Play! By Sephora December 2017

Play! By Sephora is a monthly subscription box by Sephora. It costs $10 a month and you received 5 beauty and skincare samples plus a perfume sample each month. Previously, you needed to put yourself onto a wait-list and wait to receive an email before you could subscribe, as they were rolling it out to limited quantities.

In addition to the products, Sephora includes a booklet that includes information about the product, the brand, and then tips of how to use the products. Also at the back of the book is a Play! PASS. This Pass gives you a complimentary one-on-one session with a Sephora artist as well as an extra 50 Beauty Insider points when you scan the pass at the register with any purchase. If you have the Sephora app, you can also scan the images of the products to learn more about them.

When the subscription first started, it seemed as though everyone received the same box. Now, it seems as though they have a handful of box varieties that everyone receives based on the survey you fill out at the beginning and their theme. This month’s theme is Glam Straight.

Smashbox Cover Shot Eye Shadow Duo in Golden Hour (Full-size $29)

This is a sample of two eyeshadows that come in their Cover Shot Golden Hour eye shadow palette. I LOVE Smashbox eyeshadows, so I was very excited to get these. Smashbox is one of the brands that first got me into higher quality makeup and I still think it’s hard to beat the quality of their shadows. These ones are beautiful and go together perfectly. The first color is a beautiful pinky/gold (think eye shadow version of NARS Orgasm blush) and the second is a purple/brown. I don’t often buy palettes as I feel like I can’t justify the price, but these are relatively inexpensive and still contain 8 shadows!

Make Up For Ever Artist Rouge Lipstick in Rose Wood (Full-size $22)

A beautiful nude pink, this soft lipstick is perfect for the holiday season if you’re not into bold lips. I haven’t tried it on my lips (yet) but it feels like it will be moisturizing. It’s definitely a “your lips but better” type of color. I’m hoping to try it soon (maybe on Christmas day) and see how it holds up to the wear and tear of the holiday meals!

Too Faced Better Than Sex Mascara (Full-size $23)

This mascara is one of those that you hear a lot about in the beauty community. A lot of people LOVE it, but I have yet to try it. One beauty guru that I trust has tried it and isn’t crazy about it, which is why I haven’t been too tempted in the past. I am excited to try it out though, sine I never would’ve spent the money on it. Now, do I really need another mascara sample? Definitely not, but at least it’s one I haven’t tried before!

Bumble & Bumble Thickening Volume Hairspray (Full-size $29)

A bit pricey for a hairspray in my opinion. This is meant to lift your hair and make it appear full and voluminous. While also keeping your hair in place. I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ll play around with it for sure. My hair does tend to fall a little flat right at the roots so we’ll see. If not, I know some people who would love this!

IT Cosmetics Confidence in a Cream Transforming Moisturizing Super Cream (Full-size $48)

So this cream claims to do a lot of things. Sephora says that it was developed with plastic surgeons and contains ingredients meant to moisturize, reduce the look of pores, discoloration, and signs of aging. It also claims that the concentrate is activated upon contact with the skin. The main ingredients listed are collagen, hyaluronic acid, peptides, and ceramides. The only one I’m super familiar with is hyaluronic acid which is a super moisturizer. The collagen is meant to support skin elasticity, the peptides to reduce appearance of wrinkles, and the ceramides to restore the skin barrier. If this product does what it claims, it is a great deal! $48 for 2oz of a good moisturizer is not bad at all. Fingers crossed this will be a holy grail product! Only downside is there is no SPF involved.

Dior Miss Dior (Full-size $94)

This fragrance is described as having top notes of bergamot, middle motes of grasse rose and may rose, and base notes of rosewood and pink peppercorn. I (surprisingly) have never actually smelled Miss Dior before. It’s really not bad! I like the mixture of floral and spice.

Overall, a great box to end the year on! I’m honestly excited to try every product in this box and hopefully won’t be giving anything away.

The Deal of a Lifetime

Before getting into my review, just wanted to apologize for the few days of silence. The holidays always throw me off a bit with blogging. You'd think by now I'd have the hang of it, but somehow they still always sneak up on me and I don't have anything prepared. Plus, I figure most people are spending time with those they love and not reading blogs :) Anyway, on to the slightly festive mini-review!

