REVIEW; Across The Hall, by N.M. Facile

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Genre: Young Adult, Romance

Recommend: Not really

Standalone

SPOILERS 

Summary:

Sylvia had her heart broken when Quinn ended their relationship together before heading to college. 4 years later, Sylvia is still hurting but trying to move on with her life. But when Quinn moves to the same university, and is living across the hall, Sylvia has to struggle with battling her old feelings. Meanwhile, she is trying to move on with bad boy Beau, but she soon realises she got more than she bargained for by dating him. 

My Thoughts:

Sylvia: I tried really hard to like her as the main character, but I failed. I found her to be insecure, dramatic and rather boring. Her relationship ended four years ago and she's still suffering like it was 4 weeks. Yes, he may have been the love of her life, but I doubt she has reason to still be so wrapped up in Quinn, especially as there was no contact between them to keep her hopes up. She is also extremely shallow; introduces the reader to her friends by describing them physically and on their looks alone, as if their personalities were irrelevant. I really don't understand why she stays with Beau for so long either, when dating him was such a chore for her to begin with. She needed to grow a damn backbone. 

Quinn: the chapters in this changed POV between Quinn and Sylvia. I usually like this in this a novel as it allows the author to both give snippets away to the reader, and also deliver the story from two different personalities. But in this it didn't work. Quinn was to female minded. None of his inner dialogue was from a realistic male perspective. He was so cringe and yet meant to be a gorgeous hot guy with great confidence but yet came across as unsure and insecure. 

Friends: The secondary characters in a story are always important for me. But in this, they were all insufferable. To be blunt, they were shit and cliché. They were all coupled off in serious relationships and everything was just too perfect. Kai is the typical quirky little Asian and Kerrington is a tall perfect blonde. They also believe being a good friend is acting like Quinn was a murder when he showed up. Give the guy a break!? Alright he broke her heart so take her side, but there's no reason to treat him so horribly before even getting to know him! 

Writing: This was way too descriptive in showing but then also telling, there was nothing left for the reader to put together. In the end, there was so much internal monologue that I had to skip loads to just get on with the actual story. It opens with an info dump load of who Sylvia is, her past, her friends, what she does, her friends' boyfriends etc. Slow. It. Down. 

Ending: it's nicely delivered so we slowly discover they're grandparents and all that they achieved in their life together. But again - huge information overload to which child belongs to who. We didn't need to know about Kai and Kerrie's children and grandchildren - it wasn't their story. I felt it was all too cliché in the end - especially with the accidental pregnancy drama. 

Overall:

I wouldn't really recommend this. It's an ok story but both main characters are highly unlikeable. Everything was too immature and there was nothing left for the reader to piece together. 

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