The Promise Of Amazing

by Robin Constantine

"She's just a girl, Grayson. A girl who saved my life. I wanted to sweep the hair away from her face, feel her body against me, without an audience or the threat of my imminent death. Connecting with her had felt different. Real. I had to get to know her. At least I had her name. Wren Caswell. The rest would be easy. Since the night I saved him, I'd felt a magnetic pull toward Grayson so strong, it scared me. I thought it was some sort of mystical thing, that once you saved someone's life, you always had some connection. But then he'd looked at me, those bangs grazing his eyebrows, the top button of his tee casually undone, and it wasn't only his well-being I thought about"--Back cover.

When Wren inadvertently saves Grayson's life, they are compelled to shed their pasts, figure out who they are, and fall in love. The plot contains profanity and alcohol use.

• ISBN10: 0062279483
• ISBN13: 9780062279484
• Publish Date: 31 December 2013
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Out of Print: 25 July 2021
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Inc
• Imprint: HarperCollins
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 384
• Language: English
• URL: http://harpercollins.com.au/9780062279484

Reviews

[Leah]

So, this book was not amazing. The beautiful title and beautiful cover suckered me in... and it was all just a bit meh for my tastes. I'm sure I've heard good things about this book, but it just wasn't for me. I like my main characters with a teensy bit more spice. Yes, quiet is fine, but to not even stand up for yourself, when the guy you like is a douche? Wren, I was disappointed in you. And Gray was a douche. From trying to catch mini hotdogs in his mouth (AND CHOKING ON THEM!!!!!), to calling Wren "Weenie Girl" (UGH), to just general doucheness, I couldn't warm to him. Wren was WAY too good for him. He had no reason to be a jerk, rich does not equal jerk. But Gray was a jerk. Again, and again, and again; and instead of telling him exactly where to take his jerk self, Wren just forgives him all the time. Ugh. Talk about being passive.

I don't generally mind insta-love; I do prefer a slow burn, but sometimes your eyes meet across the room etc, and it's all Ted Mosby "I'm going to marry that girl", but I didn't quite understand what made Wren or Grey have that insta-love. Being saved from choking? REALLY? HOW ROMANTIC.

I kept reading, if only to find out what was worse than Grey writing term papers for money, and it was so much worse. It actually made me feel icky, and it was breaking the law, I'm sure. BUT YAY LET'S FORGET ABOUT THAT BECAUSE IT'S LURVE APPARENTLY. Wren really needed a reality check, no one would forgive what Gray did that easily.

So yeah this book annoyed me, way more than I actually thought, until I started writing. It wasn't amazing, and that makes me sad. And Gray was no love interest I was interested in.

[bumblingbookworm]

This review was originally posted on The Bumbling Bookworm

I was looking forward to this, I'd heard some decent things about it and I was enjoying it in the beginning. I mean it had everything I usually enjoy: NYC, a romance, a bad boy - what more could I want? Unfortunately, the longer I read The Promise of Amazing, the less enthusiastic I became about it.

Check out the rest of my review here!

[Amber]

I'm not going to lie to you, I went into this book knowing that I probably wouldn't like it. I had heard tales of instalove and that is never good. My instincts were correct, this wasn't a good book. Which is a shame, because I had high hopes for it before all the reviews started coming out. And the cover is awesome.

My main issue with The Promise of Amazing is the characters, and how I didn't feel connected to either of them as a result of the stupid instalove. We barely got the chance to get to know either of them before they were falling over their own feet for each other. I wanted to learn more about Wren in particular, since I feel she is the least developed out of the two.

I don't think Ms. Constantine did a good job with any of the characters, including the secondary ones like the parents and friends. I was hoping for a lot more development with them, especially Grayson's family who were dealing with some issues. Instead it was all shoved aside for Grayson and Wren's instalove. It was very disappointing.

The climax of the book also felt a little ridiculous. I can deal with holding back my disbelief usually, but this was just way too much.

The Promise of Amazing is totally cliche, and I don't think it offers anything new. I would compare it to the latest book in Katie McGarry's Pushing the Limits series, because the two are very similar in the sense that the good girl saves the bad boy from a life of crime. BECAUSE GIRLS ARE ALWAYS FLAWLESS AND SHINY AND ARE BORN TO SAVE THE DOCTOR BAD BOYS.

[KitsuneBae]

Actual Rating: 2.5 stars

This post first appeared on: Thoughts and Pens.

Belated Happy New Year!

I know it’s kind of a bad omen to start this wonderful year with a negative review but can’t help it. It’s already past the deadline. xD The New Year Celebration really got to me. But anyway, let’s proceed…

The first thought that came to mind after reading this book was, “Contemporaries really hate me.” I gave this book my all but it was also determined to discourage me from taking things to a new level. The Promise of Amazing has a cute premise. Wren Caswell is studying at Sacred Hearts, a school exclusive for female students only. Unlike other YA heroines, Wren’s beautiful, ambitious, academically competitive and certainly knew how to bait a guy she likes. Our hero, Grayson shares the same traits so when their paths crossed, it was attraction at first sight.

