This is a horror story. Not a romance, romcom or anything like that. I wish I was joking.

I'm genuinely horrified after reading this that anyone could take this as a romance. - let alone a romcom. If you ever find yourself in Julius' shoes, please call for help and cut off contact. I'm being serious, it will not end happy and "cosy" like it appears to in this book.

I knew this wasn't my type of book going into it, generally "high school straight romances" aren't much for me, but it was for a book club so I got a library copy so I didn't feel like I was wasting anything. I was absolutely not prepared for the just horrible things within the book. For starters, the example email in the description of the book is like the most tame example you could have given. There's quite a very detailed, long description in one of the emails about how Sadie would love to slowly torture Julius and how much she'd love it. No, I'm not making that up. That's in this "romcom" and setting up this "enemies to lovers" trope. Of course, Julius actually has a pretty sane reaction to it.

The principal however, does not. Straight up saying that the emails are partially Julius' fault (no, no explanation is given to how or why) and saying they are forced to now work together.

Through literal, intended, physical assault, more verbal abuse, and her stalking him some more, somehow this book does not end with Sadie in jail or with a restraining order.


I genuinely thought at multiple points this book couldn't get worse, but it just kept going. I was actually horrified by what the author decided to give a "romantic" flair to. In what world would someone sane make this line <spoiler>"promise me you won't hit me again"</spoiler> INTO A ROMANTIC MOMENT THAT KICKS OFF THEM BEING TOGETHER????? YES THAT'S ACTUALLY WHAT'S WRITTEN IN THE BOOK

I would actually love to chat with someone who found this book romantic. Because to me, if someone really wants to kill another person, stalks them, assaults them, that is grounds for a restraining order and running the hell away as fast as you can. Not, well, everything that has happened in this book.

The book attempts to give Sadie "excuses" to her acting in these ways, like an absent father and a stressful life.. but no there's absolutely no excuse for the kind of behaviour in this. Not even "oh they're young and don't know how to control scary emotions :(" no absolutely not.

It's just really sad to see this be touted as a cute romance and something wanted. Please, genuinely, if you see your own relationship reflected in this please find help. No one should be treated the way Sadie treats Julius.

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Separating out the rant from the rest of this which will try and go into the writing itself and not the story.
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The writing I was mixed on at first, but slowly over the book started to fall apart more and more. At first I found the visual descriptors to be quite nice. They painted the scenes easily and I could vividly imagine each place. While those descriptions did continue through the book, the rest of the writing really let it down. From character dialogue feeling incredibly stilted and scripted, to the ending having a far too long dialogue exchange between 2 nameless students gossiping about... the main events through the book? including describing the "twist" that happened a couple pages prior? It's literally just "this happened. omg did it? yes and this also happened. omg really?" for like, an entire page and a bit more. Literally none of that information needed to be recapped in all honesty, and the way it was delivered was just so incredibly heavy handed.

The "twist" was also done the same way I feel, it was all so painfully obvious and predictable from the very start but the reveal was written like it was meant to be this huge surprise. Subtly and foreshadowing is absolutely not this author's strong points.

Character development is also basically non-existent. It's all sorta clumsily thrown into the final chapter but Sadie doesn't actually seem to grow or really change at all, we're just told that she's "working on it". And for the ending chapter: (This is apparently what is meant to be Sadie's character development) <spoiler>she explicitly refuses to apologise for the emails, she never apologised for attempting to intentionally kneecap Julius at one point (doesn't even come up during the last chapter) and it's literally just "I'm working on apologising so much" which feels incredibly backwards....</spoiler>
The only character that seems to have any amount of character development is Abigail, but she isn't on page for very long so even that feels fleeting. Though I did actually kinda like her character, she seemed fun and was the character most "rounded out" to me. Though, even she started to fall apart a bit near the end with (big spoilers) <spoiler>the fact she was the one who sent the emails, just really feels like a very out of character and such a dick move</spoiler>.

Events felt very fake and really just, random. Some of the things felt like things a child would imagine/write like, with instantly getting drunk -> becoming a different person -> instantly getting sober - it feels like how a child perceives getting drunk. There was just an incredibly random event with <spoiler>naked clowns??</spoiler> I still have no idea what that scene was honestly. And even things like how the emails got sent, it just makes absolutely no sense when you think about it for more than a second.

I don't really know how to end this review. I'm sort of half dreading book club because chances are, some people there probably liked it and I have no idea how to break "this book was just abusive" to a group in person lmaooo...... I genuinely hoped this book was just a huge bait and they wouldn't end up together in the end....