Book Review: Kissing in America by Margo Rabb

Kissing in America
Author: Margo Rabb
Publisher: Penguin Teen Australia

I loved romance because when you opened the first page, you knew the story would end well. Your heart wouldn't be broken. 

I loved that security, that guaranteed love.

In real life, you never knew the ending. I hated that.

Sixteen-year-old Eva has never been in love. But when she meets Will, everything changes. With him, her grief over her father's death fades, and she can escape from her difficult relationship with her mother. then, without warning, Will picks up and moves to California. So Eva- with the help of her best friend, Annie- concocts a plan to travel across the country to see him again. As they leave New York City for the first time and road-trip across America, they encounter cowboys, kudzu, and tiny towns without stoplights. Along the way, Eva and Annie learn the truth about love and all its complexities.

My Review

Thoughts on the book: I was lucky enough to receive an Advanced Readers Copy (ARC) of Kissing in America from Penguin Teen Australia. For some reason I had it sit on my TBR bookshelf for a couple of months and like normal when I actually picked it up I fell in love with the story and sat there wondering why I let it sit on the shelf for so long.

There are some fantastic issues discussed throughout Kissing in America such as the underlying issues between Eva and her mother, young love and a girls first big 'true' love, betrayal, grief over the loss of Eva's father and her mother basically denying that he ever existed in the first place. All of these issues lead to some very clever writing by the author and a fantastic story that everyone will love.

Everyone will love the main character Eva and a lot of people will properly also be able to identify with her. She loves books, I mean really who doesn't, with romance being her main genre of choice and has just met the boy of her dreams (which is saying a lot because she has very high expectations due to reading about so many perfect gentlemen in her books). Unfortunately for Eva, the boy of her dreams has just moved across the country to live with his dad. Eva believes it's true love and that Will (the perfect boyfriend) and her are meant to be together. So she decides that she desperately need to see will and concocts a plan to get her best friend to enter a tv show called 'The Smartest Girl in America' which coincidently is filmed in California. So begins the girls fantastic road trip across America to chase ever young girls dream, true love where Eva and Annie have many adventures and learn some very hard life lessons.

Favourite quote/part:

I think sometimes the biggest influence  isn't what's present in your life, but what's absent.

Rating: 5/5