Why I read it: Brie from Romance Around the Corner mentioned this one to me on Twitter when we were talking about some New Adult books we were loving. She wanted to get hold of the book but as the author is Australian, it was geo restricted for her. as an ebook and at the time, not available in print either. Myself, I ended up waiting for the UK publication as it was less than half the price to buy it from The Book Depository than to get it here - even in an ebook version. Brie tells me this one is now lined up next in her queue.
What it's about: (from Goodreads) Carly has dropped out
of uni to spend her days surfing and her nights working as a cook in a
Manly café. Surfing is the one thing she loves doing … and the only
thing that helps her stop thinking about what happened two years ago at
schoolies week.
And then Carly meets Ryan, a local at the break, fresh out of jail. When Ryan learns the truth, Carly has to decide. Will she let the past bury her? Or can she let go of her anger and shame, and find the courage to be happy?
And then Carly meets Ryan, a local at the break, fresh out of jail. When Ryan learns the truth, Carly has to decide. Will she let the past bury her? Or can she let go of her anger and shame, and find the courage to be happy?
Warning: If you have rape triggers, this is not a book for you.
What worked for me (and what didn't): This is kind of a hard one for me to grade. On the one hand, I devoured this book in 1 day, staying up way too late to make sure Carly got a happy/hopeful ending. The writing was clean and engaging, even though I probably didn't understand more than half of the surfing language. (It will be interesting to see what Brie thinks of the Australianisms in the book - there's a lot of "mate" and other Aussie terms. It felt authentic to me even while I was sometimes cringing at the way some of my brethren can be... less than articulate).
