Since Forever Ago

by Olivia Besse-Whitaker

[Jack]

Obtained from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I really wanted to like this book. The premise sounded interesting and good. Unfortunately the book did not live up to my expectations.

While it was really nice to get the guys perspective of the story, and what he was thinking there was no clear definition of when his POV started. Far too often we got Max's thoughts and feelings interjected into the story when he was in a scene with Riley. Which made it really confusing. Often times I had no idea who was thinking what.

And I have never seen characters act so immaturely or stupid. Riley lacks complete common sense, and spends much of the novel drunk.

I know the author explains on Goodreads that the reason her characters acted this way because they “define a large proportion of the current 20-something population, and I wanted the characters in my book to portray what new adults are actually like.” I have to disagree, I have never seen college kids act as immaturely and whiney as these ones did, especially Riley. Yes there were break ups and fights and drinking, but to whine about it like a highschooler? No…I feel like if this book had been set in a high school it would have been much more believable.

While there wasn’t really any insta love, because Max has been in love with Riley since they were little kids. Riley hasn’t noticed until they have a night of drunken sex. This was after a lot of build up in which Max gives Riley HORRIBLE dating advice, which she follows. She had been with the same guy for 6 years, so she doesn’t have a lot of dating experience. STILL! No excuse to follow the obviously extremely stupid advice that Max gave her. Really showed Riley’s immaturity and lack of common sense.

There was a lot of melodrama, and miscommunication and annoying things that happened in this book. There was a lot of communication issues and silly stupid misunderstandings between Riley and Max. If they thought things through instead of flying off the handle they wouldn’t have had to go through so much trouble.


But there were also a lot of funny moments in the novel too, things that had me actually laughing out loud. Which is a major plus because I find it hard to actually really laugh at books.

Overall this book was a major let down. I wanted to like it, it had its funny and cute moments, but most of the time I wanted to bash some common sense into Riley’s head.