Okay. So stories like this have already saturated the YA contemporary market but I still gave it a go because I was looking for a break from reading fantasies and dystopias. The Promise of Amazing started strong. The characters immediately stood out to me. Wren is a character that I like to identify myself with. She’s not only beautiful but she’s also intelligent, focused and confident without becoming the stereotype mean girl at school. As for Grayson, he’s definitely a bad boy but it wasn’t clear at first because he was this gorgeous, happy go lucky charmer. As I went deeper into the story, I found myself gradually disengaging from them. Wren suddenly became this sexually hungry teenager scheming and bidding her time to lure Grayson into her, uhm, bed. And that’s not the worst; she also found herself getting aroused by Luke’s—Gray’s asshole of a friend—kisses. Seriously? Apart from a few short meetings, she really didn’t know the guy and she was going out with Gray for crying out loud. Speaking of Gray, he’s one of the douchiest male leads who graced the YA lit. I was absolutely rooting for him because I love bad boys and well, I was looking forward on how Constantine will redeem his character. The author attempted though but it wasn’t enough. It felt forced and rushed.

After the characters disappointed me, I thought the plot–albeit predictable–would compensate for my annoyance. But nope. It just exacerbated the negative feelings I have for this book. A lot of the things that occurred in The Promise of Amazing hardly made sense at all. What exactly are the motivations of these characters to make them behave like this and like that? What is really the whole point of the story aside from that horrible instalove? It was like the author was just making things up along the way.

Only the dynamic familial relationship saved this book from sleeping on my 1 star shelf. The bond of Wren’s family and of Grayson’s represented realism mirroring that of today’s families. But still it was inadequate for this book to merit a 3 star rating. The ending didn’t help either to sway my decision.

In an overall assessment, I didn’t hate The Promise of Amazing. At some point, I did enjoy the banter between Wren and Gray but the author could have done a way way better job than this.

***An ARC of this book was freely provided by the publisher via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, Balzer and Bray***

[Ashley]

Nose Graze — Young Adult book reviews

I am absolutely drowning in indecision. Did I like The Promise of Amazing? Was it only okay? UGH! I don't know!!

I started out on excellent terms with The Promise of Amazing. I thought Wren was funny, had a great personality, and I could completely relate to her.

The NHS evaluation made [being quiet] sound like a character flaw. Something I could improve. That's just not how it worked.

YES YES YES! Agreed! Some people just aren't loud and chatty. Some people, like myself, are more quiet and reserved. That doesn't mean we're bad students, or that there's something wrong with us, or that there's "room for improvement". We're just quiet. We can still do good work and get good grades. SHEESH! I remember tons of parent-teacher conferences where the teachers would say, "Ashley is a good student, but she could speak up more in class." UGH! LEAVE ME ALONE!

So in that sense, I completely and totally clicked with Wren. She was the quiet girl, and so was I! I loved that.

Then in steps Grayson. He was also a great character. He was definitely the more flawed one. He had a dark and sketchy past that he was trying to overcome, but it kept pulling him down. I like how his flaws made him seem real, and how he really worked to change and become a better person.

So why not a higher rating? I think there are two main reasons for this. First, I think the book fizzled out a little towards the end. At first I really liked Wren and Grayson's relationship, but I didn't keep loving it. I wanted to see more dates and intimate moments. I think there was too much constant drama surrounding their relationship. There was always an obstacle or someone trying to sabotage what they had. They only actually went on one *proper* date; the rest was just sending texts, or seeing each other in random places. I wanted more of an intimate boyfriend/girlfriend book, and I didn't feel like this one had enough of the actual dating/relationship side.

You could also say that the book was a little insta-lovey as a result of all that. As I said, they only went on one real date, and yet they eventually throw around the word love. Is it really love? I don't think so. The insta-love didn't bother me as much as it has in other books, but it was still there.. a little bit.

And secondly, I was a little disappointed by the ending. The author spent the whole book building up this evil douchebag of an antagonist. But....

At the end, I felt like he didn't get what he deserved. As Grayson put it:

After all the crap he'd pulled, he still got what he'd wanted the most. Where was his karmic payback?

I could not agree with this more. Luke was a huge dickwad, but he got out totally unscathed. He did horrible things and yet he still got into his college of choice and totally got off completely clean. What the hell? I wanted him to crash and burn.. hard. But the lack of payback made the ending seem a bit anti-climactic. I wanted freaking REVENGE!



Overall, The Promise of Amazing started out strong, with an interesting main character and a few funny lines. But towards the end I wasn't as hooked. I wasn't devouring it and I actually did find myself skimming a little. The Promise of Amazing wasn't quite amazing; I'd say it was pretty good.