About this book:
“When seventeen-year-old Callie Christianson answers the doorbell, she never expects to find her ex-best friend, Egan Pasko, there with flowers. Their childhood friendship ended their freshman year when he shut her in a locker and walked away. But now he’s sorry and he’d like to take her on twenty-one dates to prove it. It’s an experiment, he says, to see if two people who used to be “just friends” can fall in love. And, of course, they’ll record the whole thing and put it online to see how many views they can wrangle out of it.
Callie’s ready to tell him to get lost. Until she realizes Egan’s crazy, stupid idea could help her gain the followers she needs to earn the mentorship opportunity that will launch her baking career. So the dates begin. And, even though nothing goes according to Callie’s plan, all the time spent with Egan is reminding her of everything she used to love about him.
The only problem is their viewers aren’t falling in love with her. The haters come out in droves to tell her exactly how terrible they think she is. The only thing keeping Callie in the experiment is Egan’s hints that he might be starting to fall for her. Except she can’t be sure he’s not playing it up for the sake of the camera.
Then Egan shares the most vulnerable parts of Callie’s life story online without her permission, stunning her into a shame spiral and leaving her to fend for herself in the comments. With their friendship once again at stake, will Callie walk away for good? Or is her heart too involved to let Egan go?”
Series: A stand-alone novel.
Spiritual Content- A Scripture is referenced (but not called a Scripture); Thanking God (once); ’H’s are capital when referring to God; Callie says once that God never rejected her (unlike her biological parents); Callie receives one comment that says she’s too “Jesus-y” (adding that the commentor has decided Callie uses her faith as an excuse to hate other people) & anther comment saying she’s not a real Christian (because if she was, she would recite more Bible verses on camera); Mentions of God; Mentions of churches & church going; A few mentions of praying & blessings over food; A few mentions of Vacation Bible School; A couple mentions of Bible studies; A couple mentions of Easter; A mention of the Garden of Eden;
*Note: Callie thinks that a food truck festival is the closest she’ll get to heaven “this side of eternity”; A group of teen girls say they “definitely” don’t go to church; A couple mentions of Santa Claus; A mention of a troll comment to Callie about wishing God would smite her because she’s “taking oxygen from people who need it more”; A mention of Egan crossing his fingers to ward Callie off “like [she was] an evil spirit” whenever anyone mentioned about them being a couple; A mention of Medusa; A mention of the Grim Reaper; A mention of aliens.
Negative Content- Minor cussing including: a ‘freaking’, a ‘heck’, a ‘suck it up’, a ‘what the heck’, two ‘oh my gosh’s, two forms of ‘screwed up’, two ‘shut up’s, two ‘sucked’s, three ‘gosh’s, four forms of ‘crap’, seven forms of ‘ticked’, ten ‘idiot’s, seventeen forms of ‘dumb’, and thirty-one ‘stupid’s; A few mentions of curses (by Callie, said, not written); Sarcasm & Eye rolling; Callie lies a few times (to either keep from explaining a long story to her grandparents or to not share her feelings); Injuries, Pain, Blood/Bleeding, Passing out, & Throwing up (up to semi-detailed); Finding a pet who has passed away (due to old age) & grief (*Spoilers* Callie with her cat and she sobs; Egan buries the cat in the backyard for Callie *End of Spoilers*); When Callie is under scrutiny from a crowd, she wishes she was dead; Egan runs from security at an event (after getting on stage when he isn’t supposed to); Egan and his brother have a physical fight; After disappointing news, Callie feels like she isn’t wanted and has been abandoned; Mentions of deaths, illnesses, & grief (including for a grandfather); Mentions of deaths of pets (both a dog and a cat); Mentions of a prank of someone being locked in their locker; Mentions of injuries, pain, blood/bleeding, & someone passing out after seeing blood; Mentions of a mom diagnosis with Multiple Sclerosis & her symptoms (border-line barely-above-not-detailed // semi-detailed); Mentions of poison; Mentions of throwing up; Mentions of lies, lying, & liars; Mentions of hatred; Mentions of bullies, trolls, & harassing comments; A few mentions of lottery tickets; A couple mentions of a dare to deface a police car; A couple mentions of a divorce; A couple mentions of rumors; A couple mentions of alcohol & drinking; A couple mentions of a tattoo; A couple mentions of a cat being abandoned; A mention of true crime documentaries; A mention of a young boy almost strangling a baby chick; A mention of poop;
*Note: A few implications that Callie has OCD; Callie receives mean and hateful comments online from trolls calling her “so freaking dumb”, picking apart her physical appearance and clothing choices, assumptions about her parents not wanting her and saying they would have dumped her off a bridge, saying her mom should have had an abortion, thinking she has an eating disorder, that her cat would rather eat rat poison than with be her, & making assumptions about her life (some of these bother her and others do not); Callie was adopted by her grandparents and has lived with them most of her life (*Spoilers* Due to her parents divorcing when she was little; Callie’s biological mother died a while ago; Her father lives in another state and they do not keep in touch; They have an awkward conversation where he also talks about getting plastic surgery for her ears and chest (her father is a jerk (Callie’s words) and it makes her cry later) *End of Spoilers*); Egan refers to Callie’s biological father as her “real” one; Callie wonders at one point if something is wrong with her and that’s why her parents gave her up; References to pop culture & movies (Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Ratatouille, Star Wars, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, & Mary Poppins); Mentions of brand names, items, stores, & restaurants (Moon Pies, Twinkies, Snickers, Oreos, Pop-Tarts, Fruit Loop, Laffy Taffy, Sour Patch Kids, Junior Mints, Reese’s cups, Cheetos, Easy Mac, Gatorade, Sprite, Dr. Pepper, Coke, Splenda, Post-it notes, Sharpie, Band-Aid, KitchenAid mixer, Tupperware, Day-Glo, Nike, Williams-Sonoma, Museum of Modern Art, Outback Steakhouse, Domino’s, & Dairy Queen); Mentions of fictional characters (Nancy Drew, Babe, Harry Potter characters, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Mickey Mouse, Muppets, The Baby-sitters Club characters, & Dumbo); Mentions of Julia Child; A few mentions of social media platforms & websites (Google & YouTube); A couple mentions of EPSN & Food Network; A couple mentions of TV shows & movies (The Bachelor, Braveheart); A couple mentions of Netflix; A couple mentions of therapists & their advice (Callie’s grandma is a counselor); A mention of abortion (regarding a hateful comment Callie receives that says her mother should have had an abortion instead of giving birth to her); A mention of an eating disorder (from a hateful comment); A mention of zombies; A mention of WWE; A mention of AARP; A mention of a sports team (Denver Broncos); A mention of body odor.
