Jessica PenningtonRecensioni

The review will be divided into two parts, the first half of the book and the second
The First Half
Um wow. I loved it. The humor was spot on and I couldn't help but laugh. Sid and Ash pulled some phenomenal pranks on each other and it was great.
The Second Half
Around the 44% mark, this book started turning into a romance. There were not really any pranks pulled, and the ones that were pulled were hardly mentioned. There was no humor and I did not enjoy reading it. I did not finish this book, choosing instead to quit at 80%.
Another Additional Note
Sid and Ash are both going to swim in college, yet they did not practice much over the summer. I find that highly unlikely just based off of how much swim kids at my high school practice.
All and all, this book was not my favorite and I will not be reading more by Pennington.

Rating: 2 Stars
Content: Cannot receive a rating due to the fact that I DNF.

*I received a complimentary copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are my own and a positive review was not required.

* I got this book for review from the publisher for my honest thoughts*

I did really enjoy the setting and the concept of this read. I thought this explored a realtionship that I have not often seen in YA literature. I really enjoyed the love to hate elements of the story. I really liked the setting that we saw in previous books in this series. I struggled a bit with the pacing of this book and the tension was not as "intense" or captivating as I wanted it to be. But it was super fun read and I would def read more by the author in the future.

* I got this book for review for my honest thoughts*
I really enjoyed this book.I liked how Jessica books focused on different forms of art and I loved how this book focused on art and also finding new passions in life and also focused on kids dealing with so many changes in their life. I really loved the duel POV in this novel and was equally invested in both storylines. I also really liked the romance as well. I really had a hard time putting this book done and really enjoyed it. This book was such a fun read and can't wait to read more by this author in the future.

* I got this book for review*
I you are 90's kid and grew up with shows like O-town and etc. I think this book was so much fun. I loved the both the music aspects of this novel and how it was framed around a music reality t.v show like making the band. I also really liked the story of rekindled love and also how we got both characters sides of the story and also duel timelines both current and past. This novel was a lot like onion you kept getting more info throughout the novel and that kept me engaged and it was hard to put this book down. I found this to be the prefect summer read!

* I got this book for review from the publisher for my honest thoughts*

I did really enjoy the setting and the concept of this read. I thought this explored a realtionship that I have not often seen in YA literature. I really enjoyed the love to hate elements of the story. I really liked the setting that we saw in previous books in this series. I struggled a bit with the pacing of this book and the tension was not as "intense" or captivating as I wanted it to be. But it was super fun read and I would def read more by the author in the future.

* I got this book for review for my honest thoughts*
I really enjoyed this book.I liked how Jessica books focused on different forms of art and I loved how this book focused on art and also finding new passions in life and also focused on kids dealing with so many changes in their life. I really loved the duel POV in this novel and was equally invested in both storylines. I also really liked the romance as well. I really had a hard time putting this book done and really enjoyed it. This book was such a fun read and can't wait to read more by this author in the future.

* I got this book for review*
I you are 90's kid and grew up with shows like O-town and etc. I think this book was so much fun. I loved the both the music aspects of this novel and how it was framed around a music reality t.v show like making the band. I also really liked the story of rekindled love and also how we got both characters sides of the story and also duel timelines both current and past. This novel was a lot like onion you kept getting more info throughout the novel and that kept me engaged and it was hard to put this book down. I found this to be the prefect summer read!

It started really well and I thought the dynamics between Sydney and Asher were going to make this quite a funny read. And it was. However, it could have done with a nip and tuck to cut away some of the unnecessary parts. It would have made the story more entertaining because there wouldn't have been the lulls that I ended up speed reading my way through. Witty banter and funny shenanigans.

It's hard getting on board a romance between two people who treat each other so badly, especially when they have very few actual conversations about why they "hate" each other. Pennington hints that those conversations will happen, and have happened, but in almost every instance, she side-steps showing us the conversations, themselves, in favor of giving us a flashback to the summer when Asher and Sidney were kind to one another. Instead of watching current-day Asher and Sidney connect, I'm told that they used to get along and now suddenly get along again.

The secondary characters are just as undeveloped as the romance, with the parents serving as motivation for Asher and Sidney to be nice to one another, Sidney's girlfriends appearing whenever she needs advice on her relationship (more conversations we're told happen but don't actually get to read), and Asher's BFF acting more as proof of Asher's years-long crush on Sidney than a BFF. The end result is a feeling that Asher and Sidney exist in a bubble untouched by the real world...and that their love is just as Doomed as Sidney thinks it is.