By: Frederik Backman
Published Year: 2017
Publisher: Atria Books
Pages: 65

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): It all begins with a father telling a story to his son on Christmas Eve. But this isn’t your typical Christmas story. The father admits to his son that he’s taken a life but he won’t say whose—not yet.

One week earlier, in a hospital late at night, the man met a five-year-old girl with cancer. She’s a smart kid—smart enough to know that she won’t beat cancer by drawing with crayons all day, but it seems to make the adults happy, so she keeps doing it.

As the man tells his son about this plucky little girl, he slowly reveals more about himself: while he may be a successful businessman, idolized by the media and his peers, he knows he failed as a parent. Overwhelmed by the responsibility of fatherhood, he took the easy way out and left his wife and little boy twenty years ago to pursue professional success. Now he is left wondering if it’s too late to forge a relationship with his son, who seems to be his opposite in every way—prizing happiness over money, surrounded by loving friends in a cozy town where he feels right at home.

Face to face with the idea that something is missing, the man is given the unexpected chance to do something selfless that could change the destiny of the little girl in the hospital bed. But before he can make the deal of a lifetime, he needs to find out what his own life has actually been worth in the eyes of his son. And so, he seeks him out and tells him this story…

First Impressions

A short Christmas story by Fredrik Backman? I’m in! I love the cover too, so I was in without even reading the summary.

What I thought

This was kind of a weird, depressing story.

Backman starts the book with a letter to readers, almost warning us that this is going to be a bit weird. It’s a short story he wrote about life and death and what it would mean to have never existed.

Unlike Backman’s full-length novels, this one has illustrations. There are beautiful pictures every few pages that add perfectly to the story. Considering this novella is only about 60 pages, I don’t have much of a review. I don’t know if I would recommend this as a Christmas story, but it’s an interesting perspective that I thin would make for some great discussion amongst friends.

If you like stories that can cause an existential crisis and you like Backman’s writing, you should read his latest novella. Maybe wait until after the holidays, but it’s worth a quick read. I don’t often recommend what type of format you should read in, but I’d recommend reading this in physical book format and not e-reader. The pictures are just too beautiful to not see in color.

Book Club December 2017

Final Book Club of the Year! This month, Stephanie picked Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine.

By: Gail Honeyman
Published Year: 2017
Publisher: Viking- Pamela Dorman Books
Pages: 327

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Meet Eleanor Oliphant. She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully time-tabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy. 

Then everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living--and it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.

What I thought

Honestly, I had heard about this book throughout the year and it never caught my eye. The name and the cover just didn’t do it for me. I don’t think I ever even read the summary, so when Steph picked it for book club, I was curious.

The tone of this book reminded me of Frederick Backman’s books, specifically A Man Called Ove. Considering how much I’ve loved his books, I was immediately drawn into this one.

Eleanor isn’t initially a likable character. She’s odd, a bit of a recluse, and a bit of an alcoholic. She is grumpy and judgmental of everyone around her and has no friends. I’ve learned over time though, that a lot of the time with characters such as these, they typically have a reason as to why they are acting they way they do.

Eleanor’s life is slowly changed when she’s leaving work with her coworker Raymond. Now, I’ll clarify that she was not leaving with him as a choice. They left at the same time and he happened to be going the same direction and started talking with her. While they were leaving, an older man fainted across the street. While Eleanor assumed he was a drunkard and was going to leave him, Raymond ran to help him and brought Eleanor along with him. After this interaction, Eleanor finds herself with two friends and isn’t quite sure what to do with herself.

There were a few moments in this book that I wanted to hit Eleanor upside the head because I would think to myself “there’s no way someone could be this stupid,” but the best part was, she often realized that herself after a short amount of time! I really appreciated that, as a lot of the times characters don’t realize when they’re being stupid and need another character to point it out to them.

Raymond is a nice balance to Eleanor. While a bit awkward (at least according to Eleanor), he is just a truly good and kind person. It was so refreshing to read a story with a character like Raymond. He was never cruel to Eleanor and never had any ulterior motives. He was just nice.

This book also tackles some mental health issues and I feel that it does it in a good way. Some of it seems a bit exaggerated or too quick, but for the sake of the story it works. The only issue I had with the book was the ending. It seemed like it ended very quickly. I think I would’ve liked either a few more chapters or an epilogue.

If this book has been on your radar, I'd recommend it. It's a delightful, easy, read that I think a lot of people would enjoy.

