Most Likely to Succeed by Jennifer Echols

Title: Most Likely to Succeed (The Superlatives #3)

Author: Jennifer Echols

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Release Date: August 4, 2015

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / Book Depository / Indigo

In this sexy conclusion to The Superlatives trilogy from Endless Summer author Jennifer Echols, Sawyer and Kaye might just be perfect for each other—if only they could admit it.

As vice president of Student Council, Kaye knows the importance of keeping order. Not only in school, but in her personal life. Which is why she and her boyfriend, Aidan, already have their lives mapped out: attend Columbia University together, pursue banking careers,  and eventually get married. Everything Kaye has accomplished in high school—student government, cheerleading, stellar grades—has been in preparation for that future. 

To his entire class, Sawyer is an irreverent bad boy. His antics on the field as school mascot and his love of partying have earned him total slacker status. But while he and Kaye appear to be opposites on every level, fate—and their friends—keep conspiring to throw them together. Perhaps the seniors see the simmering attraction Kaye and Sawyer are unwilling to acknowledge to themselves…

As the year unfolds, Kaye begins to realize her ideal life is not what she thought. And Sawyer decides it’s finally time to let down the facade and show everyone who he really is. Is a relationship between them most likely to succeed—or will it be their favorite mistake?

I’ve been a fan of Jennifer Echols and her books since I first read them when I started blogging five years ago. And earlier this year, I absolutely devoured the first two books in The Superlatives trilogy. And the final book, Most Likely to Succeed, it’s officially my favourite of the series. 

Kaye has always had a plan. Not just for school, but for her whole future. She’s been waiting Aidan since she was fourteen, and together they’re going to go to school at Columbia, start careers in banking, and one day get married. It’s what her entire high school career has led to. And until recently, it was everything she thought she wanted. Now, Kaye can’t stop thinking about Sawyer, the one guy she knows she should stay away from. But that’s easier said than done when their friends seem to keep pushing Kaye and Sawyer together. As the year goes on, it’s time that Sawyer and Kaye finally admit what they really want and see if maybe a relationship is exactly what both of them want and need.

Though I haven’t reviewed them on the blog, I absolutely loved (and devoured) Biggest Flirts and Perfect Couple, the first two books in Jennifer Echols’s The Superlatives series, when I read them earlier this year. The story was addicting, the characters were loveable, and the romance was just how I like it. By the time I finished the second book, I was eagerly waiting for the final book, Most Likely to Succeed. Now that I’ve read that final book, I can officially say that it was my favourite out of the three. Right from the start the story sucked me in. It didn’t hurt that I was already quite familiar with the characters because I’d met them in the previous two books. But even if I hadn’t already been familiar with Kaye and Sawyer, this story still would have grabbed me. I’m a sucker for a romance between the smart, good girl and the bad boy (not that Sawyer was a bad boy, but I’ll get to that later). I just really enjoyed reading their story. It often had me smiling stupidly, if not full on laughing. And the romance between Kaye and Sawyer was just how I liked it. I loved that the two of them were friends, even if it was at times almost a strenuous friendship, before they moved to being more (because that is totally my favourite romance trope). But I think my love of Most Likely to Succeed is in large part because of how much I loved Kaye and Sawyer themselves.

Like I’ve said, I already knew Kaye and Sawyer before I even cracked Most Likely to Succeed open. And I already had thoughts and opinions about them before I started reading the book. Mostly, I had a feeling that Kaye wasn’t exactly happy being the girl everyone expected her to be. And I had a very strong suspicion that Sawyer wasn’t the bad boy slacker everyone seemed to think he was. As it turns out, both those assumptions were very true. But they were also only scratching the surface. Yes, Kaye was unhappy, but she also had issues at home with her mom, she didn’t now if the future she’d been working for was the one she actually wanted. She was basically trying to figure out who she was amidst all the pressure of high school. And figuring out who she was, also meant figuring out how she felt about Sawyer. And Sawyer, well he’s officially one of my favourite boys. Despite what people thought of him, Sawyer wasn’t actually a bad boy, he just hasn’t had it easy. And he was trying to do better, to break the cycle his family was in. With the people he cared about, Sawyer was all kinds of sweet and seeing that side of him only made me love him more. And it should obviously go without saying that I was all in favour of Kaye and Sawyer as a couple. Obviously.

