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HowdyYAL

Howdy YAL!

I used to be the blogger called YAL Book Briefs, but I grew bored of the handle and changed my name to Howdy YAL. I also respond to MJ. I like to read, write, eat truffles, and watch bad Lifetime movies. 

Another Nauseating NA Book

Be With Me - J. Lynn

I officially give up on Jennifer L Armentrout (alias J Lynn) when it comes to New Adult thanks to Be With Me.

 

This has to be one of the blandest, most contrived NA books I’ve read in awhile.

In general, I find NA books to be bland.  I read them though out of some weird hope that one day one will break out from the norm of the abusive cute coed and BMOC and wow me.

 

It has not happened yet.

 

Jennifer L Armentrout is a writer who could’ve made an impact on NA.  I enjoy her early Lux novels and she has some interesting ideas, but her NA books really are lackluster and average to me.  Really, Wait for You is really a derivative of Tamara Webber’s Easy, except that book written better and the character seemed realistic (despite Lucas’s over dramatic backstory).  Frigid, was completely pointless.  Sure, it had a bit more of a plot than Wait for You, but at least Cam and Avery’s relationship was developed unlike Kyler and Sydney’s.

 

I really didn’t really have a lot of hope for Be With Me, but I did think that maybe, just maybe, Armentrout’s third NA book might be better than the last two.

It was worst.

 

The leads are insipid.

 

There’s Teresa who is really just your standard NA girl.  Super skinny, despite eating junk all day, who seems to attract every guy on campus.  Especially the BMOC who just can’t be with her because her past.  Well, in this case both of their past.  Rolls freaking eyes.

 

I really, really, couldn’t stand our leading man in this one.  The only thing Jase had going for him was his secret, which really had no role whatsoever in this story except for making him broody.

 

Tess’s backstory was a bore too.  The way it as played out was over dramatic and contrived that…well,General Hospital was more realistic.

 

That big tragedy on campus had me seething on so many levels.  For one thing, it wasn’t realistic.  I’ve watched enough Sherlock and CSI  to know that cops aren’t that daff.  Okay, more CSI  on that statement since Sherlock would probably say that cops can be idiots.  But still, it was sort of obvious that that character’s fate wasn’t as it seemed.  And based on the circumstances, you’d think the police would conduct a proper investigation.

 

But you know what Stephenie Meyer.  It’s fiction.

 

Oh, fuck that.

 

To be honest, that whole plot point bothered me on so many levels because it involved sensitive subject matter.  Finding out your roommate “hung” herself, does not mean start boinking the object of your lust especially in your brother’s apartment.

Really?  Really?

 

That disgusting tidbit aside, what really bothered me about this book was how copy/paste it felt.  A lot of these scenes seemed fairly repetitive from Armentrout’s other New Adult and Adult books.  I honestly skim through them because I already know what they’re going to say and they bore me.

 

Same with the courtship.  You know the characters aren’t going to get together for a hundred or some odd pages even though they are practically together (in an Armentrout book).  I get that this happens in a lot of YA and NA books, but in Armentrout’s case it’s always about ten times worse especially in the NA books.  I mean, seriously a guy brings you cupcakes every day and you don’t think he likes you…

 

I usually know that when these scenes of OMG sex is so good with him are included that they characters are going to fight and that they’ll make up sooner than later because the great sex was so good that means they were meant to be together.

That and Armentrout will throw some hasty life and death situation in front of them.

At the end of the day, I just really don’t know what to say.  This book isn’t horrific.  I’ve read worse NA books, believe it or not.  But I expect better from an author with Armentrout’s potential.  I really, just really, found this book to be cliche and full of soap opera melodrama.