Meant to Be by Lauren MorrillPublication Date: November 13, 2012
Page Count: 304
Format: Hardcover
Published by: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Source: Borrowed from library
Synopsis From Goodreads:
Meant to be or not meant to be . . . that is the question.
It's one thing to fall head over heels into a puddle of hazelnut coffee, and quite another to fall for the—gasp—wrong guy. Straight-A junior Julia may be accident prone, but she's queen of following rules and being prepared. That's why she keeps a pencil sharpener in her purse and a pocket Shakespeare in her, well, pocket. And that's also why she's chosen Mark Bixford, her childhood crush, as her MTB ("meant to be").
But this spring break, Julia's rules are about to get defenestrated (SAT word: to be thrown from a window) when she's partnered with her personal nemesis, class-clown Jason, on a school trip to London. After one wild party, Julia starts receiving romantic texts . . . from an unknown number! Jason promises to help discover the identity of her mysterious new suitor if she agrees to break a few rules along the way. And thus begins a wild goose chase through London, leading Julia closer and closer to the biggest surprise of all: true love.
Because sometimes the things you least expect are the most meant to be.
Meant To Be was one of my most anticipated reads this year. I thought I would like it a lot more than I did. I love contemporary stories, and this sounded like it would be a cute and fun teen romance. I have now discovered that those 5 star reviews I kept seeing all over the blogosphere were very misleading. I really didn't enjoy this book very much.
The biggest problem I had was that I didn't connect with any of the characters. I couldn't relate to them at all, so it was very difficult to care about what happened to them. I found Julia to be shallow and annoying, especially when she was trying to impress me with her bookish knowledge. Jason was very childish, and his lame attempts for attention really grated on me. I couldn't make sense of his hot and cold attitude towards Julia. I never bought into any of the relationship stuff. None of the potential pairings interested me or made any sense.
I had a difficult time getting into the story because the book didn't have a good flow to it. There were a lot of unnecessary descriptions that didn't add anything to the storyline. And the overall silliness of running all over London looking for MTB was ridiculous. Not to mention that the storyline seemed forced and contrived. I never felt anything while reading this book - no feelings equals a blah reading experience for me.
Meant To Be wasn't completely terrible. There were times that I almost enjoyed reading it. The writing was just okay for me, and I felt that it was a bit clunky at times. I really hate that I didn't enjoy this book more, and I hate that it took me two weeks to get through it. I kept waiting for it to get better, but it never did. This is definitely not a book that I would recommend to anyone. After looking forward to reading this book for many months, I was very disappointed with it.
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Aww, I'm sorry you were disappointed with Meant to Be. Although it wasn't as good as I was hoping it to be, I did still enjoy the book. I agree, though, I wasn't particularly in love with any of the characters.
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