Megan Harper is the girl before. All her exes find their one true love right after dating her. It’s not a curse or anything, it’s just the way things are, and Megan refuses to waste time feeling sorry for herself. Instead, she focuses on pursuing her next fling, directing theatre, and fulfilling her dream school’s acting requirement in the smallest role possible.
GENRE:
Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance
PAGES:
352 pages
PART OF A SERIES?:
Standalone
RELEASE DATE:
May 22nd, 2018
YOU CAN FIND THE BOOK AT:
iBooks
GOODREADS SUMMARY:
Megan Harper is the girl before. All her exes find their one true love right after dating her. It’s not a curse or anything, it’s just the way things are, and Megan refuses to waste time feeling sorry for herself. Instead, she focuses on pursuing her next fling, directing theatre, and fulfilling her dream school’s acting requirement in the smallest role possible.
But her plans quickly crumble when she’s cast as none other than Juliet–yes, that Juliet–in her high school’s production. It’s a nightmare. No–a disaster. Megan’s not an actress and she’s certainly not a Juliet. Then she meets Owen Okita, an aspiring playwright who agrees to help Megan catch the eye of a sexy stagehand in exchange for help writing his new script.
Between rehearsals and contending with her divided family, Megan begins to notice Owen–thoughtful, unconventional, and utterly unlike her exes, and wonders: shouldn’t a girl get to play the lead in her own love story?
MY REVIEW
Please be advised that while I try to keep my reviews as spoiler free as possible, it is almost nearly impossible to do so. This is your warning to perhaps avoid the review until you’ve read the book!
It was purely by chance and luck that I came across this book. I probably would have heard of it eventually but I met Austin and Emily at an Epic Reads event a couple months ago and someone mentioned their book and its been on my radar since. I’m not a Shakespeare fan; besides Midsummer Nights Dream, I honestly can do without but this book sounded so wonderful and Austin and Emily are honestly the sweetest, kindest people I’ve met through the book community and I’m not just saying that. Plus the fact that they’re a SUPER cute couple and wrote the book together makes it even better.
The book definitely stood up to the self made hype.
I honestly at first did not like Megan at first and I could not figure out why. I was just so frustrated with her. I was expecting to feel real sympathetic with her; how frustrating would it be to be the “girl before the actual girl” over and over and over again. Then it hit me. Megan is the me right after I got out of my seven year relationship nearly four years ago. The random hooks up, the nonchalant attitude when it comes to guys, her entire attitude is the attitude that I had for quite a few years before I started dating my best-friend-turned-boyfriend and I think sometimes its very hard to see the not always so good parts of yourself in a character. It really makes you face your own issues head on and I think that’s what made me so uncomfortable! But don’t get me wrong, this is definitely NOT a bad thing; I genuinely loved that it made me feel that way. It is nice to connect with a character because they remind you of the good things about yourself but I think there’s something even more special about connecting with the not so good.
I really loved the idea of Megan falling for Owen slowly. They start as friends, genuine friends, and that friendship brings a closeness and that closeness is what leads them to have the beautiful relationship. I’m a sucker for a best friend turned relationship story because that’s exactly what happened with me and my boyfriend – we got together as a couple seven years after we met and I think being friends first is the perfect way to go and so seeing stories like Megan and Owen, which has a slow build, makes me so happy.
I also really loved the addition of Shakespeare in there. They interweave that story with the production of doing Romeo and Juliet with the story of Megan and the boys in her life really makes me like Shakespeare a lot more. I don’t mind the stories; the language just always gets me and I think interweaving Romeo and Juliet with this story was done so well and it was beautiful and I liked the idea of exploring a lesser known character like Rosaline. Yyou can definitely see the authors’ love for Shakespeare and a book is only better when you can feel that love and passion for something.
All in all, I think this is an incredibly strong debut and I think its definitely an insta-buy when it releases later this month. Its going to do so well, and if you’re a big contemporary fan, Jenny Han, Sarah Dessen, Morgan Matson and so on, you are definitely going to enjoy this book as well. I can’t wait to see what else these authors bring to the table; I’m sure we will see more great books to come.
RATING:
5 out of 5 Stars
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