Thank you, Next by Sophie Ranald (from Netgalley)

 My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

We all have been in a situation when we were fantasizing about the person we were about to meet, and we made up stories in our head... and we all wished the ground to swallow us and make us disappear, in the moment we saw our potential date. Because deep down we immediately knew this is never going to work with him, so the whole date gets awkward and terrible. 

Zoë is one of us, who goes through all of this. I really loved the style of the book, it is an easy read and humorous. You feel like you are sitting with Zoë in a pub and just girl-chatting and gossiping about the terrible dates you have been through. I laughed out loud many times while reading her story.

I definitely recommend this book if you like romance based novels with a lot of humor in it. If you had some terrible dates, downloaded a dating app or received (unasked) pictures you will definitely find your soul sister in Zoë.   

Even though it is a funny story and an easy read, it also covers topics such as emotional and physical abuse. Shows how difficult a break-up can be and how you can become a victim of blackmailing.

It was my first book from Sophie Ranald, but definitely not my last. 

Finding Cinderella by Colleen Hoover (Hopeless series #3)

 My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

“I think if a person is really, truly in love then it has to be unconditional.” ― Colleen Hoover, Finding Cinderella

Finding Cinderella is about Daniel (Holder's best friend) and Six (Sky's best friend). Even though we are both familiar with them already from the first two books, they finally get their own little story in a separate book. The story written in a funny tone with lot of romance of course. It is a short book so you can finish it in a day or two. 

You fall in love with Daniel just as much as you fell in love with Holder in the previous books 😊 His character, his jokes and nicknames are just too cute to be ignored. He is searching for his Cinderella, who he met in a dark locker room and had some amazing moment with that unknown girl. After a while (after Six returns from Italy from the student exchange program) they meet again in Sky's room, but of course they don't know who the other person is. Anyways the chemistry works magically between them and they fall in love with each other immediately. The cute and sweet teenage love makes you smile through the whole book. When Daniel finally figures out that his lost Cinderella is actually Six, she reacts unexpectedly. Instead of getting excited and happy about finding each other she bursts out crying. Around the end of the book Six finally reveals her secret: she got pregnant from Daniel in the locker room before she went to Italy. In Italy she gave birth to a baby boy and put him up on adoption. Daniel needs a bit of time to deal with the news, but in the end everything turns out just fine. Also they learn about Sky's adoption story and the book (the whole series) ends with all four of them making a pinky promise, that all these secrets will stay between them.

Even though I was suspecting since the beginning that Six will be Cinderella, the end of the book (the pregnancy) really made me surprise. And this is what Colleen Hoover is so good in (one of many of her talents): putting twists in a book and just surprise you with these unexpected events. The book was a bit lighter read after the first 2 book of the series, since there she describes more serious topics. This part of the series takes you back into your teenage years and teenage loves and all the craziness around it.

“That’s exactly what this feels like. Like she’s a drug I’ve become immediately addicted to but I have none in supply.” ― Colleen Hoover, Finding Cinderella

Losing Hope by Colleen Hoover (Hopeless series #2)

 My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

“You were always there, you know. Even when I couldn’t remember . . . you were always there” - Colleen Hoover, Losing Hope 

We could say Losing Hope is like an extra part of Hopeless. The book is written from Holder's perspective. It is a necessary part to understand the book Hopeless even better. 

We get answers to many questions: 1. While Holder hates Less's ex-boyfriend, 2. What did he went through when Sky was kidnapped 3. How did he feel about her sister's death etc.

The book is beautifully written, and we fall in love with Holder's character even more. The true love he felt for her twin-sister Less and the true love he feels for Sky (Hope) is simply gorgeous. In the book he is writing letters to his deceased twin-sister and in these letters he explains his feelings even more detailly. We see his inner struggle and that he never gave up on finding Hope. 

The reason why I gave only 4-star rating to this book is that since I immediately continued to read it after I finished Hopeless, I pretty much remembered every detail from the first book. This way I had a feeling of re-reading. Of course there were some extra parts and another point of view of the story - which were necessary to understand the plot better - but mostly the things were repeating, even though another words were used. 

“I can't explain to you how perfect this girl is. And when I say perfect, I mean imperfect, because there's just too much wrong with her. But everything wrong with her is everything that draws me in and makes her perfect.” ― Colleen Hoover, Losing Hope

Hopeless by Colleen Hoover (Hopeless series #1)

My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

“The sky is always beautiful. Even when it's dark or rainy or cloudy, it's still beautiful to look at....it'll be there no matter what...and I know it'll always be beautiful.” ― Colleen Hoover, Hopeless

The story is about Sky, a teenage girl, who just starts public school. She was a private student until now. When she was 5 years old she was adopted by her non-biological mother, Karen. Her life seems quite normal until she meets Dean Holder. 

And who is Dean Holder? The boy whose sister just committed suicide and has a bad reputation. The so called bad boy at the school. But slowly we learn that Holder is one of the kindest souls who went through a lot in his life. First he lost his childhood friend, Hope, and then her twin-sister, Less.

As Sky and Holder falls in love the story also gets deeper. Holder can not ignore the facts, that Hope and Sky look so alike. He manages to put the pieces together and finds out that his lost childhood friend, Hope, is in fact Sky. But how should he tell this to Sky without ruining her life?

Sky recognizes Holder's childhood house on a picture and slowly starts to remember pieces from her childhood before the adoption. As she realizes that Karen actually abducted her from his dad she gets on the road with Holder to find her real home. 

When they arrive to Sky's childhood place the worst memories come forward too. Sky was abused by her father who started to drink after Sky's mom died. During the confrontation of her dad, he admits that he also abused his own sister (who we find out is Karen), and Less (yes, Holder's sister). As he can not bear the guilt anymore he shots himself and dies.

Karen admits that she only kidnapped Sky because she saw that he also abused her. She changed her name and did not let her use any electronical device (phone, TV, internet), so Sky never finds out the truth. She only did all this to protect Sky. In the end of the book Sky returns back to Karen and is deeply in love with Holder. 

📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚📚

At the part when Holder got so excited/scared about finding Sky/Hope, and falling in love with her but also hiding something, at first I thought that they might be siblings. So that's why Holder started to avoid Sky and tried to fight his feelings for her. When I realized that Sky was only his childhood friend and neighbor I got relieved that their romance can continue 😅 

I truly loved the book (well, how can you not love CoHo anyways 😉). Again it describes stories and situations which are hard to talk about, but unfortunately they happen in real life. Abuse, child abuse, kidnapping, suicide, bullying - they are all real and they are all hiding in that dark corner of the room. It takes a true talent to bring these difficult topics into books which are also uplifting and romantic. 

"You can't get mad at a real ending. Some of them are ugly." - Colleen Hoover