What Book Club Thought

General consensus was that this was a good choice! It took a few of us to get into it a little more than others, but in the end we all really enjoyed it. It was also fun to talk about a lot of the funny moments as well as those that bothered us a bit. We didn't get into a hugely deep discussion about this one, but we did throw it back since Reese Witherspoon's production company has purchased the rights for this book. We discussed which actors we could picture as Eleanor and Raymond. We agreed that we would like Eleanor to be played by an unknown (someone mousy and unassuming) but that Raymound would be played by someone better known. Stephanie came up with someone who was similar to Jack Black when he was in The Holiday and we all agreed that would be perfect. 

Series Summary- Jackaby

I recently finished the Jacakby series, which consists of 4 novels. Instead of writing individual reviews for each book, I figured I would just do a round up of my feelings on the series as a whole. I often find that there are series (trilogies especially) that I LOVE after the first book but then my feelings wane as the series goes on. Sometimes even to the point that while I couldn’t recommend the first book enough, I no longer recommend the series itself.

I've included the summary for the first book below, followed by my summary.

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Newly arrived in New Fiddleham, New England, 1892, and in need of a job, Abigail Rook meets R. F. Jackaby, an investigator of the unexplained with a keen eye for the extraordinary--including the ability to see supernatural beings. Abigail has a gift for noticing ordinary but important details, which makes her perfect for the position of Jackaby’s assistant. On her first day, Abigail finds herself in the midst of a thrilling case: A serial killer is on the loose. The police are convinced it’s an ordinary villain, but Jackaby is certain it’s a nonhuman creature, whose existence the police--with the exception of a handsome young detective named Charlie Cane--deny.

Doctor Who meets Sherlock in William Ritter’s debut novel, which features a detective of the paranormal as seen through the eyes of his adventurous and intelligent assistant in a tale brimming with cheeky humor and a dose of the macabre

Back to my summary :)

The Jackaby series follows Abigail Rook and R.F Jackaby. Rook is a young woman from England who has come to the US to find adventure. Jackaby is Sherlock-Holmes-esque in that he is a quirky private detective. However, he has the added bonus of being a Seer, someone who can see auras and supernatural creatures. As a result, the cases he investigates are the ones that are more than what they seem. Shortly after arriving in the US, Rook takes on the job of becoming Jackaby’s assistant, so the series follows them on their adventures.

The first two books I flew through. I loved getting to know the characters and the way that they saw the supernatural world. I also liked that they were a bit simpler in that they are kind of procedural. I enjoy crime procedurals, so I liked following Jackaby and Rook as they solved their crimes with a bit of a twist.

Every character in this series is so much fun. Jackaby is odd, but loveable, Rook is strong and curious, and every other character that gets introduced (that isn’t evil) is just loveable. I also wasn’t able to figure out a lot the twists because of the supernatural elements, so that was fun.

The second two books take on a bit more of an overarching story that involves battels between good and evil. I tend to struggle with books that are the searching kind of adventure. Sort of like The Hobbit, where it’s just a long story about trying to get to the final destination. I also don’t do well reading battles. I find that I get bored with all of the descriptions and confusion and I just want to know who lives and who dies and who wins in the end.

While the third book was still a quick read for me, the fourth one took me a long time. It wasn’t because it was bad, it was just not a book that I could read for long periods of time. The final book was also a bit more supernatural heavy than the first three, so I think that made it a bit harder to read as well. I did like the way that the series ended and am sad to say goodbye to these characters.

If you’re someone who likes a bit of supernatural and enjoys procedural stories, I think you’ll like this series. Just beware that the last two books get to be a bit heavier. I still enjoyed them, but I just preferred the style of the first two books in the series a bit more. I honestly could’ve had a series of 10 books in the style of the first two. I get why the second two books went the way they did, and like I said, I’m happy with the ending, but I still would’ve liked more of the procedural side with characters I loved. I would also gladly read a prequel with Jackaby and even a check-in with Rook later.

The Boy is Back

By: Meg Cabot
Published Year: 2016
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
Pages: 400

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Sometimes to move forward, you have to go back…

One post. That’s all it took to destroy the care free, glamorous life of pro golfer Reed Stewart. One tiny post on the Internet. 

Then again, it’s not like Reed’s been winning many tournaments lately, and his uncle isn’t the only one who says it’s because of the unfinished business he left behind back home in Bloomville, Indiana—namely Reed’s father, the Honorable Judge Richard P. Stewart, and the only girl Reed ever loved, Becky Flowers.

