, thanks to Julie Hammerle's writing, and I enjoyed reading the quick, snappy chapters. One thing I particularly liked was that the reader gets elements from both sides of the story, which is always a bonus for me: you get Elena's perspective, and you get Oliver's as well.

I also liked the whole message behind the book: no one is truly bad and evil, you have to dig in to discover the beauty in people. Of course there are always extreme cases and I'm not asking everyone to see in pink and everything. But for once, when life is hard and tough, reading a positive book makes people feel great.

It certainly worked for me.