99 Days (99 Days Series, #1)

by Katie Cotugno

[bookishzelda]

99 Days is one of those books that you can read through pretty rapidly. I think the character interactions are what makes it so intriguing. It involves some very messy relationships though.

I liked Molly from the get go. It really made me ache for her the way people treated her. There are a bunch of different sayings about stones that could easily apply. I wanted to crawl into the book and yell at those girls for being immature twits and good people make mistakes. That none of this will matter in the long run of life. Then punch them out….well I guess that last part would make me immature. The point being, I really felt for Molly. I think it’s sad she doesn’t stand up for herself because she feels she deserves it and those people are not the ones that should be judging her. It’s really between Patrick and her. Although Molly ends up making some poor decisions at points, I was still rooting for her happy ending.

I loved Gabe. I was really rooting for him and Molly to make it. He was so sweet and seemed to really care about her.

I didn’t like Patrick in the past or present. I could see how him and Molly were more like young puppy love. He was very selfish and it really bothered me. I really wanted him to go find something else to do. I could see how they might have residual feelings towards one another both bad and good. When Molly ran off, they didn’t really get to have the closure they needed.

There are a lot of things in this book I could relate to unfortunately and one of them is the pushing people away and running off. So I get the whole Molly and Imogen dynamic and why she could be mad. I’ve had friends be mad when I tried to find my way back after disappearing on them too. Imogen is a cool girl though and I like how she tells things to Molly straight.

I liked how the book is divided into each chapter being a day. There are 99 days until Molly leaves for college. Which gives the books setting of the entire summer. I enjoyed the plot even though parts of it were hard at times. I think I would get frustrated with all the characters at points. I liked how it portrayed multiple sides the issues though. No one is really innocent but you really get to see how lopsided the blame can be. I liked the way the ending left it, although part of me would like to see what Molly’s up to maybe even a year later. After she has been away at Boston. After everyone kind of gets away.

I really enjoyed 99 Days. This is always a tough topic to tackle and I think Katie Cotugno was able to capture many different angles. I thought it was well written and definitely sucks you in.