That might be a bit of a spoiler, but anyone who's watched Hallmark Christmas movies knows that someone in the relationship will freak out at the eleventh hour and Ruin Everything. Pennington doesn't present anything different here...and you don't have to know Sidney for more than 50 pages before you know she's the one who'll be doing the Ruining. Unfortunately, that last-minute relationship sabotage coincides with the end of the summer, whereupon the book loses almost all its momentum. By the time Sidney attempted her Grand Gesture to Fix It All, I was a lot more invested in getting to the end of the book than the relationship it depicted.

Reality TV? Rock band contest? Count me in.
See my full review here: https://www.instagram.com/p/BumDpWVnrPn/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet

This is the perfect summer romance to read!½

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. My thoughts and opinions are my own. Any quotes I use are from an unpublished copy and may not reflect the finished product.

“Sometimes you don't know what you want until you just do. It hits you like a wave, knocks you underwater, and when you surface, all you want is this one thing. It's like gasping for air.”

I don't know why it took me so long to start Love Songs & Other Lies, but I really enjoyed it! I ended up borrowing the audiobook from Hoopla (my new favorite way to listen to books), and thought Dan Bittner and Laurel Schroeder did a wonderful job narrating. I immediately fell in love with Vee and Cam, and liked how the author alternated between Then and Now to tell their story.

If you know me, you know I really hate it when a book's main conflict is a secret. I completely understood why Cam didn't want to talk about his past, but once he and Vee reached a certain point in their relationship (sleepovers and the L word), he should have come clean about his history. He lied to everyone, so it wasn't like the secret was solely kept from Vee, but it was still something he was willing to lose her over. The pain of his loss eclipsed everything else.

One of my favorite parts of the book was when Vee's mother explained what happened between her and Vee's father. Vee had always assumed the worst, but the truth made her realize something about her own relationship with Cam. I also really liked the musical elements, and the songs Cam and Vee wrote for themselves and each other. They had entire conversations within their lyrics.

The relationship between Cam and Vee starts slow and stays pretty steady. There are no hot and heavy moments, but they have a sweet and endearing romance. Cam tries to help Vee come out of her shell (when it comes to performing in front of others), and Vee gives him the space he needs to breathe. She knew he had secrets, and that there were things he repeatedly avoided talking about, but she never pushed him to share more than he wanted to (even when it was super obvious things didn't add up). I appreciated how mature their teenage romance was, and that two level-headed lovebirds made it work despite the holes and misinformation.

I also liked Logan and the rest of the band, but we don't see too much of them outside of performances and rehearsals. Vee elaborates on how she and Logan became friends (would love for Logan to get his own story), and there are other interactions with people, but the focus was on Cam and Vee. Alternating between the past and the present didn't leave a lot of time for secondary character development, since it's mostly about how the two of them met, what happened between them, and how they're currently dealing with their unexpected circumstances and close proximity.

Love Songs & Other Lies was a wonderful story about love (new and rekindled), unimaginable loss, and how relationships ebb and flow over time. It was really lovely, and I'm definitely looking forward to reading more books by this author! (★★★★☆)

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This story exemplifies the adage 'My mind is a dangerous neighborhood. I should never go there alone.' The first summer Sidney and Asher met when their parents rented two lakeside camps adjacent to each other, both of them felt something spark. Unfortunately, Sidney's constant need to plan out everything and overthink the potential results went into screaming overdrive when she saw something that changed how she interacted with Asher. While their common bond is competitive swimming and they'll be at the same college next year, the intervening summers have become a 'seldom out in the open' war of pranks that culminate in one that results in both families being evicted and scrambling to find places to stay for the rest of the summer.
What follows is like watching two young people leaning out to grab the brass ring, but dropping it each time they think they've finally succeeded. It's painful, sometimes funny, and very well laid out. Teens of both sexes with insecurity and/or obsessive thought issues will relate. A very satisfying book.

The plot was creative, but I did't love the characters. Also the book took me a little while to get into because there were a lot of characters introduced at the beginning. With the alternating first person POV switching every page or two between past and present I sometimes found myself having to flip back to the chapter start to remind myself if I was in Vee's or Cam's POV. However by the time I got about 2/3 of the way through, I had a much tougher time putting the book down as the two main characters finally began to grow on me in, and I enjoyed the ending.

I received an ARC of this book for free as part of a Storygram book tour.

When I first started this book, I just thought it would be your typical YA summer romance book. Something generic and cliched. But it ended up exceeding my expectations and being so much more.

This book was so damn cute. Aiden and Olivia had such a cute relationship. Like that is the teen summer romance that I have always wanted. They were so good together and brought out the best in each other. They complemented each other so well. And Aiden in general is just amazing. Like he’s total boyfriend goals.