But Reed hasn’t spoken to either his father or Becky in over a decade. 

Until that post on the Internet. Suddenly, Reed’s family has become a national laughingstock, his publicist won’t stop calling, his siblings are begging for help, and Reed realizes he has no other choice: He’s got to go home to face his past . . . the Judge and the girl he left behind.

Becky’s worked hard to build her successful senior relocation business, but she’s worked even harder to forget Reed Stewart ever existed—which hasn’t been easy, considering he’s their hometown’s golden boy, and all anyone ever talks about. It was fine while they were thousands of miles apart, but now he’s back in Bloomville. She has absolutely no intention of seeing him—until his family hires her to help save his parents.

Now Reed and Becky can’t avoid one another…or the memories of that one fateful night.

Can the quirky residents of Bloomville bring these two young people back together, or will Reed and Becky continue to allow their pasts to deny them the future they deserve?

First Impressions

Meg Cabot is one of my favorite authors, so when I found out that she was adding another book to the Boy series, I was beyond excited. Two series extensions from Cabot in one year? I couldn’t wait. As these books are written in emails and letters and so forth, I was curious how that would change in the current time.

What I thought

This book was almost as cute as the others!

Becky lives in her hometown and works at the family business. Reed is a pro-golfer who lives in LA. Neither of them have talked since their prom night 10 years ago. When Reed’s parents start having money troubles, his family finally convinces him to come home and help out.

I enjoyed the family aspect of the novel. Reed’s sister-in-law was probably one of my favorite characters with all of her meddling. I liked seeing the family come back together and Reed dealing with his parents. What I didn’t like as much was the romance between Becky and Reed. Something about it just didn’t click for me. I think my biggest issue with it was there wasn’t a lot of buildup. Reed came back and instantly he and Becky were in love again.

I liked their banter and I think I felt on his end some of the pining which made me understand how he was immediately in love with her again. He had never had a serious girlfriend in the past ten years. Becky on the other hand is currently in a (seemingly) serious relationship when Reed comes back to town. As soon as she sees him again it’s like the other guy ceases to exist. I tend to dislike storylines like that because I can’t personally relate to/understand how that can happen.

Cabot manages the email/text communication really well and it makes for an easy read. There were a few journal entries from Becky and I do wish there had been more of that. I feel like if there had been then maybe I would have connected with her a little more. We get a lot more insight from Reed’s side of the family which maybe allowed for more understanding of his feelings for Becky.

I vaguely remember that some of the other books connected through various characters, but since I haven’t read them in a while, I couldn’t remember if this story connected too. I would be curious to read this one again after re-reading the others.

I know this was a short review, but I don’t have much to say about it. It’s a cute but predictable story that was a fun read. It has the same feeling as the previous books in the series and was enjoyable. I would probably re-read it again in succession with  the other novels in the series, but I don’t think I’d purchase it. It’s a cute book and maybe I have high standards for Cabot. I did really like it, but it wasn’t one of my favorites. If you like cute fiction with a bit of romance, I would highly recommend checking out this book as well as the previous ones.

Winter Solstice

By: Elin Hiderbrand
Published Year: 2017
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Pages: 262

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Raise one last glass with the Quinn Family at the Winter Street Inn. 

It's been too long since the entire Quinn family has been able to celebrate the holidays under the same roof, but that's about to change. With Bart back safe and sound from Afghanistan, the Quinns are preparing for a holiday more joyous than any they've experienced in years. And Bart's safe return isn't the family's only good news: Kevin is enjoying married life with Isabelle; Patrick is getting back on his feet after paying his debt to society; Ava thinks she's finally found the love of her life; and Kelly is thrilled to see his family reunited at last. But it just wouldn't be a Quinn family gathering if things went smoothly.

First Impressions

This is book 4 in the Winter series, so I was super excited (and surprised) when I saw this cover. I honestly thought that the series was going to be over after book three, so book four was a bit of a pleasant surprise. It’s a cute cover that would’ve caught my eye, but the first two are still my favoties.

What I thought

As a warning, this is the 4th book in this series. There will be spoilers, as it’s a bit difficult to review this book without any.

As with the previous books, this one picks up a year after the last one left off. Bart has been found and is back home, Ava is in New York with her new boyfriend, Kevin and Isabelle are married with a second baby, Patrick and Jennifer are still maneuvering life after jail and addiction, and Kelley is dying of brain cancer.