Much like with the rest of Jennifer Echols’s The Superlatives series, I absolutely loved Most Likely to Succeed. This series was the kind of fun yet thoughtful romance that I love reading. If you haven’t checked it out already, I can’t recommend it enough.

Waiting on Wednesday (46)

For those of you who don't know, Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill of Breaking the Spine where book bloggers devote a post to an upcoming book release they are particularly looking forward to reading.

THIS WEEK'S PICK:

SUCH A RUSH BY JENNIFER ECHOLS

A sexy and poignant romantic tale of a young daredevil pilot caught between two brothers.

High school senior Leah Jones loves nothing more than flying. While she's in the air, it's easy to forget life with her absentee mother at the low-rent end of a South Carolina beach town. When her flight instructor, Mr. Hall, hires her to fly for his banner advertising business, she sees it as her ticket out of the trailer park. And when he dies suddenly, she's afraid her flying career is gone forever.

But Mr. Hall's teenage sons, golden boy Alec and adrenaline junkie Grayson, are determined to keep the banner planes flying. Though Leah has crushed on Grayson for years, she's leery of getting involved in what now seems like a doomed business--until Grayson betrays her by digging up her most damning secret. Holding it over her head, he forces her to fly for secret reasons of his own, reasons involving Alec. Now Leah finds herself drawn into a battle between brothers--and the consequences could be deadly.

I absolutely love Jennifer Echols and her books, especially her more dramatic ones...though this is where I admit I still have to read Love Story. At any rate, I've heard nothing but great things about this one and I am very much looking forward to reading it when it comes out.

Such a Rush by Jennifer Echols will be published July 10, 2012 by MTV Books.

Forget You by Jennifer Echols

Title: Forget You

Author: Jennifer Echols

Publisher: MTV Books

Release Date: July 20, 2010

Source: Purchased

Buy the Book: Amazon / Book Depository / Indigo

WHY CAN’T YOU CHOOSE WHAT YOU FORGET...AND WHAT YOU REMEMBER?

There’s a lot Zoey would like to forget. Like how her father has knocked up his twenty-four-year old girlfriend. Like Zoey’s fear that the whole town will find out about her mom’s nervous breakdown. Like darkly handsome bad boy Doug taunting her at school. Feeling like her life is about to become a complete mess, Zoey fights back the only way she knows how, using her famous attention to detail to make sure she’s the perfect daughter, the perfect student, and the perfect girlfriend to ultra-popular football player Brandon.

But then Zoey is in a car crash, and the next day there’s one thing she can’t remember at all--the entire night before. Did she go parking with Brandon, like she planned? And if so, why does it seem like Brandon is avoiding her? And why is Doug--of all people--suddenly acting as if something significant happened between the two of them? Zoey dimly remembers Doug pulling her from the wreck, but he keeps referring to what happened that night as if it was more, and it terrifies Zoey to admit how much is a blank to her. Controlled, meticulous Zoey is quickly losing her grip on the all-important detail of her life--a life that seems strangely empty of Brandon, and strangely full of Doug.

I first discovered Jennifer Echols when I read Going Too Far. When I found out that she had a similar book coming out I got excited because I just loved Going Too Far. I can now say that I had the same reaction to Forget You. I just absolutely loved it. The story was great, the characters were great, I just couldn’t put it down no matter how sleepy I was getting. Jennifer Echols just has a way of writing that completely draws the reader into the story, and in my books that makes for some pretty awesome writing and story telling.

Zoey always has to be in control of everything and no one can find out about the real problems in her life. It’s bad enough that everyone knows her dad got his twenty-four-year old mistress pregnant and is leaving her mom to be with her, now Zoey’s mom has had a total nervous breakdown and is being kept at the mental hospital. Then Brandon, a super popular and hot football player, takes interest to Zoey things seem to be looking up. But a car wreck later, Zoey can’t seem to get a handle on things again: Brandon barely speaks to her, she can’t remember anything that happened the night of the crash, and of all people, Doug Fox, seems to be the only one who knows everything that’s going on with Zoey.

I felt like I could relate to Zoey throughout most of the book. Her whole thing about being a good listener to everyone’s problems, been there done that. Being team captain without necessarily being the best on team, been there done that too. But unlike her, my parents are still together and my mother has never been institutionalized. Zoey was really great though I did get exasperated with her at times, especially when she kept on going on about being Brandon’s girlfriend just because she’d slept with him once. I’m sorry but randomly hooking up with someone, in most cases, does not make you that person’s girlfriend or boyfriend. Especially when you know said person has been hooking up with girls all summer long and talking to you about it. But other than this I really liked Zoey.