I also enjoyed the writing style. It was easy and effortless and the POV changes were done very well. Because of this, reading this book was a breeze. I flew through it.

I loved that this book dealt with a teenager with vision loss. That’s something that I haven’t come across in a YA book before so it was nice to see that representation.

The only critique I have is that I wanted a little bit more closure in the epilogue. It was short and only from Aiden’s perspective. There was something in Olivia’s life that I had wanted to see how it played out.

Overall, if you’re looking for a cute YA romance to read for the summer, definitely pick up this book!½

Virginia (Vee) Miller is looking forward to her summer on the road with her high school rock band friends, now known as Your Future X. What she doesn't know when she decides to join their tour is that her ex will be there; and those wounds definitely haven't healed yet. Now, Vee and Cam are forced to work through the problems that ended their relationship while the entire world is watching.

The structure of this novel is absolutely what works the best. Told in a then/now format, Pennington slowly reveals the beginnings of Vee and Cam's relationship, switching back to now to create even more intrigue. It made the plot more interesting, making the reader desperate to get to the end to figure out what put an end to what seemed like an incredibly compatible relationship. What may have been a predictable plot in a more straightforward novel becomes more interesting with this structure.

Having two points of view also helps in giving the reader a fuller picture of the relationship; if we got only Cam's or only Vee's point of view, we would be likely to be biased toward one or the other. The inclusion of both their voices makes the reader feel empathy for both sides of the relationship. They both have reasons for doing what they do.

With a cast of extremely relatable characters and an immersive plot structure, fans of summer romance and rock bands will find a home in Pennington's story.

Love Songs & Other Lies by Jessica Pennington was a very deep, emotional and raw account of young love and adult circumstances. Going into this book, I expected a nice, quick and laid back easy read with the typical young adult flirtatious, impulsive and adolescent plot. I realized after the first few chapters that the characters had a lot of substance and the plot intrigued me as much as the characters, I was surprised to find that I couldn't put the book down. While young Virginia tries to put her heartache behind her seeking solice in a warm, carefree, no-holes-barred exciting summer, her hot, young adversary to whom she had sworn off forever is led back in to her life, altering her original excitedment-filled summer plans. Get ready for some emotional turmoil!

https://iwriteinbooks.wordpress.com/2018/06/02/love-songs-other-lies-jesica-penn...

I have read several books, recently, that tackle the harsh world of media-skewed publicity. It’s pretty horrific in some cases and Jessica Pennington’s debut, Love Songs and Other Lies, falls into that box.

In some ways, we’ve turned creativity into a dog-eat-dog war zone which is such a shame but it makes for some really great novel material. The thing I like about this lens on celebrity, however, is the look behind what the tabloids show. It ultimately shows far more heart than we could ever dream to find in pure voyeristic media consumption.

Pennington’s story follows a pack of friends in alternating points on a timeline, as they form musical bonds and then stumble into the world of fame and reality television. The book is told through two sets of alternating eyes: PR intern and former bandmate, Virginia narrated alonsidge new-to-town, accidental rock star, Cam. By piecing together both narratives and both points in time, holes are filled in and the original story framework is fleshed out.

I am finding that I have a strong affinity for mixed voice storytelling, mostly because I am someone who loves to think about things from multiple perspectives. Especially when there is any sort of mystery or scandal involved, this method really makes for a better-told tale and a more empathetically relatable book.

Like most books about bands and music, this one goes much deeper than a few power chords and stage manager production notes. Though the whole thing comes in just under 300 pages, the story is as heavy and powerful as it is small.

As the title indicates, there is much to do about honesty and integrity, laying down the age-old battlefield of loyalty and trust. Again, I love how in-depth this split-point-of-view format allows the story to go, hashing out old friendships, new love, and the ultimate act of self-discovery.

What I thought was going to be a sweet, little light summer read, turned out to be a much more impactful read and I highly recommend it.

I have a thing for contemporaries with music in them. I just always pick them up, and the don’t usually disappoint. I liked Long Songs & Other Lies, but I know it’s going to be a forgettable read for me. While I did really enjoy the Then-Now format and the history it brought to the story, and I always love a good RomCom contemporary, I just didn’t get invested in this. The main problem I had with the story is that my interest started waning and just kept fading the more I read. By the end of the story I didn’t care about it at all anymore and I just finished it because it was so easy to read. This isn’t bad by any means, it just didn’t really do anything for me either.

I received a copy of the book from Tor Teen via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.