It was the first of the novels to have everyone in the Quinn family home. I also believe that it was the earliest starting novel of the series. Winter Solstice starts right before Halloween and actually ends on Christmas day. The story centers around Bart, Kelley, Ava, and Jennifer most of the time. We do get a check-in with Mitzi and Margaret as well, but Kevin is pretty non-existent, along with Patrick.

Ava is in New York with her new boyfriend and is on the edge of realize whether or not he is the one she wants to be with for the rest of her life. Bart is home and struggling with being a civilian again. He also has a severe case of survivors guilt. Mitzi is, obviously, dealing with Kelley’s cancer, and Kelley has some chapters from his perspective which was heart warming.

There’s also a character new to this series, Eddie Pancik, who is apparently from another of Hilderbrand’s novels, The Rumor. I haven’t read that book, so it’s a bit confusing to begin with when this new character with an already established background is thrown in, but I think Hilderbrand does a decent job of making it understandable without having read The Rumor.

I think the biggest question is whether or not a fourth book was necessary. I did like having more time with the Quinn family and finding out what had happened in their lives. I liked watching Bart and Jennifer tackle their demons. However, I liked not knowing exactly what happened with Kelley, but I think that’s just because it’s a heartbreaker.

If you are a fan of the series, I’d definitely recommend checking it out. This is not a series that will make sense if you read them out of order. There’s a lot that happens from year to year and the stories build on that and the relationships. It’s not as Christmas-y as the previous ones, as it ends on Christmas day, but it’s a good book to read in the months leading up to Christmas to help you get in the mood.

Close Enough to Touch

By: Colleen Oakley
Published Year: 2017
Publisher: Gallery Books
Pages: 336

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): One time a boy kissed me and I almost died... 

And so begins the story of Jubilee Jenkins, a young woman with a rare and debilitating medical condition: she’s allergic to other humans. After a humiliating near-death experience in high school, Jubilee has become a recluse, living the past nine years in the confines of the small town New Jersey house her unaffectionate mother left to her when she ran off with a Long Island businessman. But now, her mother is dead, and without her financial support, Jubilee is forced to leave home and face the world—and the people in it—that she’s been hiding from.

One of those people is Eric Keegan, a man who just moved into town for work. With a daughter from his failed marriage who is no longer speaking to him, and a brilliant, if psychologically troubled, adopted son, Eric’s struggling to figure out how his life got so off-course, and how to be the dad—and man—he wants so desperately to be. Then, one day, he meets a mysterious woman named Jubilee, with a unique condition...

First Impressions

Colleen Oakley’s debut novel, Before I Go, was one of my favorite books of 2015. It immediately became one of my favorite books permanently and I have recommended it to so many people. When I found out that Oakley was coming out with another book, it got added to my to-read list before I even read the synopsis. Once I read the synopsis, I was a bit nervous because it sounded similar to Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon which I loved, but I was really excited to check this one out anyway.

What I thought

Jubilee is allergic to people. If her skin comes into contact with another human’s skin she will break out into a terrible rash, and may even go into anaphylactic shock. She also has not left her home in 9 years, and only has occasional contact with her mother over the phone. When her mom dies, she realizes that she has to start her life.

Jubilee is a unique character, and not only because of her allergy. She is also agoraphobic and has a lot of anxiety issues. I haven’t read many (if any) books with main characters who have this level of anxiety. It was also interesting to think about how she has not been able to feel someone’s touch since she was 6 years old, and she is now 27. I think that in that aspect, this book could be an interesting book club choice with a lot of interesting discussion points.

This story is also told in alternating view points with the other chapters being Eric’s story. Eric is a young man who is recently divorced and has two children, one who is adopted and the other who is his biological child. I liked Eric’s story and I liked how his and Jubliee’s relationship developed, but I looking back on his story it feels as though a lot was left unresolved. Eric has moved to Lincoln for 6 months on a temporary job assignment with his adopted son Aja. This is where he meets Jubilee. However, Eric’s problems involve his 14 year old daughter not talking to him and Aja dealing with the death of his parents (2 years ago). It just didn’t seem like we got any resolution on Aja and the difficulties he was having or even the relationship between Eric and his daughter. I think with the amount of storyline that Oakley gave him, Eric needed his own book.