Sexual Content- Four forehead/hair kisses, an ear kiss, two cheek kisses, two almost kisses (semi-detailed), a barely-above-not-detailed kiss, and two semi-detailed kisses; Wanting to kiss, Staring at lips, & Remembering an almost kiss (barely-above-not-detailed); Touches, Embraces, Snuggling, Dancing, Hand holding, Flutters, Shivers, Warmth, Nearness, & Smelling (up to semi-detailed); Winks & Blushes; Noticing & Staring (including noticing his muscles, barely-above-not-detailed); A college-age guy hits on Callie, but backs off when she says she’s seventeen; Callie’s grandmother is concerned she’s involved in something “illicit” (but is not); When Callie and Egan are dancing, an instruction has them step back from each other because it’s not prom and they aren’t “going to a hotel afterwards”; Two ‘hot’s; All about & many mentions of dates, dating, crushes, boyfriends/girlfriend, exes, & breakups; Mentions of kisses & kissing; Mentions of jealousy & girls getting in Egan’s personal space and touching his arms; Mentions of cute guys; Mentions of falling in love; A couple mentions of making out; A couple mentions of butterflies; A mention of voyeurs that put nanny cams in other people’s rooms; A mention of a guy trying to look down a girl’s shirt; A mention of a couple kissing; A mention of a guy kissing his biceps; Some love, falling in love, & the emotions;
*Note: Mentions of cup sizes & plastic surgery (*Spoiler* When Callie is talking to her biological father for the first time in ten years, he (a plastic surgeon) comments about adding “a couple cup sizes” for her in a few years because “if genetics are to be trusted” she’s going to need it *End of Spoiler*); When going to a ballroom dance lesson, Callie comments to Egan that she wasn’t told to wear a “rhinestone bikini” and he says it’s a bummer that she doesn’t have one (which she calls him out on what that’s supposed to mean, but he apologizes for it being inappropriate and that he said it before he realized how it sounded); A few mentions of butting into conversations & wiggling a butt; A mention of Callie receiving help from Egan’s mom about what bra size she needed years prior; A mention of abs; A mention of testosterone.
-Callie Christianson, age 17
1st person P.O.V. of Callie
292 pages
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Pre Teens-
New Teens-
Early High School Teens-
Older High School Teens-
My personal Rating-
Well, this was a fun summer YA story!
When we (rather quickly) find out what Egan did to Callie, I was fully on her side and grabbing my pitchfork to chase after him in her honor. At first, Callie was a little…standoffish in a way (which made sense because of what he did), but I will note that Callie is denser than the pink lemonade pound cake she makes at times. But yet, I still enjoyed the book. I think some won’t like her or Egan and while I understand and had a few moments of going “he’s an idiot” (okay, more than a few because he was more pushy than I liked), I did like their growth and how apologetic Egan was about the past (and current) mistakes.
I do wish there would have been more Christian content in this book (especially wishing there a scene of Callie’s grandmother encouraging her about praying about her troubles because there was a moment that would have fit in perfectly), but if you view it as a Clean Fiction or standard YA book, it was very clean and had no questionable content—something that is hard to find in the general market for teens nowadays.
As a YouTuber who is has major safety awareness habits, I did cringe at Egan filming outside of Callie’s house and live streaming one of their dates (which he said he wouldn’t prior because of privacy reasons). Along with last names possibly being used and them being recognized in their town, I was concerned for their privacy and safety. There’s crazy people out there on there! But it’s a fictional book so I was trying not to think about it—but just don’t do what they do, okay? 😅
Overall this was pretty cute and I would read more by this author. This book could be a fun, summery read for girls 14/15+ that want a clean romance with some humor.
See y’all on Friday with a new review!
*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
