Review: Biggest Flirts

Biggest Flirts by Jennifer Echols
Series: Superlatives #1
Genres: Contemporary, Young Adult
Published by Simon and Schuster on May 20th 2014
Also by this author: Perfect Couple, Most Likely to Succeed
Format: Hardcover (336 pages) • Source: Library
Goodreads • Amazon • Barnes & Noble

Tia and Will’s lives get flipped upside down when they’re voted Yearbook’s Biggest Flirts in this sassy novel from the author of Endless Summer and The One That I Want.Tia just wants to have fun. She’s worked hard to earn her reputation as the life of the party, and she’s ready for a carefree senior year of hanging out with friends and hooking up with cute boys. And her first order of business? New guy Will. She can’t get enough of his Midwestern accent and laidback swagger. As the sparks start to fly, Will wants to get serious. Tia’s seen how caring too much has left her sisters heartbroken, and she isn’t interested in commitment. But pushing Will away drives him into the arms of another girl. Tia tells herself it’s no big deal…until the yearbook elections are announced. Getting voted Biggest Flirts with Will is, well, awkward. They may just be friends, but their chemistry is beginning to jeopardize Will’s new relationship—and causing Tia to reconsider her true feelings. What started as a lighthearted fling is about to get very complicated…

What Worked

• I liked that Tia, our main character, wasn’t afraid to be herself. She would party, have fun, and not worry about what anyone thought of her. I’m not used to main characters that are more sexually experienced or open about hooking up. I prefer that in books and wish I could see it more often.
• I loved Will. As far as love interests go, he was so cute and great. He pretty much kept me going with his book and was the only reason I cared to finish because I wanted to make sure he ended up happy. And I liked his earring.
• I haven’t read any other books by this author, but I give her major props for this series. The Superlatives is such a cute idea! The next books in the companion series feature some of Tia’s best friends, who win other superlatives. Overall I’m excited for the series despite some of the reservations below.
• The ending was really cute. View Spoiler »You get the impression that obviously her and Will are going to be together, but it’s going to take some effort on Tia’s part. I’m glad she came to her senses but obviously you can tell that’s going to happen right off the bat. « Hide Spoiler It was very hopeful and not completely closed off. I like when endings leave something up to the imagination while implying that things are headed in the right direction.

What Didn’t Work

• As great as Tia was in her sex-positive ways, she really annoyed me most of the time. My least favorite book trope is when the main character is emotionally closed-off and refuses to entertain the idea of a serious relationship. Normally it’s because they’ve been hurt in the past; in this case, Tia watched her three sisters run off with terrible guys, and two of them got pregnant and left behind. I understand that could make her leery about relationships, but (a) shouldn’t that prevent her from being sexually active in general, since she could end up pregnant like them? and (b) the love interest in this book wasn’t a deadbeat like her sisters’ boyfriends. The whole thing just didn’t make sense to me. I understand she was avoiding heartbreak, but she certainly wasn’t avoiding pregnancy. Tia was also constantly scheming about things or coming up with weird plans. I just didn’t understand her logic.
• The portrayal of high school was totally unrealistic. The following things just do not happen in any high school I’ve heard of:
  • New guy moves to down and immediately starts looking for a girlfriend right away.
  • Everyone assumes two people are dating solely because they were talking together at a party or go out to lunch together.
  • The minute a couple breaks up, the two people almost immediately have new boyfriend/girlfriend. Like literally the day after.
  • People use the phrase “friends with bennies.” That’s gross. Use the whole word.
• I despised the writing style. I have no idea why. Some parts just confused me, like the author was phrasing things in a weird way that didn’t make sense or was jumping around too much. It’s kind of hard to explain, but it just did not work for me AT ALL.
• Yes, a lot of it was predictable. You can pretty much tell from the beginning that View Spoiler »her and Will are going to end up together after many issues, fights, lies, and miscommunications. When they pretended to be dating to make Angelica jealous, it was painfully obvious that Will was really doing it so that Tia would get a feel for what it was like to date him, so she would want to do it for real. How did Tia not see that coming? For someone portrayed as “a smart girl that doesn’t try,” she didn’t have a lot of common sense on that one. « Hide Spoiler It was extremely heavy on the “typical YA” that I talk about so frequently.

Final Thoughts

Overall a pretty decent read for me. I was pretty balanced on the things that bugged me vs. the things that I enjoyed. It was a solid contemporary for people who don’t mind the predictability that comes along with it. The main character was not someone I could agree with or understand on a lot of levels, but it didn’t completely ruin the book for me… especially when the adorable love interest cancels out a lot of her shit. The writing style didn’t work for me, so I am kind of leery about reading the second book (which I have an ARC of), but I think it’ll be fine. Tia’s personality and feelings about relationships made this book not work as well for me. You can see that I still rated this on the higher side because to me, “the ends justified the means.” I did end up caring about the characters enough to see what happened. My feelings flip-flopped A LOT throughout the book, but it still came out as a cute contemporary romance that many people will enjoy.

 

Related Posts