While the allergy storyline was interesting, I wasn’t crazy about the ending or how it was used. It got to be a bit boring at times because it seemed as though Jubilee’s issue was the fact that she couldn’t touch people and that was it. Once she was able to get out of her house (relatively easily looking back on it) a lot of her other issues went by the wayside. I wish she could’ve had more development with her other problems, such as dealing with her mother’s parenting and her death as well as dealing with the fact that she never had a father.

I will say that Oakely did a great job overall with building relationships. I think that the relationships in this book are what held it together for me. I loved seeing all of the characters interact and that’s what I kept coming back for. I think that it just needed to either be more simplified, with the characters having less issues to deal with, or more complex, with Oakley having the characters deal with all of the issues she dealt them.

Overall, I feel lukewarm about this book. I liked a lot of it and found it interesting, but there were a lot of holes. I wanted more from both of their storylines and the ending seemed a bit abrupt. There was also a relationship plot point in the epilogue that seemed so unnecessary and just ended up irritating me. I would recommend that you check this out if you like stories in which the characters who have unique problems to deal with and if you like books that have good relationship building. I am still a fan of Oakely’s, but this book was a bit of a miss for me.

This Adventure Ends

By: Emma Mills
Published Year: 2016
Publisher: Henry Holt & Co
Pages: 320

Amazon Barnes & Noble

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Sloane isn't expecting to fall in with a group of friends when she moves from New York to Florida—especially not a group of friends so intense, so in love, so all-consuming. Yet that's exactly what happens.

Sloane becomes closest to Vera, a social-media star who lights up any room, and Gabe, Vera's twin brother and the most serious person Sloane's ever met. When a beloved painting by the twins' late mother goes missing, Sloane takes on the responsibility of tracking it down, a journey that takes her across state lines—and ever deeper into the twins' lives.

Filled with intense and important friendships, a wonderful warts-and-all family, shiveringly good romantic developments, and sharp, witty dialogue, this story is about finding the people you never knew you needed.

First Impressions

I was very excited that Emma Mills came out with another book as I really liked her debut, First & Then. The blue cover caught my eye as it’s one of my favorite colors. The summary, however, not so much. It appealed to me enough to add it to my TBR, but it landed there and I forgot about it.

What I thought

I’m so glad that I added this book to my library pickup list without re-reading the summary. I did re-read it when I got home, but even though I wasn’t crazy about it, it was in my house so I started reading it anyway. This book was so wonderful. It was a keep me up past my bedtime book, which I haven’t had in quite a while.

Sloane is a senior in high school when her family moves from New York to Florida. She didn’t have any connection to New York, so she welcomes the move. While reluctant to open up to people, she finds herself thrown into a group of friends, closer than she ever expected.

If you like friendship stories, this book is for you. It is one of the best friendship stories I have read in a while. Also, Sloane and her sense of humor is right up my alley. She has a great dry humor that just left me constantly giggling and smiling throughout the book. While maybe not completely realistic, I enjoyed it so much it didn’t matter to me.

Sloan is a good person, and that is obvious from the very first moments of the story when she stands up to a bully for Gabe. This sparks an immediate friendship with her and Gabe’s twin sister Vera. Along with Gabe and Vera comes Aubrey and Remy, who have been friends with Gabe and Vera for practically forever.

The summary makes the hunt for the painting by Gabe and Vera’s late mother seem like a much more significant part of the story. It’s definitely a part of it, but it’s pretty minor. It’s a good way to develop Remy and Sloane’s relationship, and it definitely allows for some conflict and revelations later on in the story, but it isn’t centered around that. When I read the summary, it sounded like it was going to be a book that was all about the hunt for the painting, but it isn’t.

I also loved Sloane’s dad. He’s essentially Nicholas Sparks but stuck in a rut. He writes tragic romances where someone usually dies and is the reason why the family moved to Florida. He has a similar sense of humor to Sloane which makes for some great banter. While there is a little bit of tragedy in this story, it’s nothing like one of his books which was a relief. Every dramatic plot point was realistic which I greatly appreciated.

Like I said, if you’re looking for a great friendship story, this is the one for you. I loved being a part of their budding friendship and loved Slone’s personality. She is strong and relatively confident in herself, minus typical teenage woes, which was a delight to read. I can’t recommend this book enough and it makes me look forward to Mills’ next book even more!