Doug was pretty awesome too, I’ll admit it. I loved discovering that he wasn’t at all who Zoey thought he was. He wasn’t exactly who everyone thought he was and that’s something I really like about a character. What I liked the most about Doug was how much he cared about Zoey and wanted protect her from different things going on...though if he could have done that without omitting certain facts it would have been even better. I can say for sure that I liked him a whole lot better than I liked Brandon, but if you ask me that’s not something that’s very hard. Brandon was a jerk. I’ll leave at that and stay polite.

I also really liked the story itself. This is only the second book of Jennifer Echols that I’ve read but I already love the way she tells stories. Forget You completely drew me in and I wouldn’t have put it down at all if I would have had a choice. Sure there were some elements of the story that I saw coming but that didn’t make me like the story any less. It was amazingly written, fast paced and absolutely amazing.

Anyone who has read anything by Jennifer Echols should most definitely pick up Forget You. Anyone else should pick it up, it’s that good of a book. It will find a way to shock you but you still won’t want to put it down.

Going Too Far by Jennifer Echols

Title: Going Too Far

Author: Jennifer Echols

Publisher: MTV Books

Release Date: March 17, 2009

Source: Purchased

Buy the Book: Amazon / Book Depository / Indigo

HOW FAR WOULD YOU GO?

All Meg has ever wanted is to get away. Away from high school. Away from her backwater town. Away from her parents who seem determined to keep her imprisoned in their dead-end lives. But one crazy evening involving a dare and forbidden railroad tracks, she goes too far...and almost doesn’t make it back.

John made a choice to stay. To enforce the rules. To serve and protect. He has nothing but contempt for what he sees as childish rebellion, and he wants to teach Meg a lesson she won’t forget. But Meg pushes him to the limit by questioning everything he learned at the police academy. And when he pushes back, demanding to know why she won’t be tied down, they will drive each other to the edge--and over...

Like a lot of book I’ve been reading lately, I picked up Going Too Far because of all the great reviews I had seen online. I now see what all those reviews were going on about and I have to say I absolutely agree with them. It was a fantastic read that had me from start to finish. I absolutely could not put it down until I had read every last word. That’s just how good a book it was.

Meg wants nothing more than to get away from her small town and go to university. She already knows the night of her graduation she is leaving and most likely not coming back. The last thing she wants is to end up like her parents. And then one night she gets in trouble and meets Office John After. John just wants to stay in this small town and protect teenagers from what happened ten years before on the train bridge. Both have their secrets and will push each other to new extremes and who knows where it will take them.

I loved Meg as a character. You can really see that she grew through the course of the story. She starts out as someone who doesn’t really care about anything except getting away from home. She is the go-to bad girl even though her reputation may not always be accurate (it just may have something to do with her hair). She doesn’t plan anything because that would mean thinking too far into the future and that’s something she just can’t do. By the end of the book she is making plans and actually enjoying making plans and looking forward to the plans she made. Meg was also a really realistic character; despite not having gone through all the same things as her I could relate to her on so many occasions.

I don’t even know where to begin with John’s character. You think he’s one thing and then a few pages you realize you may have gotten it wrong. And when you think you finally have him figured out it turns out you were wrong once again. He is such a complex character and you don’t understand him completely until the very last page of the book. I’ll admit that may have had something to do with me not putting the book down. I was so obsessed with figuring him out that I would not stop reading until I was able to know who he truly was. It was really a great incentive to keep reading...at least for me.

The story is basically all about Meg and John’s relationship. Their relationship is such a complex one that you need the entire book to figure it all out. Just like with John’s character, I just had to keep reading so I could find out what happens between them. And like many things in this book, I didn’t find out until the very last page. Despite everything not unravelling until the very end of the book, the was never a time when the story dragged on. The book was relatively short and the story was fast paced which only served to make me read further.

It was my first time reading anything by Jennifer Echols and I can honestly that I will be picking up more of her books in the future. I truly enjoyed Going Too Far and would recommend it to anyone looking for something different. It wasn’t completely out there but it was definitely different from most of the books in the same genre.